I would like to think I'm a very caring person. I genuinely love people and hate to see them hurt or upset ,or anything outside of Happy. As of late I am questioning if I truly love myself. HOW, does one love themselves? What does that look like? To me it seems selfish and that I would have to take time from others to do so? I don't hate me.... I just don't think about me. ?????

Someone here must love themselves, How did you start?

[amandalouise]

Originally Posted by LolaCabanna

I would like to think I'm a very caring person. I genuinely love people and hate to see them hurt or upset ,or anything outside of Happy. As of late I am questioning if I truly love myself. HOW, does one love themselves? What does that look like? To me it seems selfish and that I would have to take time from others to do so? I don't hate me.... I just don't think about me. ?????

Someone here must love themselves, How did you start?

loving one self is ...

doing nice things for yourself for example I show my love for myself by...

leaving work at work so that I can relax and have sometime to focus on what I need and want for myself and my family.

I treat myself to little things like one day I took myself and my wife out to breakfast just because thats what I felt I needed at that moment.

I exercise and eat a good balanced diet.

I meditate for my own mental wellbeing

I take my medications every day

I pay attention and attend to my bodies hygienic needs like bathing/showering every day, brushing my teeth, combing my hair....

I take time every day to find one thing about myself that I like. Today I like how my nail polish looks on my toes. it really "dresses up" my feet which I normally dont think my feet are very nice looking. I like how my body felt last night after a long soak in the tub with scented oils...

[Miswimmy1]

i think its a fine line between arrogance and acceptance, loving urself. I think that truly loving urself is just accepting urself as you are, appreciating ur situation for what it is, and being content with urself. i dont think loving urself looks like how loving someone else, you know. its not praising urself or going around say how great you are. its more quiet love... so taking care of ur needs, being healthy (mentally and physically), etc.

It took me over 4 decades, but I finally did reach at least a little bit of self-love, and I've been working on it ever since. I think it has to do with accepting yourself, warts and all. You don't have to be perfect in order to love yourself. Do other people have to be perfect for you to love them? Can you love them in spite of their flaws? Then the same goes for YOU. Accept who you are, but never stop trying to improve. This is key for me. I screw up regularly, and I always will. But at least I keep trying. I'm not a rotten person, just a flawed one.

I genuinely love people and hate to see them hurt or upset ,or anything outside of Happy.

This is a wonderful quality, so just apply it to yourself. Try not to do things that hurt you or upset you. Take care of yourself. Do the best you can, and forgive yourself when you mess up. And if you start to feel like you don't deserve to be cared for and happy (not suggesting this is the case for you, but it was a problem for me) then that's something you need to work on. Therapy is good for this

I think that the fact you're looking at this means you're ready to start working on it. And that's great! I hope this post makes sense ... it's a really deep question and not an easy thing to do.

[Sunne]

I'm in the process of learning this.

What helps me is mindfulness. Loving kindness meditations. Also being reminded by T to be kind to myself. Learning that I deserve to like myself and celebrate who I am. As we all do.

I think loving yourself is the opposite of selfish (if it's in an accepting, real way... not a narcissistic way). I really believe as you become more happy with who you are, you are a better person to be around and know. You can give more, because you are happier and more loving in general.

[Anne2.0]

That is such an interesting question, whether one loves oneself or how you love yourself or how you even know you love yourself.

I find other people really easy to love IRL (I have trouble, online, finding ways to connect to people in the same ways I do IRL, but this board is the limit of me attempting online connections).

Right now I think that loving myself means that I don't beat up on myself anymore, that I accept myself, and that I don't think of myself as some kind of terrible person. I don't feel like I'm much along the pathway of loving myself as much as no longer hating myself.

But I have found that I am more loving towards others as I am less self loathing of myself, that as I accept myself I also accept others better. So for me, being more loving towards myself has had positive effects on how I feel about others, not negative.

[healed84]

I wonder if loving ourselves look different from person to person and varies in different stages of our lives. I think that loving myself right now means accepting myself for where I am right now. Being okay that I am not yet where I am. I think eventually it will mean accepting the parts of me that may go against what other people think is right or wrong.

Maybe for you Lola.. It may seem selfish, but really take time for yourself. you take care of a lot of people.. Now you need to take care of yourself. Take time out of the week for yourself, do stuff you enjoy.. excersize, do things you like to do. Do what brings joy to your life. (((hugs)))

[Chopin99]

I tell people that before they can truly love others, they must love themselves. I think Healed is right in that loving oneself looks different for everybody. T has identified a pattern with me in that my love can be selfish, i.e. what can I get out of the relationship. I think that is true to some extent and is due to what I witnessed growing up (my mom using me to get her needs met), so I grew to learn people love others to get their own needs met.

I know I'm not nearly as bad about that as I used to be, but T says it will take time. It took me many years to learn to be that way, it will take time for me to unlearn. However, she sees the fact that I am truly motivated to change as a good sign.

I realized today in session that I really don't love myself yet at all. So, maybe just don't listen to me.

[autotelica]

For me, I hate myself whenever I make mistakes or embarrass myself. I hate myself when I *should* feel a certain way, and I'm not feeling it.

So I guess if I were going to go about loving myself more, I would try to have compassion for myself. If I met someone with my problems (and my good points), would I hate them? Probably not. I would probably say, "She's kind of a weirdo, but she tries her best and deep down is a nice person."

It's hard for me to advise myself to "be kind" to myself. It seems to me I do this anyway, without calling it "kindness". If I want something, I get it. If I want to do something, I do it. I don't intentionally inject myself into unpleasantness just because, and I don't go out of my way to put other's needs before mine. So for me, I don't think the prescription is doing nice things for myself. I'm already pretty selfish.

[susan900]

Originally Posted by Chopin99

I tell people that before they can truly love others, they must love themselves. I think Healed is right in that loving oneself looks different for everybody. T has identified a pattern with me in that my love can be selfish, i.e. what can I get out of the relationship. I think that is true to some extent and is due to what I witnessed growing up (my mom using me to get her needs met), so I grew to learn people love others to get their own needs met.

I know I'm not nearly as bad about that as I used to be, but T says it will take time. It took me many years to learn to be that way, it will take time for me to unlearn. However, she sees the fact that I am truly motivated to change as a good sign.

I realized today in session that I really don't love myself yet at all. So, maybe just don't listen to me.

That is so true,"you can't love others unless you love yourself" I think its not selfish to love yourself. Its about accepting yourself as you are, while you are trying to improve your life.

I have not found it easy to love myself, as I have always been aware of the people who reject me, and this used to make me feel.. "what is wrong with me?" Also my husband tells me to stop comparing myself to others. Now, I try to think, I can accept myself, as God accepts me as I am.

[stopdog]

I think I like myself. I enjoy my own sense of humor, I like being alone with me. I try to make the best decisions for myself and others with the info I have at hand. I don't know how that happens. I have more problems in dealing with other people and knowing what to do with them. Oddly enough that therapist thinks I am too perfectionistic and that I beat myself up.

[rainbow_rose]

i really have no clue ...

Originally Posted by LolaCabanna

I would like to think I'm a very caring person. I genuinely love people and hate to see them hurt or upset ,or anything outside of Happy. As of late I am questioning if I truly love myself. HOW, does one love themselves? What does that look like? To me it seems selfish and that I would have to take time from others to do so? I don't hate me.... I just don't think about me. ?????

Someone here must love themselves, How did you start?

Hi Lola,
This is a great thread. I too struggle with this.
You say you are kind and caring and love people, well if you met someone else with these wonderful qualities, wouldn't you appreciate them and accept them? Of course, so why not do the same for yourself?
Instead of beating yourself up about things, think of all your wonderful qualities instead...Its not being selfish, its called taking care of yourself
I have started to do some work on this, T reccommended I buy myself something nice- at first I was thinking whooaawww, this woman is crazy because I always felt guilty about spending money on myself because I used to spend all my money on my partner. But now it feels good to be kind to myself. I have started to do what I want to do instead of what others expect and want me to do and the relief of trying to please others is gone.
Lola, you have to be kind to yourself and look after you because no one else will.
People close to you might not like it at first but eventually they will see how happy you are which will eventually benefit them too. If you are happy the world smiles too.
Good luck and remember you are a lovely person and deserve to be happy

I think we have to find out who WE are before we can love/like ourselves. When we wear the mask we grew up with we really don't know who we are. We are so afraid to ask that question of ourselves for fear of what we might find. There are parts of ourselves that isn't all good &caring. There are times we don't like or particularly care about someone but we're afraid to look at that part of ourselves we limp along trying to be 100% good. And that's not possible but until we're willing to look at our shadow side we can only know half of who we are and in denying the other half we are starting from a place of self rejection. To love ourself we must love who we don't want to be too

[Brightheart]

I think it comes back to self-acceptance, self-care, and self-compassion. You treat yourself with kindness, understanding, and respect. You try to be gentle with yourself when you fall and you encourage yourself to stand up once again. You listen to your feelings, you comfort yourself during times of upset. You stand by yourself with care and support.

[sittingatwatersedge]

Originally Posted by Brightheart

I think it comes back to self-acceptance, self-care, and self-compassion. You treat yourself with kindness, understanding, and respect. You try to be gentle with yourself when you fall and you encourage yourself to stand up once again. You listen to your feelings, you comfort yourself during times of upset. You stand by yourself with care and support.

Brightheart: I agree with you but it seems just impossible to do.

Originally Posted by Brightheart

I think it comes back to self-acceptance, self-care, and self-compassion. You treat yourself with kindness, understanding, and respect. You try to be gentle with yourself when you fall and you encourage yourself to stand up once again. You listen to your feelings, you comfort yourself during times of upset. You stand by yourself with care and support.

This , I agree this.... but how? Is how the magic question?

[mcl6136]

Lately, I have been watching myself with others and trying to be half as nice to myself as I am to others.

At my current level of shame, self-loathing and self disregard, this feels like full-on pampering!

Originally Posted by mcl6136

Lately, I have been watching myself with others and trying to be half as nice to myself as I am to others.

To me this comes off as feeling selfish.

[unaluna]

I think I treat myself just as my mother did: you are too much trouble, you can do without me doing this for you, you are just too much trouble. Any little tiny thing would be HUGE.

Originally Posted by hankster

I think I treat myself just as my mother did: you are too much trouble, you can do without me doing this for you, you are just too much trouble. Any little tiny thing would be HUGE.

I get this.... so how do I stop it.... as I am eating my way through a bag of jawbreakers....

[unaluna]

Originally Posted by LolaCabanna

I get this.... so how do I stop it.... as I am eating my way through a bag of jawbreakers....

we're workin on it. at this point, i'm hoping it's not a race against the clock on my part.

[Brightheart]

Originally Posted by LolaCabanna

This , I agree this.... but how? Is how the magic question?

I think you start by being self-aware. Pay careful attention to your inner critic. Observe your behaviors without judging them. Remind yourself to be kind to you. How would you treat a friend? I have a lot of work to do before I can say I love myself, but I see the path now and there have been improvements.

It's possible.

From the main page. http://blogs.psychcentral.com/mindfu...lf-compassion/

Take care.

[anneo59]

Originally Posted by LolaCabanna

I would like to think I'm a very caring person. I genuinely love people and hate to see them hurt or upset ,or anything outside of Happy. As of late I am questioning if I truly love myself. HOW, does one love themselves? What does that look like? To me it seems selfish and that I would have to take time from others to do so? I don't hate me.... I just don't think about me. ?????

Someone here must love themselves, How did you start?

this one can be hard to address. I can relate. I am amazed by people who seem to be able to do this better than I. However, I've often heard that you can't truly love others if you don't love yourself, so I dunno! The best!

[anneo59]

Originally Posted by hankster

we're workin on it. at this point, i'm hoping it's not a race against the clock on my part.

know what ya mean hankster, the best