In life we will all have multiple different relationships. With our parents, with our family, with our friends, with our significant others, etc. But, in my opinion, the most important relationship we will have is one we have for our entire lives. It’s the relationship we have with ourselves.
Your relationship with yourself is literally the only relationship you will have from the start of your life to the end of your life. Other relationships will come and go, but the one with yourself doesn’t go anywhere. However, it can, and will, change throughout your life. One day you might love yourself and the next you may hate yourself. One day you might want to do a lot of things to improve yourself and the next day you might be solely focused on making others happy. I believe that making sure you are happy and healthy should be at the forefront of your mind, though. Your relationship with yourself should be the most important relationship you have in your life. In the last two years I have learned how to depend on myself and no one else for my happiness. It’s taken a long time, and a hard as hell road, to get here but I wouldn’t be as strong as I am now if I hadn’t had the struggles I’ve had. I am very grateful for everything I’ve been through though because it has made me appreciate myself, everything that I’ve been through, and my own happiness more than I thought was possible.
Why is this? Well, because if you’re not happy with yourself and if you don’t love yourself, then I can promise you that all of your other relationships will feel it and be affected by that. Not happy with how you’re performing at work? Your co-workers and boss might see the affect that thought process has on your job and it could affect the way your relationship with them is. Don’t love yourself? Your relationship with your significant other could be affected by that because if you can’t love yourself then how can you love someone else? Not happy with your everyday life so you just don’t want to go out and do anything? Your social life and potentially your home life can suffer because of that. Which is why I think having a happy and loving relationship with yourself is of utmost importance.
The way I see it is you only have one chance at life. You don’t want to waste it being sad and miserable with yourself. So how do we do that?
Enjoy Life and Think Positive Thoughts
About a year ago I noticed myself thinking more negative thoughts than I normally do. So, to see if I could fix that I tried thinking more positive thoughts. And it actually had a positive impact on the way I felt about myself and the world around me. I told myself not to sweat the small things like people cutting me off in traffic or a bad day at work, and to instead focus on what makes me happy and enjoy those things more. And in turn, I noticed my mood improve significantly.
Fake It Til You Make It
Recently, I watched Nikki Blackketter’s YouTube video “28 Things I Learned in 28 Years” and one point she made stuck out. The old saying “fake it til you make it”. And it really works. She talked about how she would throw her shoulders back and tell herself that she’s a bad b and she would find herself having the confidence she didn’t think she had to either do a public speaking event, or go on stage, or do a meet-up. And it’s true. If you trick your mind in to thinking your confident or tell yourself you’re a badass who has a handle on their life, pretty soon you’re going to notice your relationship with yourself improving and your confidence improving along with it. So put a smile on your face and eventually it will become a real one.
Surround Yourself With Positive People
If you surround yourself with people who also do not have a good relationship with themselves, you will find that you will begin to think negative thoughts about yourself as well. Instead, surround yourself with people who realize that their most important relationship is with themselves. This will help you love yourself. If you see them doing things they love, making themselves happy, improving every day to be their best self, eventually you will want to do those things for yourself, too.
Make Sure You’re Spending Alone Time With Yourself
Being around people who make you a better person definitely helps when it comes to loving yourself, but spending alone time with yourself will also help. Taking time each day to do something by yourself that you love will help your mind focus on just you. Sometimes we need that hour or two a day to reflect on what’s going on in our lives, bring the focus back to ourselves, or to just do something we love doing on our own. Spending time by ourselves really helps us get a handle on who we are, what we love, and what we want from life. Learning to depend on ourselves and no one else for happiness is a huge step in life that I feel everyone needs to take.
Date Yourself
This kind of goes hand-in-hand with spending time with yourself. But this also means going out and doing things you normally wouldn’t do if you didn’t have someone with you. Go to the movies alone, go to a restaurant alone, go shopping, binge your favorite show on Netflix, go to a bookstore or library or coffee shop and read your favorite book, or take a trip somewhere you’ve always wanted to go. Giving yourself quality “you” time is more important than making sure you have every minute of every day book with interactions with other people.
Yes, our relationships with other humans is really important, too. But, having a good, solid foundation and loving yourself will only help to improve your other relationships. You can’t be happy with others if you’re not happy with yourself first. It’s a hard thing to realize and an even harder thing to accomplish, but once you do, you’ll realize how right I am ;).
