Do You Love Yourself?

If you don't love and respect yourself, you are setting yourself up for heart ache, being used, and thoughts of self judgement.  Self love is not selfish.  Self love is fundamental to psychological well being.  It is the foundation of a loving heart.  If you do not love yourself, you will have a skewed vision of love, often seeking to fill the void you feel with someone else.


Don't confuse the desire to share your time and love with another, with the need to complete yourself or feel whole. When people convince themselves that they are incomplete with out being with another person they are deluding themselves into thinking that somehow another person can make them feel whole. No one can make you feel happy or whole. These are feelings that can only come from within your own heart. 


Sure, a new love will provide feelings of elation and a temporary feeling of fulfillment, but as the newness wears off in the relationship, so will the feeling of completeness, unless you have learned to love yourself. The void you may feel in your heart is because you haven't embraced your own perfection. LOVE YOURSELF FIRST, and then you will be offering a complete person with a whole heart to the relationship.


It can be challenging to overcome a lifetime of self judgement.  Be gentle with yourself.  I use a positive affirmation every morning to remind myself that, "I AM healthy, happy and whole."  Whenever I feel self doubt, I repeat this phrase a few times.  It may sound like it won't make a difference, but I assure you that it will.  Loving yourself first is a fundamental step to being happy.  


 Namaste-


 Laura Barrette Shannon 

Reclaiming Self Esteem

HAVING self esteem stems from loving who you are. If you don't love yourself, your heart is not complete. Those without self love often search for someone else to fill the empty void within their heart. Because they are low in self esteem, they have lower standards of who they date and who they associate with as friends. Their lack of self worth drives them to be with people who support their lack of self respect, often getting involved with abusive individuals. If you are having trouble loving and respecting yourself, you must take action to be the kind of person who you will be happy to be.

Begin by writing down all the qualities that you admire in other people. Forget about the physical qualities, as they are not important in this exercise. Really search your soul to find what personality traits you would like to display to the world. Some qualities that raise self esteem are compassion, integrity, honesty, hard working, and responsible. Review your list, and then make an agreement with yourself that you will take action to be the kind of person you admire. Realize that the patterns of low self esteem have arisen because of you have given your personal power away by disrespecting who you are. You are worthy of your love and respect as much as anyone. Your unique qualities are what makes you special. Take total responsibility for how you interact with others, and how you respond to life situations. Begin to reclaim your personal power by taking control of how you respond to life. As you begin responding with more patience, integrity, and compassion you will begin to feel good about yourself. 

Remember, 

It does not matter who you were yesterday, 

only who you are from this moment forward. 

Laura Barrette Shannon

author of Be Happy Now book