10 May Want to know how to increase self-love? Try these science-based strategies.
Via Psychology Today by Tchiki Davis
Self-love is sometimes thought to be an appreciation for one’s own worth or value. The words “self-love” are not generally used in psychology research. Instead, research is conducted on topics like self-worth, self-esteem , or self-compassion —topics closely related to self-love.
Positive feelings towards the self are thought to be a crucial aspect of well-being. For example, self-esteem contributes to positive feelings and more initiative (Crocker, & Knight, 2005). Luckily, there a number of ways to boost self-love. By using these strategies, hopefully, we can feel better about our personality, skills, and appearance. Here are some self-love tips:
1. Be kind to yourself. When we judge and criticize ourselves, we can end up feeling even worse about ourselves. We’re being bullies. That’s why when trying to develop self-love, it’s important to be nice to ourselves. We could start by writing ourselves a self-compassionate letter —a letter where we talk to ourselves gently and tell ourselves all the nice things we want to hear.
2. Own your power. If we feel like we have little control or power over our lives, we can start to feel helpless and hopeless. Even though we don’t have control over everything, if we look, we can find ways to own our own power. For example, we might take responsibility for keeping our room clean or our bed made. We might decide to practice random acts of kindness . Or we might start working towards building a new skill that will help us get a better job. We are not entirely powerless, and we show ourselves self-love by taking back control of our lives.
3. Try self-love meditation. Guided self-love meditation may help us work on the parts of our minds that can be destructive or self-loathing. Basically, we take time to sit quietly and think positive thoughts about ourselves and remind ourselves that we are indeed worthy of our own love…
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