Love yourself

This should be your highest priority, out of everything we have discussed thus far. Today we are going to do this entry differently then the rest. I challenge you to write yourself a letter. I want it to be real and show yourself love. Write the good, the bad, all of the things about you and I’ll do the same.

Dear Hope,

When I look at you what I see is someone who is afraid to fully love themself. I see someone who holds back their true nature and hides themself from the world. Someone who compares to others your accomplishments, and friends you have. I see someone who doesn’t truly value who you are, and that makes me so ridiculously sad. Ever since you were a kid you have been a theatrical clown, who loves to make others laugh. That icebreaker led you to some real connections with others, and sometimes for superficial relationships. The inner jokester in you loves to play pranks and make up stories to tease others, because you hate taking life so seriously. Yet in your adulthood it seems you can’t get serious enough. When did you lose that laughter hope? When did you allow that brilliant light to go out? I know you wanted so badly to be accepted by your family and others, and the constant rejection put chains up around your heart. I know those wounds are deep and they created this rigid perfectionist that needs to do everything the right way. But it doesn’t have to be that way anymore, you don’t have to hide away. You can come out from your safety and step into your laughter and sunshine. The world is a wonderful place full of people who will love the person you are. It will help you blossom and be true to yourself. Hope you are like a great story teller, a theatrical soul, someone who can read peoples very core, like an old gypsy fortuneteller. Your ability to empathize and see someone for who they are and accept them where they are at is extraordinary. But as of late you have become calloused and hard, full of judgement. That rough edge has made it hard for you to grow a garden of laughter. When will you just love yourself? When will you fully chose to walk in your greatness, and stop allowing the inner critic, and others tell you just how amazing you are? I hope it’s soon because I miss laughing. I miss the confidence and most of all I miss being seen for who I am. I want to tell you how much I love you, that you are the most important person to me. I couldn’t be here without you, so why not chose to love me back? What if instead of fighting the river, you just allowed it to be and flowed with it? You have put your armor on for far to long, and fought the good fight, but the war is over now. It’s not happening anymore. You have done the time to repair, you have forgiven those around you, and been discovering how to heal, but the thing is you have. You just need to love yourself now. That’s the final step in this. You wait for answers, you wait for signs, but the last thing you need now is to love yourself. Fully, genuinely, and forever. Once you do that you won’t hear the inner critic as much, you can finally go into the world and chose your tribe. You can make your family who you chose to. But it all starts with loving you first. That’s it. That simple thing will bring so much abundance, and joy, and love in and it all begins here. Are you ready to start loving yourself? Because I love you so very deeply.

Love always,

Hope

As I reread those words they truly expressed all that I have felt. It’s hard to love yourself when the world has told you just how unlovable you are. Casting you aside like some broken watch, even though all you need is just a new battery. All we need is support, and if you never are able to hear it then you have to be the one to support yourself first. It’s hard, oh boy is it hard. To see that you are loved and supported but not really feeling it. It’s hard when your brain is hardwired to keep searching for it, even if it’s smacking you in the face. That is why loving yourself opens you up to receive it. It makes what’s in front of you visible. Opens your eyes to see what you truly have and stops you from constantly searching for it. When you love yourself you stop longing for the outside world to define you, to make room for you, to accept you, and you start being 100% authentically you. When you love yourself you chose to make you #1, and nothing can bring you down. Nothing can shake that foundation or break you. By loving yourself you become unstoppable and confident. I am going to start today. Whenever I start to feel anxious, sad, depressed, insecure instead I will say I love myself. I chose myself. I am here for myself. I am going to challenge myself to love me, and really focus on doing so. The rest of my quarantine is going to be that, loving myself. That is how you become better. That is how you change. Are you ready to love you?