This morning I decided to start a new self-love practice where I look at myself in the mirror and say out loud to myself, “good morning, I love you”.
I’ve done enough self-love work to be comfortable looking at myself in the mirror, I’ve done this before. I’ve even looked myself in the eye and said I love you to myself.
Last night I didn’t sleep well, so this morning my mood was not the best. I was able to look at myself and say good morning just fine.
The “I love you” was a whisper, but I said it, and I was able to soak it in and get some warm fuzzies. It was feeling good.
And then, my mind wandered. I started looking at the dark hair around the sides of my mouth and thought, god, you have mustache hair, how ugly!
I looked back into my eyes after thinking that, and seeing the sadness in them that that thought had caused. I knew negative thinking like that *felt* bad, but, seeing that pain in my eyes…that image will stay with me.
That made me want to do better. I need to be even kinder to myself. Our negative thoughts about ourselves affect us so very deeply.
If you don’t believe me, try doing what I did. Try looking into your eyes when you criticize something about your body. Not only feel how painful that is, but SEE how painful that is. Maybe that will help you like it did me. Help us want to do better. We deserve better. We deserve our kindness.
Something else to keep in mind is not beating ourselves up for being mean to ourselves. Instead, perhaps catching yourself when you notice yourself being self-critical, and extending kindness to the part of yourself that is feeling self-critical.
We aren’t going to change overnight. It’s a process. Let us be kind to ourselves as we navigate this.
Kari Storm 