Why Self Love Matters

There is no situation on earth that feeling like shit about ourselves improves.

Self love gets a bit of a bad rap sometimes. It can seem like every second person on social media has decided they’re a self love expert and carries on about buying roses and getting pedicures. But if you’re a skeptic like me, you might think that sounds nice, but really is it important? I seem to be getting on fine feeling less than loving about myself.

But it is that important, because it can transform your life to be a hell of a lot easier and more enjoyable. It makes us A TON nicer to be around for other people. But like a lot of things, people get confused about what it is.

What self love is

• It’s a feeling of worthiness
• It’s being able to ask for what we need
• It’s a sense of being as good as anyone else
• It’s feeling ok in your body just as it is
• It’s knowing we don’t need to be perfect to be lovable
• It is being ok with sometimes people not liking us
• It is about taking responsibility for getting our needs met

What self love is not

• Self love is not narcissism! It’s not thinking we are better than anyone else
• Not taking responsibility and blaming other people for your life
• Thinking you never make mistakes
• It’s not about ‘treating’ ourselves with things that improve our appearance - this is cloaked insecurity and approval seeking

The absolute BEST WAY to get self love is by connecting with our body. I found this out by accident! (or I thought it was accident, my teacher knew all along). I realised that whenever I was working with ‘embodiment practices’ a fancy term for connecting with the body, I started feeling really good. Grounded. Calm. Turned on. Happy for no good reason.

It’s important to note that I wasn’t disconnected before that. I had been a student and teacher of yoga for several years at this point. But I wasn’t connected in a loving way.

That’s what inspired my 10 min tantric yoga practice for women.

It is also one of the reasons I work with the body in my coaching. Working with the body is SO POWERFUL! It’s the key to lasting change, the key to our insight and wisdom, our pleasure, power, potential.

I get gushy and excited when I talk about this but it is truly extraordinary what can happen when we start relating to ourselves and our bodies with love and sensitivity.

Lots of love,

Ruth

3 Things You Can Do to Improve the Quality of Any Relationship

Nearly all of is have a relationship or two that aren’t the way we want them to be. It could be a family member, your current partner or an ex you want to stay on good terms with, a friend, or a colleague, but it should be someone where, try as you might, it bothers you that it’s not as positive as it could be.

This is an exercise to help you make peace with the situation and explore the possibility of improving the relationship. It might be possible, and it might not, but this is a good way to find out and either enjoy an improved connection or let go of wondering if you could make it better.

Show them you appreciate them

Even if we live with someone and tell them we love them every single day, this is a powerful because it shows we have gone to the next level of connecting with someone. The key here is to show them in a way that is meaningful for them. There are many ways people communicate love, and if you’re all about words but your partner is all about gifts, you’d do better to buy them a little something rather than write them a poem.  

Find a new approach to conflict

I am going to go into more detail on this topic soon, but for now here’s a quick overview of a new way to approach issues where there’s some friction.

Sometimes in life, sorting out areas of conflict can be complicated. People understand words differently, have different triggers and different value systems.

Here is the best approach I know of for approaching touchy topics.

1. Start with something positive. ‘You know, the thing I love about you is the way you <insert example>’.

2. Use collaborative language for the middle but; ‘But we do seem to have a bit of a problem with... How do you think we can work through this? Do you think it’s worth trying...?

3. Finish positive. Reiterate something positive or state something new.

When you do this it will help both of you start to associate dealing with issues together as a good thing.

Let go of the outcome

If you genuinely express appreciation for someone, try and humbly work through an issue and understand their perspective and it doesn’t work, hard as it might be, let it go. You can only do you best. You can’t force a relationship to work. There are all sorts of things that could be preventing it going the way you want.

I know sometimes this sucks, but ultimately if these things don’t work, you would be better off worrying and putting your effort into relationships that are going to work.  

Lots of love

Ruth