LEARNING TO LOVE YOURSELF - even when you don't know how
- Sophie Shaw
- Mar 18
- 2 min read
Hi gorgeous,
I hope the sun is shining for you, wherever you are - but if it's not, read on. Because it's not always sunshine and roses. Sometimes it's poop and tears.
Sometimes you can't access your positive attitude. Sometimes you don't know the bloody answers and everything feels like crap.
And you need to know that that's ok - and love yourself anyway, amid all that crap.
Today, I was talking to a friend about a wonderful book - Learning to Love Yourself by Gay Hendricks.
This remarkable book was instrumental in my own journey of self-acceptance and self-love, and I recommend it to most of my clients.
In his book, Gay quotes from his work with clients, and there is one particular exchange that I always find very powerful. I'll summarise it here:
This client is in Shitsville. They are despondent, hopeless, and self-hating. Gay asks: "Can you love yourself for feeling that way?"
The client considers this, and responds that, no, they can't love themselves for feeling like that.
Gay Hendricks asks: "Can you love yourself for not being able to love yourself?" I personally found this concept SO powerful.
After considering this, the client finds that, yes, they're now able to access some self-love.
It's that broader, more compassionate perspective that I find so beautiful. Not only do you NOT have to be perfect - you don't even have to know HOW to love yourself, to love yourself.
You don't have to be nailing it all the time. You don't have to know the answers. You don't have to be healing all the damn time.
You have absolute permission to be sulky, in the doldrums, or totally lost. And you have permission to love yourself anyway.
The act of loving yourself is simply a choice. You can say to yourself "I have no fucking clue what I'm doing, and I love myself anyway."
It means that (for the moment anyway), you don't have to resolve anything, and you don't have to EARN self-love by being positive, or taking positive action, or being an amazing self-healer.
You can be temporarily in the shit, and love yourself anyway. It's unconditional. You love yourself simply because.
And of course, the loving yourself will make that positive action so much easier to take. What a relief.
So look - here's some resources to help you with this:
Listen to these podcast episodes:
Are We Done With Self-Improvement Yet? - here I talk about self-acceptance on the deepest level.
Self-Care - Beyond Bubble Baths - there has to be more to self-care and self-love than a pamper session, right?
Check out Journey to Self-Love
This is honestly one of the most powerful things I've ever created. An audio mini-course, containing 3 incredible healing meditations, a special bonus track, and an accompanying PDF workbook.
Journey to Self-Love powerfully addresses three critical aspects of self-love:
Becoming your own source of love
Releasing past hurts
Releasing resistance to loving the self
If you don't know HOW to love yourself - this is a great place to start.
And in the meantime, I'm sending you (as always) big love,
Comments