Self Love Is Not a Bubble Bath

When you hear the term self love, what images come to mind?

Booking in nice activities for yourself? A long bath? Weekends away with the boys? Massages? Buying yourself things you like? Although self love is often referred to as pampering yourself and doing things that bring you joy, I would like to share what I have learned is the true definition of what self love is. Spoiler alert: It’s nothing like a bubble bath!

Men, you need to hear this too, because self love is something that we all need to ensure we are able to do for ourselves. In fact, many men suffer from being way too hard on themselves, and not allowing themselves to ‘fail’. This can set you up for some pretty negative self talk which could be holding you back from taking risks and being able to connect and thrive in your relationships, your career, and working towards your life goals.

Self love is fundamentally the act of being aware of how you talk to yourself, and the way you think every second of every day. I can honestly liken the realisation of this to a personal epiphany. Here’s a scenario that highlights how pampering yourself is only the first layer of self love. I’m sitting in a lovely bathtub with a scented candle, telling myself that I’m a horrible person who ruined my family for my own selfish needs. Does that sound like practising self love to you?

True self love is when the voice whispers from the stage “You’re horrible and selfish”, and you stand up from the back of the auditorium and yell “No!” in your most assertive voice. Then you stride up the aisle and say “How dare you speak to me like that. Get the hell out of this room if all you are going to bring here is judgement and negativity. I am worthy, I am good, I am imperfect, as are all of us. I need understanding, kindness, forgiveness, empathy and love! Not hatred. Breaking me down just leaves crumbs for those around me who need me to feel strong. Stop stealing that from people I love, we don’t need you!”.

Then the whole crowd gives a standing ovation as the voice slinks out the side door.

Yes, that scenario flirts with Hollywood imagery. But that is actually what it felt like once I realised what I was doing to myself and made the choice to start speaking up against those voices. I have a vivid memory of the day I became cognisant of my constant self talk after initiating my divorce. I was putting folded towels into the cupboard and I heard a voice clear as day say “I hate myself”. I almost looked around to see who said it was so clear and noticeable. Up until that moment I would have extremely negative and self defeating thoughts and barely register them. Thoughts such as the following were on a constant loop:

-You’re selfish

-You’re a bad mother

-You only care about yourself

-There’s no point you even being here

-Nobody will ever love you again

-You are dysfunctional and don’t know how to love

-You’re unattractive and you don’t have anything to offer

-You are going to be alone forever and that’s all you deserve

Is it any wonder at all that I ended up in an abusive relationship two years after my separation? When I look back on all the things I was saying to myself on a daily basis, I understand now why I had to look for someone else to tell me that I wasn’t any of these things. If someone else could look at me and recognise that I had value, then all of the messages I was giving myself must be untrue. I must be ok after all.

Enter the love bombing stage. All of sudden I was being told how amazing I was, what a great mother, a career woman, so attractive, ‘out of his league’ etc. I bathed in the glow of feeling worthy and appreciated, and finally felt some relief from the endless razoring of the self flagellation. It felt like being drip fed morphine after lying broken on jagged rocks for years, bleeding out with no pain relief. Here was my pain relief, in the form of grandiose statements of love and admiration that cancelled out the vitriolic voices.

Little did my unsuspecting heart know what was really coming. I had no idea that all of these statements were just a form of grooming by an abuser. Getting me hooked up to the drip. He wasn’t stupid. On a cellular level he knew what my voice was whispering to me all day. He knew that by bombarding me with admiration and soothing compliments, I was starting to become addicted to feeling good and worthy again. He knew all too well that I would begin to depend on him to take away my pain. A person who doesn’t love themselves is ripe for an abuser’s picking.

After three and a half years of being stuck in a toxic cycle of love bombing and emotional abuse, I was finally able to practise self love by ending it all and making the call to give myself the love that I was yearning for so much. I needed to stop trying to find someone else to tell me I was loveable and look inward to hear those statements of positive regard from the person that mattered the most, me! I started to talk to myself like I was my own best friend. I made the conscious choice to love myself properly. And that’s when I realised that finally I was getting to a place of REAL self love.

As a younger woman, I thought I had high self esteem and self confidence because I was assertive and outgoing socially. How wrong I was! I had no conscious awareness of the real stories I was telling myself about who I was and what I deserved, until the searing pain of divorce and then extricating myself from another abusive relationship finally got me to concentrate with laser focus on ways to feel better. Through therapy, I realised how abysmal my self talk had been for most of my life. I began to explore the power of subconscious thought and the actions we take based on the stories we tell ourselves.

Through my coaching work, I’ve realised how many people are not practising real self love. That many people struggle with their ‘gremlins’ and negative self-talk daily. Through the process of sharing these thoughts in a safe place, they are able to hear them aloud and realise how cruel they are being to themselves without even realising it. From there, they can begin to put together some strategies for reframing their negative self talk, and get to a place of being kinder to themselves.

Latest research has shown that on average the human mind will have around 6,000 thoughts per day. If you catch yourself saying things in your head that you would never say to a loved one or a friend, that is when you know that you need to become vigilant about the thoughts that you allow yourself. It’s helpful to really ‘tune in’ to your thoughts as they flash through your mind while you run on autopilot. If you’re saying something negative or self defeating, imagine someone saying those things to your mum, your brother, your nephew, your child. Would you allow that? Or would you stand up for them? Stand up for yourself the way you would stand up for anyone you love, by consciously challenging and changing that narrative day by day.

I practise self love every single day now. Sometimes it’s of the pampering variety, but without fail, it’s the way I speak to myself. I will never go back to allowing those voices to have air time in my mind again without immediately answering them with a kind and empathetic response. I’m back to feeling like I belong here, like I do have value, and that I am important for the people in my life. I have realised that the greatest gift I can give to anyone now, is to help them understand how to love themselves. If even one person reads this and adds to their knowledge of how to love themselves in some way, then my journey was worth it.

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This post was previously published on medium.com.

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