What Is Your Relationship With Yourself?

So, this month I’ve been talking about healthy relationships.

BUT

I’m wondering what kind of relationship you have with yourself.

IN OTHER WORDS

Do you like you?

Do you?

I hear so many people talk about the fact that they don’t like this or that about themselves, or if they had a chance, they would change this or that about themselves.

I get this.
I could say that I don’t like the fact that my hair is baby fine. I could say that I don’t like the fact that I am only 5’6″. I could say that I don’t like the fact that I have a squarish face.

BUT I DON’T.

Why? Because most of the physical things about a person can’t, or shouldn’t, be changed. Why don’t you like what you don’t like about yourself?

Own Your Physical Attributes

I don’t like my baby fine hair. It looks like someone laid a piece of paper over my head if I wear it long. It won’t hold a curl or a perm. OK. So, I learned to deal with it and like it. Now, I wear it short and style it with a little mousse.

I don’t like my squarish face. It actually reminds me of my great grandmother’s stoic photograph that hung for years in my mother’s basement. (Now, it is in my garage and face to face with the picture of my overly stern great grandfather.) So, I have learned to deal with it. In researching style, I have learned that there are some clothing and hair styles that will make the squarishness stand out and some that will embrace it.

Instead of disliking something about yourself or trying to change it, own your physical attributes. As “Baby” says to her father in Dirty Dancing, “…if you love me, you have to love all the things about me…”

Spend Quality Time With Yourself

How much time do you personally give to yourself each day? An hour? A half an hour? Fifteen minutes?

Having a good relationship with yourself requires you to spend some quality time with yourself. Time to get to know who you are as an individual. It is important to realize that when we are with family, friends, and co-workers, we sometimes put on a mask in order to get along with them.

BUT

who are you when you are alone?

Check out Blake Shelton’s song, ‘Who Are You When I’m Not Looking?‘

Do you like spending time with yourself?

Great ways to spend time with yourself: go for a walk, go for a bike ride, take yourself out for coffee, or take yourself out shopping.

Take Time To Pamper Yourself

If you are a parent, you have precious little time to yourself. If you have toddlers, they probably even follow you into the bathroom.

So, how can you pamper/spoil yourself?

My youngest son and my best friend both have sold me on the fact that I need to indulge myself in a massage at least once a week. My youngest son is a massage therapist and my best friend to me to a spa for a massage for my birthday several years ago. I wish massages had been suggested to me when my children were younger.

It’s not only the massage, but the atmosphere of the spa that makes the experience. Low lights and calming music begin the experience followed by a warm massage table as the stress in your muscles is kneaded away.

Another way to pamper yourself is a long, hot bath. This one I indulged in every couple of week when my kids were small. I’d put them to bed and then, pour a hot bath with fragrant bubbles. I’d lay in the water until it began to cool. After I dried, I put on my comfiest jammies and sit with a book until bedtime.

When you go to have your hair cut, make sure that you have them shampoo your hair first. For years, I would make sure I had washed my hair in the morning and then just let the stylist cut my hair. I had forgotten how much the experience of having someone else shampoo my hair eased my stress. Now, I make sure the stylist knows I want my hair washed.

Notes To Self & Affirmations

Leave a note on a mirror to yourself. For years, I had a magazine clipping of a silhouette of a person in a yoga position with the words “My body. My biography.” It made me aware of the fact that I am who I make myself.

Other things can include:

You are an awesome individual.

You ARE my best friend.

Be the best YOU you can be.

AND

Affirmations are hitting the self-help books and posts like wildfire. I say them when I wake up, or into my mirror as I get ready for the day, or write them on the old chalkboard hanging by my calendar.

It is essential, for all other relationships to work, that we like our self and like spending time with our self FIRST!

Take time today and get to know yourself. Find out who you are when you are by yourself. Let me know how it goes and how you build your relationship with your self.

---