25 Must-Read Ways To Love Yourself More

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In this post, we discuss all things self-love! Discover 25 ways to love yourself, increase confidence and nurture the relationship that you have with yourself.

Learning to love yourself can be a challenging yet beautifully rewarding journey.

It’s messy, painful, confusing and daunting at times… and it’s highly empowering, deeply healing, joyous and beautiful too.

The journey of self-love is a profound alchemical process.

It is a journey that will have you facing truths, not just about yourself but about others and experiences you have had.

It will have you feeling the full spectrum of emotions, including the uncomfortable emotions and the emotions society has often taught us to suppress.

It will have you leaving your comfort zone, healing wounds, getting to know your authentic self and not being afraid to show up as them.

It is a journey that will lead you to unapologetically love and embrace every part of yourself, including the parts of you that have been shamed by yourself and others, and it is a journey that will teach you self-advocacy, self-acceptance and self-accountability, which are all forms of self-love.

When you are first beginning your self-love journey or are struggling with self-love in general, it can be hard to even know where to begin.

When you are so deeply unhappy with yourself, seeing a way forward and finding the motivation to show up for yourself and love yourself can be challenging.

Often, figuring out how to love yourself can be just as confusing.

I believe that figuring out what self-love means to you is important, alongside coming to an understanding of how you struggle with self-love and what your needs and wants are, so that you can begin to implement small steps to help you move forward in your path of cultivating true self-love.

Below you will find actionable steps and self-love tips to incorporate into your everyday life. These 25 ways to love yourself are based on radical self-acceptance, taking back your power, building confidence and investing in your well-being.

25 Ways to Love Yourself More

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1. Accept your feelings

Have you ever heard the saying ‘What you resist, will persist.’? It’s true.

To begin to love yourself, you must accept your feelings, whatever they are. Becoming aware of a feeling and accepting that it is there is the first step in beginning to process it.

Whether it’s feelings of inadequacy, disliking something about your appearance or feeling unsatisfied with a situation you are in, facing these feelings head-on and accepting that they exist is key.

Pushing away or belittling feelings that you have is invalidating what you truly feel and only saves these truths for later.

2. Set boundaries

Discover your boundaries and then set them. If your boundaries change, set new ones. Your boundaries are allowed to change.

As someone who has been there, setting boundaries can be scary, especially if you struggle with people-pleasing. Ignoring your boundaries and keeping the peace to appease someone else can be extremely harmful to you.

Communicating your boundaries and sticking by them is a form of self-respect and self-love.

99.9% of the time, when you fear setting boundaries, it is because you fear someone else’s reaction to them. You are not responsible for how someone feels or reacts in response to you setting healthy boundaries. Someone’s inability to regulate their emotions in response to you setting healthy boundaries is not your problem.

If someone has an issue with you setting healthy boundaries that are in your best interest, are they someone you truly want in your life? If someone has an issue with you setting healthy boundaries, were they benefiting from your lack of them?

Stating boundaries allows you to see truths in relationships, too, especially early on when getting to know someone! The right people for you will respect your boundaries.

Setting boundaries with yourself is just as important, too! This can look a variety of ways. An example of setting boundaries with yourself is making the conscious decision to discard a habit or behaviour you have that you’ve noticed negatively impacts you, such as scrolling too much or procrastinating working on a goal that is important to you.

Setting boundaries drastically benefits your relationships, including the relationship you have with yourself.

When you practice setting boundaries, you become stronger, more confident and unapologetic when it comes to setting them, even if it is scary at first.

3. Affirmations

Affirmations are a simple yet transformational way of shifting your mindset and cultivating a sense of self-love. They are short statements or mantras that you can recite out loud, in your head or even write down.

The benefits of using affirmations, to name a few, include increased confidence, easing anxiety, a shift in mindset, increased self-love and creating new subconscious beliefs (they are a wonderful manifestation tool!).

Here are some positive affirmations for you to try:

4. Say ‘No’ more

Practice saying ‘no’ more to things that aren’t a 100% ‘yes’. This ties in with the first two points of accepting your feelings and setting boundaries.

Whether you aren’t feeling up to doing something or you feel uneasy about a situation, trust your gut and honour your feelings!

Life is too short and your energy is too precious to waste doing things that aren’t a ‘hell yes’.

5. Practice self-care

Self-care equals self-love, and I’m not just talking about bubble baths and a face mask. However, these definitely count and are favourite self-care practices of mine.

Practising a balanced approach to self-care is a way of showing up for yourself, showing love to yourself and tending to your well-being.

The ways to love yourself and self-love tips found in this post are all forms of self-care.

Sometimes, self-care looks like setting an important boundary or taking care of your basic needs when you’re burnt out. Other times, self-care looks like running yourself a lovely hot bath and sticking on your favourite movie.

6. Prioritise your goals

Putting your dreams first and taking aligned steps towards them is one of the most powerful ways to love yourself.

Life sure gets busy, and for those who have responsibilities when it comes to taking care of others, personal goals can get put on the back burner.

Is there a goal you want to achieve? Is there a special dream that you have?

Acknowledging your dreams to begin with is a form of loving yourself. Believing you can achieve them, planning small, actionable steps and then taking them is a rewarding path that brings self-love and makes the version of yourself who has those special dreams feel seen.

7. Accept that you are allowed to be different

Accepting that you are allowed to be different to others is one of the most transformational ways to love yourself. When you accept this, you create room for allowing yourself to be different.

Whether it’s a difference in opinion or views, the way you present yourself externally or even a path in life you wish to take – you are allowed to be different and you are allowed to break away from other’s expectations and limitations they have placed on you, and you are allowed to break away from expectations and limitations you have placed on yourself!

Refusing to censor yourself and standing firm in your truth and authenticity is a powerful and radical form of self-love.

8. Stop tolerating disrespect

When you tolerate disrespect from others, you disrespect yourself. You also teach others what you are willing to ‘let slide’ and put up with when you do this.

Disrespect comes in many forms, from an insult disguised as a ‘joke’, someone disrespecting your boundaries, to someone close to you gossiping to others about you – stop tolerating it!

9. Check in with yourself

Checking in with yourself is an important form of self-care, and it can look several ways.

Some examples include checking in with your mental health, your physical health, what kind of self-care you need and in general, checking in with how you feel.

Sometimes we can get distracted with day-to-day life, but taking a moment to ask yourself ‘How am I really feeling?’ and/or ‘How is my body feeling?’ can go a long way.

10. Make time for things that bring you joy

This is pretty self-explanatory! but seriously, are you currently making time for the things that bring you joy?

It is superr important to incorporate such things into your everyday routine. Even if you are someone who has a jam-packed schedule, you can still do this!

From putting an hour or so aside for a weekly self-care night to popping on your favourite playlist on your morning drive to work or even adding a comfort meal to your weekly menu, you can easily make time for the simple pleasures in your everyday routine.

11. Less energy takers, more energy givers!

Loving yourself also looks like making room in your life for more energy givers in place of pesky energy takers.

Energy takers are the things that leave you feeling drained and negative.

Some examples of ‘energy takers’ include:

Doom-scrolling
Dwelling on the past
Gossiping
Worrying about the future
Not drinking enough water
People pleasing

Energy givers are the things that leave you feeling replenished, inspired and positive.

Some examples of ‘energy givers’ include:

Sunlight
Being present in the moment
Healthy foods
Engaging in your passions
Spending time with loved ones
Spending time in nature

Which energy givers do you enjoy?

12. Accept that self-love isn’t shameful

A big part of learning to love yourself is accepting that self-love isn’t shameful, nor is it arrogant.

In society, we have often been taught that loving ourselves and expressing it is too ‘prideful’ and ‘self-centred’.

True self-love does not pertain to being arrogant or feeling above others. Those traits indicate a lack of self-love and feeling inferior to others deep down.

13. Stop carrying the burdens of others

Sometimes when struggling with self-love, especially alongside struggling with people-pleasing, we can take on others’ burdens as well as our own.

Love yourself by understanding that you can have empathy and compassion for others without being a ‘martyr’.

14. Make time for yourself

Consciously putting time aside to have some alone time is a wonderful way of practising self-love.

Add a couple of hours of ‘me time’ into your week where you focus solely on yourself, your favourite self-care rituals and the things that bring you joy and see how it makes you feel.

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15. Stop taking the actions of others personally

Overthinking the actions of others and taking them personally negatively impacts your self-esteem, increases anxiety and takes a toll on your relationships overall.

Often, when we are struggling with low self-worth and are lacking in the self-love department in general, it can be easy to take the actions of others personally.

It is important to remember that everyone is at the centre of their own world. Everyone has their own personal things they are dealing with, and everyone has their own unique conditioning, which shapes how they think and act, too.

Not everyone’s actions are about you! Practising discernment is key.

16. Shadow work

Becoming aware of, working through and integrating aspects of the shadow self brings healing, personal growth and self-awareness.

Shadow work and self-love are interlaced.

Through shadow work, you uncover parts of yourself that were unconscious and repressed, often parts of yourself that are uncomfortable or that the ego may have resistance to in some form.

Overall, shadow work involves a whole lot of self-acceptance, healing, compassion and self-love.

17. Get out of your comfort zone

Getting out of your comfort zone builds confidence, and it deepens your relationship with yourself.

Trying new things and working through the discomfort that can come with leaving your comfort zone leads to getting to know yourself better, growth as a person and increased self-love.

18. Stop playing small

Stop playing small when it comes to yourself and stop keeping yourself small to please others!

Quit downplaying your talents, strengths and yourself as a being overall.

19. Speak kindly to yourself

How you speak to yourself matters. When struggling with self-love and low confidence, getting wrapped up in the mind, having negative self-talk, and ruminating are common.

It is important to speak to yourself with compassion and respect, the same way you would with someone dear to you. If you wouldn’t speak disrespectfully to their face, why are you doing that to yourself?

Your inner dialogue and where you place your focus shape your world.

The version of yourself that you choose to show up as is going to impact the experience you have. Who are you showing up as? Someone who speaks poorly of themselves or someone who holds themselves in high regard and practices self-compassion?

Practising being present and observing the mind alongside practising positive self-talk goes a long way when experiencing negative thought spirals.

20. Be mindful of where you give energy

Learning to trust how you feel and acting accordingly when it comes to giving your energy to certain people, places, and things is a common part of learning to love yourself.

This point can be applied to many different scenarios, for example, deciding to stop giving energy where it isn’t reciprocated or deciding to channel your energy into a passion instead of something that you no longer feel in alignment with.

All in all, your energy is highly valuable and being mindful of what you give your energy to is a way of showing love and respect to yourself.

21. Accept your poor habits

Being honest with yourself and accepting the poor habits that you have allows for self-growth, understanding yourself more deeply, and bringing forth healing.

When you accept you have poor habits, you are no longer denying them. Instead, you are being honest with yourself and are met with an opportunity to create positive change whilst practising self-compassion.

22. Start manifesting your dreams instead of doubting them

Seriously… do it!

Instead of trash-talking your dreams, envision yourself having achieved them and take the necessary steps towards them. Nobody is standing between you and your dreams, and nothing is limiting you except the limits you place on yourself.

23. Listen to your body

Your body is working to keep you alive, and it tells you what it needs! Honour your body by paying attention to what it is telling you.

Whether it’s hunger, too much food, not enough sleep, being sick or feeling anxious, your body will send you signals.

Listen to the cues your body gives you and any sensations that arise.

24. Ditch the perfectionism

Love yourself by allowing yourself to show up imperfectly.

The definition of ‘perfect’ is different for everyone, and when you are struggling with perfectionism, the mind is always going to find something new to pick at.

Understand that striving for success and taking pride in what you do does not have to mean ‘have a perfectionist approach’.

Whether it’s in regards to learning a new skill, working on a project or striving towards a goal, ditching the perfectionism is a chance to appreciate the real, raw, beautiful and authentic process that is unfolding.

25. Stop comparing yourself to others

Comparison is the thief of joy. Everyone is on their own unique journey, and no two people are the same.

If you catch yourself comparing yourself and your circumstances to another’s, ask yourself if it is because you truly desire something they have and are inspired? Or are you engaging in unhealthy comparison?

Did you find this post useful? Pin these 25 ways to love yourself for later!