Why practise self-love?
As Forbes states, without self-love you can never reach your maximum potential and will most likely not succeed in climbing the career ladder to, let's say, a managerial position if that is your goal. The reason for this is simple: probably there are more than enough people around you already who doubt you and put you down. While it is good to be realistic and constructively critical of yourself in a healthy way, it is even more important to be forgiving, encouraging and confident towards yourself. Often there is nobody who will pat you on the back apart from yourself. If you want to be confident and effective in your work over the long term, you have to practise self-love.
How to do it in practice?
Here are some tips on how to be more forgiving of yourself and practise self-love in connection with your work:
- Write down your accomplishments. The first trick of self-love is to write down your own achievements. Make a note of what you have accomplished and what you can be justifiably proud of. And keep this list handy whenever feelings of melancholy or inferiority prey on you.
- Say encouraging things to yourself in the mirror. It sounds weird (and at first will also feel weird), but an effective way to boost your confidence and learn to love yourself is to say encouraging things to yourself in the mirror. For example, you might stand in front of the bathroom mirror in the morning after brushing your teeth and tell yourself out loud that you are smart, successful, skilled and have potential.
- Occasionally set aside time for yourself. Practise self-love by making yourself a priority. Often we tend to neglect our own needs and preferences because of work, family or other responsibilities. But sometimes it is necessary to take time for yourself and maybe just relax quietly.
- When you mess up, do not consider it fatal. Don't feel too bad if you make a mistake. To err is human. Rather than paralysing yourself with despair over your own mistake, you should learn from it, forgive yourself, and maybe try a different approach next time.
- Do things that put you in a positive mood. Now and again, forget about what makes other people happy and do things that make you yourself feel positive. You will then be more motivated, work better and as a result be able to support people around you more.
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