I woke up early, did the perfect self- care routine, eat a salad and listened to a
good vibes podcast but I still don’t feel good about myself. Will I ever? Is self- love
even a thing?
I would like to preface this by saying that I do not think self-love is a myth. And
this belief stems from the fact that we’re all born an innate sense of self
preservation. No matter how strained our relationship is with ourselves at any
given moment, we will all still be likely to follow a course of action that will prove
to fruitful, or at least not harmful.
But self-love as concept has gained notoriety in recent times and the
never ending tide of toxic positivity is to be blamed. When you keeping repeating
the same words over and over again, the start to lose all their meaning and
essence and this is precisely what the “drink water, love yourself” posts over-
saturating every social media outlet have done to idea of loving oneself. Quotes
on Pinterest with sunset back-grounds were nice, initially, but this is somehow
evolved into “kicking a person when their down.”
Lifestyle write ups and influencer Instagrams choose to treat mood swings
as something taboo when it’s as normal as can be. Good days and bad days, ups
and downs, we all experience our fair share and sometimes, there isn’t a
profound reason for a foul demeanour, maybe you just woke up on the wrong
side of the bed and that’s okay. We cannot ‘Gratitude Journal’ away all our
problem.
The current life gurus have a warped view of what lifting up spirits is
supposed to be. When their hacks and tricks and self-affirmations don’t work,
because they were designed that way, it will naturally lead to resentment. What’s
the point of trying if nothing is going work? But the thing about pain is, it
demands to be felt (See, John Green figured it out and he’s a millionaire now). We
need to sit with our emotions, understand them, access and then attempt to
remedy the situation. And if that’s not enough, ask for help. There are things that
a juice cleanse just can’t fix. It is impossible to feel good about yourself every day
or even like who you are all the time. The mirror always seems to be fair-weather
friend.
We inhabit this mind eternally, a disagreement of two is inevitable.
Supressing emotions, insecurities and pretending that they’re not there won’t
make them go away. Self- love is hard, there isn’t a never ending reservoir of
emotion and effort that can be tapped into when needed. It comes and goes. Self-
love is not consistent, it’s not easy but it’s also not a myth.
Naina Priyadarshi Mishra
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