The discourse around self-love has never really resonated with me. Don’t get me wrong: as a spiritual person (even my purple aura color says so), I’m the first to believe that your thoughts become your reality. But declaring “love” for myself has often felt a little disingenuous. I always thought it was my natural aversion to lovey-dovey emotions (typical Aquarius here). But after being pushed to say “I love you” to a mirror last year at a wellness retreat, I realized it wasn’t that I didn’t relate to self-love—it was that I hadn’t built enough trust in myself to feel it.
When you’re given advice on self-love, it’s typically filled with commentary around the importance of self-care and grace for your mistakes. Podcasts and articles will suggest uplifting music, ignoring your inner critic, or looking in the mirror and saying “I love you” to your own face. But the idea of trusting yourself? Eh, take it or leave it. And yet, no number of positive affirmations or mood-boosting activities can get you to a place of genuine self-love if you don’t really, truly trust yourself. “If we look in the mirror and say, ‘I love you, I believe in you, you’ve got this,’ but we haven’t built that foundation of self-trust, then we have no reason to believe our words,” says Liz Moody, author of 100 Ways To Change Your Life.
We live in a culture that tears us down and then tells us to love ourselves,” says licensed psychotherapist Lia Avellino, LCSW. “The message is that, ‘You should be skinny, be smiley, be nice, don’t be angry, and buy all sorts of things to fix yourself—but also, while you’re at it, love yourself.” “We live in a culture that tears us down and then tells us to love ourselves.” —Lia Avellino, LCSW, licensed psychotherapist These mixed messages aren’t just confusing, they’re incessant. “The number of negative messages we take in from ourselves and from society eclipses the number of kind messages,” says Moody. Which means all of our positive affirmations and feel-good quotes can only do so much when our brains are constantly “creating neurological pathways that tend more toward negativity and reproach,” she says. Basically, our brain gets comfortable with bad vibes, and it can begin to view self-love as sketchy. To love yourself authentically, you need to learn to trust yourself first, says Moody.
