Last week I wrote about how we can love and value ourselves while also having big goals and high standards.
This week I’m realizing wait a second, self love? Très difficile. Muy dificil. That is very hard.
I mean, there are so many reasons not to love myself. I get frustrated and angry easily, I’m insecure, I hate being wrong, I question how resilient I am. If I have these qualities, if I get snappy, if I’m judgmental and reactionary, how can I really love myself? How can I feel I am worth it?
I go round and round in circles, trying to logic my way into deserving unconditional love. As you might guess, the conclusion is: not lovable.
My life coach Darla will suggest that I could choose to fully love myself, as is, and I imagine her saying this as she waves a glittery wand and magical birds chirp. And I’m like yeah, I’ll do that after about 100 more sessions when you’ve fixed everything that’s wrong with me.
Today I’m wondering what it would look like to separate logic and love. To accept that love isn’t logical, and be okay with things not “making sense.” To let love be a little more magical and a little less reasoned.
I keep thinking about what Olympic 400m runner Quanera Hayes told me, about how her self worth is rooted in her faith in God, and God’s love for her. Her self worth doesn’t come from her medals, her performance at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, her Diamond League Champion title, or her 4 World Championship medals. It also doesn’t come from the roles she plays - mother, athlete, mentor, sister, daughter, wife. It doesn’t come from any particular qualities she does or does not possess. It comes solely from her faith that God loves her, so why shouldn’t she love herself?
There’s no logical explanation for why even God loves her, but that also doesn’t matter. She believes it, so it’s true.
I don’t have the same religious experience as Quanera, but I don’t need to. I do believe in a higher power, or powers. Deep down I do believe there are things we can’t understand in our world, and that life is a little bit magical.
If I were try on Quanera’s strategy, I wouldn’t need to logic my way into loving myself unconditionally. There would be no need for reasons. I’d say, The universe loves me unconditionally, so why shouldn’t I do the same? It wouldn’t need to make sense, and I could still believe it’s true.
I’m going to try this one on, but I’m still gonna keep Darla around. Because maybe like, she can fix me?
Picture credit: Quanera Hayes