By Books Author Denise Turney

Prove you love yourself. You know it’s time you did this. But how do you know you’re loving yourself, even now? How do you really know?

Think about it. If you were asked to list signs of having a cold, what would you list? Scratchy throat, stuffy nose, cough and tiredness? What if you were asked to list symptoms of being excited? Would any of these appear on your list – alertness, curiosity, rapid heartbeat, happiness and feeling alive?

Exploring Unconditional Love

Finally, what if you were asked to create a list of signs that prove you’re loved? If someone found your list, what would they find? Would they find words like warmth, kindness, appreciation, acceptance, realized value, welcomed, desired, cared for, connection, safety and trust?

What’s on that list reveals what think love is.

When is the last time you gifted yourself with what’s on your list? Ask yourself, when is the last time you made yourself feel loved. This is a time when you (you alone) treated yourself in a way that caused you to feel unquestionably loved.

Prove You Love Yourself as an Early Start

Confession. When I was younger, I thought self-love was selfish. Back then, I thought the Creator put me in the world to love everyone else except myself. Guess that’s why I sometimes felt like love was a risk, a risky chance that might or might not yield the results I was seeking.

Now it makes perfect sense to me. The entire time I was committed to loving everyone except myself (again thinking that loving yourself was a selfish and negative act to engage in), I was waiting for someone else to love me. Each time I believed that I had loved someone else, sacrificed for someone else, I expected to receive love.

When that didn’t happen (and looking back, it seems like it didn’t happen a lot), I felt disappointed. Love seemed like a trick to me. Or, as Amy Winehouse sang, it was as if “Love Is A Losing Game”. Fortunately, I didn’t give up on love.

People Who Help Your Prove You Love Yourself

Do you believe in love? Is love powerful, weak, necessary, real or unreal to you? Did you become familiar with love during your childhood? Hopefully, your parents, extended family and friends gave you love. It is my trust that the people circling you as you grew up demonstrated love for you. Even more, I trust that those people poured love into you, making it easy for you to realize that you have value.

Whether or not that happened, you have to work to love yourself. You have to prove you love yourself. And you have to prove it throughout the day.

Yet, life gets busy. Before you know it, you’re telling yourself that you don’t have time to rest. You start to believe that sacrificing your peace and joy for a relationship, a job, a belief is best. Even more, you might convince yourself that you just don’t have time to do what it takes to make yourself feel loved. That’s why breaking big impact actions into small steps helps.

11 Easy Self Love and Self Care Acts

Here are 11 easy things you can do to feel loved. They’re simple acts that can have a long, powerful and lasting impact. Add these to your daily routine and see if you don’t start to feel better, see if you don’t start to feel more loved.

1. Listen to a song that causes you to feel hopeful, happy.
2. Sit still for five minutes as soon as you awaken. Do the same five minutes before you drift into sleep at night. These are easy self-love and self-care actions. After a while you might decide to increase the time to 10 minutes in the morning and 10 minutes at night.
3. Write yourself a love letter. This love letter doesn’t have to be long. The aim is to tell yourself, to demonstrate to yourself, how much you truly do love you.
4. Breathe deeply for 60 seconds. As a tip, you could use a virtual timer to sit still, sit quiet and breathe for 60 seconds. Should this sound like too much time, start smaller. Start breathing deeply for 30 seconds and then work your way up to 60 seconds.
5. Stand in front of a mirror and tell yourself three things that you appreciate about yourself today, right now. Pay attention to how you feel as you do this. Notice if there’s an area where you find yourself struggling to believe something good about you. (Hint: You’re awesome!)
6. Drink fresh water each day. Also, eat a healthy diet.
7. Exercise daily – moving your body in healthy ways is an act of self-love.
8. Get outdoors and enjoy a safe walk in nature. Stay outdoors for 45 minutes. This simple act can improve your mood, mental focus and physical well-being.
9. Take one day a week to rest. Instead of working, do fun, relaxing things that you enjoy.
10. Dance to a song that you love once a day. Not only is this fun, it’s great exercise.
11. Open up to loving relationships. Say good-bye to people who constantly criticize, belittle and abuse you.

Whether you give love to someone else or to yourself, it is from within you that love flows. To feel empowered and confident enough to be who you really are, prove that you love yourself. Go beyond simply saying that you love yourself. Prove it.