Self love is my way of living

I closed my eyes and touched my slow-beating heart. I was about to write a topic I have a large interest in. Interest is an underwhelming word. It does not carry the care and concern I have for the special topic and that emotion.

 If love is an emotion, self-love is the more concrete and nuanced version of that feeling. Loving yourself is a liberating activity that can ignite powerful possibilities for a spectacular life.

Many people encounter it when they face rejection or out of disappointment or when they feel unloved. However, countless others practice it out of nothing but a genuine interest and love for themselves. 

What drives them to keep their love to their own and not look at others? For me, it came with a feeling that I cannot quite explicitly love anybody or express it in the same genuine way I have an honest love for myself.

Because I am wired that way, and I like to keep it clean and tidy.

As I am self-centric in love, I can never exhibit or express my love for others in a lovable way for a long period. And I always had an innocent affection to own mind, as it always supported me, even when I was unwanted or became an unprioritized material to others.

I cannot pinpoint one but can remember many occasions where my mind carried me from adverse circumstances and situations to help me out and bring a smile. So when external people sometimes wondered why I look too serious or sentimental, I was smiling in my inner world, living in my wandering thoughts. But of late, many people noticed that it had changed drastically, and the pristine cheerfulness in my lovely face came to a reality thanks to my own efforts and hard work. It was also a byproduct of self-love.

But the battle is not always a happy one. I can remember some hundred examples where I stayed, took the blows, went bottom, and remained alone with silent wounds. I realize I am not well when I hear a wounded tone in my voice. I do not like to possess a serious voice, and mine is an emotional voice where it is easy for close people to catch how am I with the tone of my voice.

But being a less talkative but social person, I often express so little, and sometimes it does not convey what I had intended, and it is why I need to pause a bit, reflect and deliver by curbing my natural instincts, but most of the times I give it my natural reaction. I love the uncheerful tonality and abstractness in my voice because they have got genuine thoughts and I can bring them out if I am more concise and refined with my words. In that way, I can become a more beautiful person than I am right now!

Being a selective social person, and having a carefully constructed circle, self-love has helped me to liberate myself from the social noises that could keep a person of my age confused. Of late I realized a particular aspect of me - that I already sorted many things, and one thing many others have sorted but I am yet to, is the clarity to express everything in the real sense. 

I believe societal acceptance is a marker, an indicator to you to realise you are taking that apt step. At the same time, I also know one cannot dance to the tunes of society all the time. So it is an issue-based, situation-driven thing, that one needs to take care of, in life. 

A belief of this sort has given me the courage and conviction to walk without nerves. Now I am least bothered about my past actions and least worried about present mistakes because I know for a fact that persistent efforts may bear fruit - slowly, steadily, and subtly.

And if I look back, I see myself evolving better. Such gradual progress keeps me content with how I approach life's bigger problems. 

What about marriage and family, one may wonder. I am not ready to share my life with a partner because I do not wish to reduce myself to the nucleus called family, despite my love for my dad, mom, or people I consider as family. And honestly, I do not quite believe in blood relations, but my associations are based on mutual bonding and genuine affection.

Perhaps, a wedding is unsuited to my dreams and desires. There are only three needs I like to have from a partner if I find any, but I absolutely believe I am not going to look for one. And unless I meet a like-minded person and form an organically meaningful connection, I am not going to get into any form of romantic relationship in life! And as I have the luxury of my own love to me, I like to think that I can stay independent from romantic relationships for a significant timespan. 

I am happy I experienced the happiness, comedy, and tragedy of love in one go. I still like that person, but not in the sense of a lover, but as a human with whom I shared many memorable moments. I am grateful to her because she taught me a lot, and brought my smiles back during a troublesome period. When she left, she actually sow seeds for me to be more positive, situationally aware, stay chill, and give away a mysteriously unfocused life. 

What did I do when I and she parted ways many months ago? Initially, I sat delusionally in my room, on my own. Despite carrying out regular tasks, I could not come to complete terms with rejection. It was wayward and it took a while before the storm fizzled out in an unpleasant but relevant way.

Being a self-lover, I always used to underplay my thoughts and actions and always asked how the person at the other end was doing. And when the question turns back to me, I had no answers. 

A painful phase is a careful teacher. It really brought out the gold in me and churned me to evolve with purpose and wisdom. When I say wisdom, it is not in a zen-like sense, but in a normal, everyday sense, where we live and do stuff on our own. 

How do I love myself?

It came without practice. I learned it as I experienced it. It took away many of the inhibitions. That helped to present oneself in an unapologetic but original way. The two factors I naturally practiced are empathy and courage for oneself. Empathy for what I go through and courage to get things done without external help. 

I have not aligned myself with a life partner but developed a beautiful way to embed my universe to myself. I laid a nest and I live there peacefully. I don't seek the need for love as I found my love to be more rewarding, compounding, empathetic, unconditional, and organic. It does not mean I don't love or care less about people, but I have put in a framework, because I do not know any other ways to make it work, for now.

Self-love and accomplishing goals

It is absolutely worth a try to chase all the passions with zeal. They are our own, and no one else would any day capture the depth of how important they are to you and to your life.

I dream of a life where I accomplish my innate dreams, live true to my views, and beliefs, and march with a character.

Note to self - I have jotted down what has been hidden in my mind for many months. Maybe, I will come back to this after some progress is made. 

What about my goals? I know I can achieve a few, and I know I will try because I love myself more than anyone else!

So isn't self love a clear path to dig out the hidden gem in you?