I think the little acts of self-care like face masks,
getting your nails done, going for a walk, taking time to read, and anything
else you can think of get a bad rap. A lot of people seem to believe these
things are not “real” or meaningful self-care. I don’t agree.
It took me a long time to learn to tolerate myself again,
let alone start loving myself. Part of what helped that was small acts of
self-care. I wasn’t ready to go to therapy. I wasn’t ready to talk to my doctor
about what medications could help. I wasn’t ready to start doing the things
that I needed to do to really improve my mental health, but I knew I hated
myself and I needed to do something.
I started small; keeping my nails done was the first step. I
figured that if my hands looked nice, I would feel more confident meeting new
people and shaking hands. Then I realized that my skin had seen better days, so
I started working on skincare and learning what my skin needs to be healthy. I’m
still not great at keeping a skincare routine, but it’s a vast improvement. I
noticed that when I was washing my face and applying my products that I was “talking”
to myself as I did it. I started trying to appreciate different parts of my face.
This led to me being able to appreciate different parts of my body and my mind.
Those small steps led to big steps because I now had some idea
of what it looked like to start taking care of myself. I spoke to my doctor
about meds, I started therapy. I started to treat myself they way I would treat
someone that I love. I worked on feeding myself well and working out. I worked
on learning how to be gentle with myself when I was struggling instead of
beating myself up.
I can’t say I’m just bursting at the seams with self-love
yet, but I definitely get along better with myself than I have in a very long
time.
