/g/ - girl talk

>I always hear people saying to "love yourself" but these are usually people who get tons of validation and attention from others

Or they could be people who came to realize that one can't stop others from complimenting them so they politely roll with it instead of being self deprecating.

I do think that its possible to love yourself and not actively seek validation from others.

You don't have to ~love yourself~, you just have to be fair to yourself. You shouldn't judge yourself more harshly than you judge others, you don't need to be perfect or better than everyone else, you don't owe it to anybody to meet their standards either. You can dislike things about yourself, but as long as you're not hurting anybody you don't need get overemotional and self loathing over it. I've noticed that my insecurities are often a reflection of other people's expectations rather than my own (eg idgaf about being popular but for a long time I stressed over it because other people think it's important), so it helps to really think hard about why you feel this way and figure out who you're trying to impress. If it's other people, fuck em. If it's you, either you can work on it or accept it.

Separating yourself from whatever ways you use to seek validation can wean you off it. I hate attention whores so I derive self esteem from not needing/seeking praise, but I only got to this point by cutting myself off from SNS and minimizing my social life.

idk if this is self love exactly, but i've been in bouts of depression and i somehow woke myself up by just not giving a fuck about other people's expectations and i feel so free.

>>72876
Im not an attention whore but I sometimes feel worthless if people don't like me
>>72879
How did you stop caring?

it might seem counterintutive but loving yourself is easier if you're less egoic so you can see yourself without the bias that you're an exceptionally shitty person.
the stronger an ego you have, the more often you'll probably hate yourself because your behavior and thoughts don't match up with what your ego thinks you should be.

>If you can’t love yourself how in the hellare you gonna love somebody else

You have to be your own cheerleader. Self validation come from setting realistic goals for yourself and giving yourself permission to feel good about achieving them.

You don’t need to pay attention to what everyone is saying about you. Learn to listen and weed out what needs to be paid attention to and what doesn’t. 90% of the negative stuff others say doesn’t need to be heard and you don’t have to take anyone else’s baggage on board.

Basically, things become a choice. You take on what others want to say or who they want you to be or you just drop it all and do your thing. The kind of people constantly giving negatives to you are the kind of people you don’t need to listen to anyway, because you will never satisfy them.

Validation from others can lead to dependent behaviour and constantly trying to do the next thing to gain more validation. Sometimes it never comes, sometimes it’s not in the format you want or from the source you were hoping.

In short:
Be your own cheerleader
Give genuine validation to others when it is deserved
Give genuine compliments to others
When the voice in your head starts to talk negative, talk back to it with all the awesome things you do (sometimes a making a great cup of tea counts)
People are idiots and you don’t need to listen to everyone
You are allowed to say “fuck it” and put yourself first
You are not selfish for not pandering to everyone
You can do it, because you are so full of untapped potential to be super awesome. You just need to find a way to cultivate and tap that inner voice that tells you how awesome you are.

I think self love is very much like a parental love, or should be. It’s unconditional, but also not about blind praise or ego. The kind of love where you want to see someone grow and succeed. I think that’s the ideal kind of self love.

>>73018

Entirely this, Anon. Well put.