Love Yourself First

There is less than a week until Valentine´s day and for some, this day really puts a spotlight on your relationship status. I am a romantic at heart and I think that’s because I grew up watching Disney movies on repeat. If you stop to think about it, the classic Disney films with female leads always follow the same pattern. The princess is in distress and is ultimately saved by her prince charming. It happened to all of them: Snow White, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty, should I go on?

Naturally, I grew up thinking that one of my biggest goals in life was to find that perfect man, and at that moment my life would be complete. That led me to always have crushes on boys at school and when Valentine's Day came around and I didn’t receive a letter from a secret admirer I would be crushed. I started to think that a girls worth came from how pretty she was and how many boys were after her, which thinking about it today really saddens me. In my teenage years I started changing my personality to what I thought would be attractive to boys. When I first started dating I settled for the first boy available, that wasn’t a good experience as he kind of mentally abused me and threatened me when I wanted to leave him. Ultimately I stayed with him for two years because I thought having a boyfriend was cool. That is one of my biggest regrets.

Many years have passed and I have drastically changed the way I think. One thing that I have realised is that before you can love a partner you need to first love yourself. You need to feel content with yourself and feel like you are the only person in charge of your happiness. If not, you will start looking for the thing you are missing in a partner, and perfect as your partner can be, they will never be able to truly fill that whole. And if that relationship ends, you will feel broken and lost.

It is wonderful to find someone you love, but you should see that person as a life partner and not as the sole reason for your existence. There is a fine line between loving someone and depending on someone.

What I’m trying to say is, regardless if you are in a relationship or not, you need to learn to love yourself fist. You only have one life, so nurture yourself and try to fix by yourself the little holes that sometimes life makes. Love as much as you can but never feel like your happiness is in the hands of someone else. And if you feel like you are in a relationship that is causing you more heartbreak than happiness, learn to let go because life is too short and you should never allow someone to make your life difficult