When Kamal Ravikant found himself at rock bottom, bereft from a failed startup and a lost loved one, he decided to start practicing some life-changing self-love and to never look back. In his book, Love Yourself Like Your Life Depends On It
“Love yourself with the same intensity you would use to pull yourself up if you were hanging from a cliff with your fingers. As if your life depended on it. Once you get going, it’s not hard to do. It just takes commitment.”
Over time, our self-talk carves out pathways in our brains. We come back to these pathways again, for better or worse.
Kamal’s idea is to consciously develop a new pathway that is deeper than all the others, so that all of our thoughts continually flow through this channel of self-love.
“I love myself. I love myself. I love myself.”
Are you ready for your first exercise?
This month, keep the words “I love myself” running through your mind—constantly.
When you lock your keys in the house for the second time this week? “I love myself.”
When you totally nail that presentation? “I love myself.”
When you forget to play Tooth Fairy because you were preoccupied with packing lunches and signing reading logs and watching the season premier of Gray’s? “I love myself.”
When you’re driving in the car with your favorite song on? “I love myself.”
All day, every day. High or low. “I love myself.”
As Kamal says, “This is a practice. You don’t go to the gym once and consider yourself done. Same here. Meditation is a practice. Working out is a practice. Loving yourself, perhaps the most important of all, is a practice.”
Are you up for it?? 🙂
Now back to carving that new pathway…
I love myself, I love myself, I love myself…
Hi Erica,
A great post and a great idea to do a series on self-love. It is a good reminder to love myself, particularly in those moments when I’m not feeling that good about myself. I will try to constantly remind myself this month. I used to practice saying the words in front of the mirror. Looking forward to reading more.
Thanks so much, Amor. Kamal actually talks about looking into the mirror when you say this – He does it for five solid minutes! So keep it up! 😉 Thanks so much for reading and taking the time to comment!
Great! I’m in!
I just tried this and can’t say it with out crying. I really need this. I am very much looking forward to this month. I found this article on the day that I accepted that I got Rick bottom.
Hi Miss Aimee, I’m sorry I’m late saying so, but I just wanted to tell you how touched I was by this comment. I NEED reminders like this from women like you to help me remember why I think this topic is so important. Thank you, sincerely. Thank you so much for being here, and many best wishes.
I just read Cheryl Richardson’s The Art of Extreme Self-Care and she has a whole chapter about this. So, I printed out a pretty picture from Google that says “I love you” and have framed it to put next to my bathroom mirror for a reminder to tell myself. Seems like it could be a potentially life changing thing to do. Thanks! Love your blog!
Hi Karen! Yes! What a beautiful place to put that reminder. Good for you!
And I just recently heard of that book, so now that I’ve heard about it twice, I think I better go look it up! Thanks for the idea!