Love yourself first!

I’ve always been told…'you meet people when you least expect it,’ or ‘they turn up when you’re not looking.’ Now, I’ve always been slightly pessimistic to these almost routine-like phrases. Is it something people say to singletons to make them feel just that bit better about not finding 'the one?'  And surely if I'm not looking and Mr. Perfect walks by, I’ll miss him right? And if we least expect it, does that mean he will walk by at 8:30 in the morning when I’m at the co-op getting milk, braving the braless look, in a pair of Primani joggers with my ‘I have not yet had a coffee’ eyes and ‘I don’t care for hair brushes at this time’ bouffant? Cause believe me, he’d keep walkin’!

Nonetheless, one piece of advice that I am a great believer in (and we all should be in this day in age, where 21st century over confidence and the egotistical generation game can sometimes get the better of us,) is to ‘Love yourself, before you Love anyone else.’ However, I appreciate and understand the difficulty to do just this when we can be knocked down by narcissistics and careless beings who are able to love themselves simply by making others feel like total shit (which of course people, is not the way to do it and may I add…that Karma will bite them in their stupid I love myself asses.) It seems that because we struggle to form strong relationships, commit to one another and respect one another, this phrase is more spoken then acted upon. It seems that within our generation, we skip from one partner to the next and this new norm of guys not wanting to settle down just yet because the new COD is coming out, there are a few things to get out of their system first (pah, there is no other meaning to this then a simple bone-everything), or my favourite and most popular response of ‘my heads not in the right place;’ our confidence and concept of loving ourselves becomes inexistent. As a result of this, our brains seem to run through every single time we have been rejected/put down or dumped over Facebook (yup still bitter.)

But I was told once that our brains are programmed to do just this. Once something goes wrong, in my case the continuous man hunt which always results in me being caught and trapped until the hunter gets bored and moves on to the next victim (strange metaphor but you get what I mean,) our brains begin to dwell on allll the other crap things that have happened in the past.

Recently, and believe me it pains me to type it; I became interested in a fellow who seemed to worship the ground I walked on. He told me how beautiful I was and how nice my eyes were and even though I was a little weird, (meh) he found me very interesting. This is the sort of thing that gives us girls that confidence boost and enables us to dig deep into that pocket of self worth to find that little thing called self love. BUT (there it is again,) of course as time passed and miss-ex-girlfriend begun texting again because she couldn't comprehend with his new found happiness,(it’s not just men,) I got the ‘I love spending time with you BUT, my heads not in the right place at the moment speech.’ And I'm pretty sure that is the updated version of the ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ talk that we all try to avoid both saying and hearing...

As much as I was genuinely interested in the guy, it’s not like we had been together for two years (heck 6 months would have even be a record for me,) but because similar events had happened and hurt me before, my brain went into overload. ‘Well Chelsea, this isn’t the only time this has happened now has it, what about in year ten hmmm, when you’re first boyfriend dumped you because you were too scared to ‘get off’ with him’ or in 2009 huh? When Mark decided to ditch you for that lesbian because she was ‘more of a challenge’ (fair play to him, you can’t get more of a challenge than that!) You almost start battling with your own mind ‘hey shut up!’, ‘wait, who told you about that?’

But this is a habit, just like smoking or biting your finger nails and it needs to and can be stopped. If you trained yourself into thinking and dwelling on the past that shouldn’t even matter anymore, then you can without a doubt train yourself back into not doing this. And as much as I have turned this blog into another reminiscent rant about another man-related experience, I say this to all of you reading (all three of you followers;) there is no need for anyone to make you doubt yourself…ever! Unfortunately, as I keep going on like some 80 year old lady who keeps repeating herself…in this generation, things are not simple or straightforward when it comes to relationships. And I think, a lot of the time, relationships fall because we have forgotten to love ourselves. We have to stop thinking about those who have made us forget, because everyone is right when they say to you, they are NOT worth a second thought, or the first for that matter.

Instead of thinking about how bad he made you feel, think about how good something makes you feel. Today! The present! A smile from someone who served you lunch, a joke told by a colleague, or your friends drunken dancing on Saturday night. Instead of throwing daggers (not literally, Shakespeare was good at his metaphors…me on the other hand) at his new ‘bit on the side,’ think about how lucky you are that you are out of that, and she has it all to come. Besides you are better than her anyway! You really are. And don’t think about what happened four years ago, where is he now? Still at his mother’s? Glued to the television, with a spliff in one hand and a poor girl on the other? And now ask yourself, where are you? Exactly.

Find out HOW to love yourself here: http://galadarling.com/static/about-gala