Learning to Like the Person You Live With: 6 Ways to Build a Better Relationship With Yourself
What do you see when you look in the mirror? Not necessarily physically, but in the depths of the eyes staring back at you. Who is that person? What about that person do you admire? What makes you want to be friends with them? What would you say to that person if they were sitting across from you?
Sometimes when we look at ourselves, we don't see the whole person. We see our trauma, our shame, our mistakes, the decisions we wish we could take back, the moments when we didn't show up the way we wanted to.
We can become so focused on who we aren't that we forget to notice who we are. But you can choose to build a different relationship with yourself. You can learn to see the person who made good decisions, the person who was an overcomer, the person who persevered when things were hard. You can learn to recognize that your past is part of your story, but it doesn't have to determine your present or your future.
Here are six ways to start building a better relationship with yourself.
1. Notice What You Are Grateful For
Life is what we make it. That doesn't mean we can control everything that happens to us, but we can become more intentional about where we allow our attention to go. It's easy to spend the day thinking about everything we don't like, everything that went wrong, or everything we still need to accomplish. Try noticing what you do enjoy. Maybe it's your morning coffee, a conversation with someone you love, a funny moment with your child, a beautiful sunset, or just getting through a difficult day.
Gratitude doesn't erase the hard things. It simply reminds us that the hard things aren't the only things. The more we notice what we appreciate about our lives, the easier it can become to appreciate the person living it.
2. Follow Through With Yourself
Think about how it feels when someone repeatedly tells you they are going to do something and then doesn't. You start to lose trust. We can do the same thing to ourselves. If you tell yourself you are going to take a walk, make an appointment, clean something up, or finally give yourself some time to rest, and you continually don't follow through, you may begin to feel disappointed in yourself. Start small. Make a promise to yourself that you can realistically keep, and then keep it. Following through builds trust with yourself. It reminds you, "I can count on me."
3. Notice Your Strengths and Your Progress
We are often much better at noticing what we do wrong than what we do right. Take some time to recognize your strengths. What have you survived? What have you learned? What are you getting better at? What are you doing today that you couldn't do a year ago? And remember, progress doesn't always look impressive. Sometimes, progress is getting out of bed. Sometimes, it's eating when you don't feel like it, making the difficult phone call, setting a boundary, getting through a hard day, or simply choosing to try again. You don't have to accomplish something extraordinary to be proud of yourself.
4. Accept That You're Human
You are not invincible. You are not going to be great at everything. You are going to make mistakes. You are going to disappoint yourself sometimes. You are going to have moments where you don't respond the way you wish you had. And that's okay! Growth doesn't require you to be perfect. It requires you to be willing to learn.
Ask yourself, "What can I learn from this?" instead of "What's wrong with me?" There is a difference between accountability and beating yourself up. You can take responsibility for your choices while still giving yourself grace.
5. Make Time for Yourself
It's easy to have "free time" and immediately fill it. The laundry needs to be done. Someone needs something. There's another errand. There's another task on the list. But when was the last time you intentionally spent time with yourself? Not productive time, not time catching up on responsibilities, just time to breathe.
Read a book. Sit outside. Watch the sunset. Drink your coffee slowly. Listen to music. Take a walk. Do something you enjoy simply because you enjoy it. You deserve to experience yourself outside of what you accomplish for everyone else.
6. Drown Out the Noise
Sometimes we are so surrounded by noise that we don't know what our own thoughts sound like anymore (or sometimes feel like we don’t want to know). We fill silence with the phone, social media, other people's opinions, expectations, comparisons and/or constant stimulation. Give yourself opportunities for quiet.
Being alone with yourself doesn't have to mean criticizing yourself or replaying everything you've done wrong. It can become an opportunity to understand yourself. You can recognize your mistakes without internalizing your mistakes. You can acknowledge your past without living there. You can practice self-forgiveness while still taking responsibility for what you want to do differently moving forward.
Here's the thing: The person you are today doesn't have to be the person you were yesterday. Giving yourself grace is an important part of learning how to love yourself again. Your past may have shaped you, but it doesn't have to be your present or your future. You can learn from what happened. You can learn what you are and aren't capable of. You can recognize where you need to grow. You can celebrate how far you've come. And maybe, little by little, when you look in the mirror, you'll start seeing something different. Not a perfect person. Not someone who has it all figured out. Just someone who is worth knowing, worth understanding, and worth being kind to.
If having a healthy relationship with yourself feels difficult, therapy can help. Therapy can provide a space to explore the experiences, beliefs, shame, and self-criticism that may be shaping the way you see yourself. You can learn to understand yourself more deeply, practice self-compassion, build confidence, and create a relationship with yourself that feels safer and more accepting.
Sometimes learning to love yourself starts with simply learning to see yourself clearly.
