Unlock the Secret Sauce of Self-Love: The Ultimate Guide to Being Your Own BFF!" 🎉 Get ready to level up your self-love game as we dive into the "shit meter," redefine 'selfishness,' and discover how the simple act of loving yourself can change your life! 🚀💖 

B͇u͇l͇l͇e͇t͇ p͇o͇i͇n͇t͇s͇ o͇f͇ k͇e͇y͇ t͇o͇p͇i͇c͇s͇ +͇ c͇h͇a͇p͇t͇e͇r͇ m͇a͇r͇k͇e͇r͇s͇ 

🌼 Intro: Why We've Been MIA 

[00:00:00] The host talks about their recent "life reset" and why they've been off the grid. You can't pour from an empty cup, am I right? 

🌸 Chapter 1: What's the Big Deal About Self-Love? 

[00:00:39] What does it mean to love yourself? It's more than bubble baths, people! 

Exploring the 3 pillars of self-love: Seeing yourself, hearing yourself, and valuing yourself (SVH, baby!) 

How checking in with your feelings can be a game-changer. 🎮 

🍀 Chapter 2: Why You Gotta Love Yourself? 

[00:02:54] How self-love impacts the way the world treats you. Like, for reals. 

Introducing the "Shit Meter" concept – the ultimate gauge for people-pleasing. 💩 

🌺 Chapter 3: Real-world Examples of Self-Love 

[00:08:13] Are you your own hype person or worst critic? Spoiler alert: Pep talks win. 

Birthday celebrations: Do you party like it's your birthday or act like it's just another Tuesday? 

🌻 Chapter 4: Is Loving Yourself Selfish? 

[00:12:02] Debunking the selfish myth. Spoiler: It's not. 

Why putting your oxygen mask first isn't just for airplane emergencies. 🛫 

🌹 Chapter 5: How Self-Love Can Transform Your Life 

[00:16:06] Why embracing the 'New You' might mean saying 'Thank U, Next' to some folks. 

💕 Closing Notes 

Leave with a renewed sense of how to love, honor, and cherish yourself. Cause you're a catch! 😉 

L͇i͇n͇k͇s͇ f͇r͇o͇m͇ t͇h͇i͇s͇ e͇p͇i͇s͇o͇d͇e͇:͇ 

✔✔✔️ Register today for a full-on Life Makeover – a super easy, gentle and fun way to heal every aspect of your life with Art Therapy Meditations 

https://artoflifecenter.com/art 

✔✔✔️ Subscribe to Art of Life podcast 

https://listen.artoflifecenter.com/listen/ 

✔✔✔️ Leave a review for Art of Life podcast 

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Apple: Click link and scroll down to the Ratings & Reviews section near the bottom of the page, then give a 5star rating and write review https://podcastsconnect.apple.com/mypodcasts/show/artoflife/3c78b5c13de0446b8b8a8e8ccb1cd648/episodes 

Hi there.

So it has been some time for the art of life podcast.

I've just taken a little break and just settled back in trying

to really do what I preach for everybody else is go from the inside.

I've taken some steps and some thinking around just resetting

my own life to be able to connect with myself and then connect back

and give that to you even more.

Our topic today is called understanding, accepting and loving yourself.

So what does loving yourself mean?

I think that it's got to go beyond just having a luxurious bath or a long massage.

It's got to go beyond that.

My definition of loving yourself, of loving myself, is seeing myself,

hearing myself and valuing myself.

So, seeing would mean noticing my emotions.

How do I feel about something?

Hearing is letting those emotions come through, letting my own

inner voice come through.

And then just valuing myself, that this is how I'm feeling.

It's a little bit regardless to the other person or to the whole

situation, it's just giving.

space to myself.

That's sort of my duty to myself, right?

It's noticing how I feel, just checking in with my body to see how does a situation

or how does a person make me feel.

It probably would mean connecting with people and embracing

situations that are right for you.

Now, a lot of times we might find ourselves being at some party, for

example, or being in a situation where we are not really happy.

But just by the very act of checking in with myself, by hearing myself, by valuing

myself, I can then start making a decision whether I want to be a part of that party,

I want to be a part of that group or not.

So it will definitely lead to some shift.

And ideally where it's coming from is just you connecting with yourself.

The more you connect with yourself, the more you allow your inner joy and

your inner peace to take priority.

And slowly that shifts things around you.

Then the next question is, why loving yourself is important?

Like I said, for me the definition of loving myself is

seeing, valuing, hearing myself.

And by doing that, I basically am telling the whole world how to treat me.

I'm telling the world this is what I like, this is what I don't like.

You see, if I was to put myself in situations that I did not like

or I did not enjoy, and I just did not share that, voice it out,

then how is anybody else to know?

Sometimes it can be really small things as well.

Sometimes it can be big things as well.

And depending on where you are in your journey, nothing is right or wrong.

You know, you might let some things slip by.

Some things might become a little bit bigger for you that you need to speak.

And that's absolutely okay.

But it's just having those little situations where sometimes you

try to be nice, but it's not really working in your favor.

So examples, you might be nice because you don't want to upset someone else.

Their behavior is really upsetting you, their comment is really upsetting

you, but you just want to be nice.

So you suck it up and you be quiet.

And you can see that for yourself, how that plays out and we've all

been in a place as well where we've let those situations happen.

There might be a trend for you where you want to go and shift that as well.

What I've come to experience is I've got a really funny term for it.

I call it the shit meter, right?

The society programs us to be nice, to be good.

This is how you be good.

You listen to the other person.

Basically you obey whatever they are saying, whatever

they are wanting from you.

And you smile and you giggle and laugh and just basically be how they want you to be

even if it is not sitting right with you.

And my shit meter concept is, basically, that when we are trying to be nice,

it's almost like an exercise of how much shit am I allowing people to let in me,

literally, like that's the amount of shit I'm taking before I speak up, right?

So if the being nice part is above and beyond me, it goes beyond me.

I'm basically saying, "Hey, that's all right.

You can just say whatever comment you want.

You can put me in an uncomfortable situation and I will be nice.

So I will take all of that shit".

There was a time where I used to really pride myself with my shit meter as well.

You know, that person said so and so, so and so, and I was just so well

behaved I did not say a damn thing.

You know, my shit meter was like really, really high.

But it made me inside be really uncomfortable because

it wasn't working out, right?

You see within me is then all of that frustration and just like, look at me,

see me for me, see me, hear me, value me.

Because if somebody is undermining you then they are inherently crossing

at least one of those fragments.

They're either not seeing you, they're either not hearing you, they're either

not valuing you, or maybe all of these.

So, then it's your choice, and you have to see what becomes a priority for you.

Is it being nice?

Is it being kinder to somebody else?

Or is it being kind to yourself?

Personally, I found that , if you take that guilt away and you just said, or you

just let that emotion be shown of how you feel, it takes a whole lot of weight away

from you, because when you try to carry somebody's expectations of you, they might

be very well meaning as well, but when you are carrying that and when you're trying

to live up to that, there's a balance that you are shifting with yourself.

You essentially are giving them a little bit more importance

than you give to yourself.

And loving yourself comes back to loving yourself.

Taking pride in valuing yourself.

Just giving yourself that space to be and this is what I like,

this is what I don't like.

I have some examples for you just to think through if you want to think around

loving yourself and perhaps at least in my terms this is how it means to me.

Think of your day.

Think of just how you talk to yourself.

As you go around, are you criticizing yourself?

So are you saying, Hey, I'm running late and oh my God, I did that again.

Look silly me.

Is that your talk?

Or is your talk like, that's all right.

I'm running late.

It's fine.

I have always done this, whatever.

But like just doing a little bit of a pep talk with yourself.

What do you do?

Do you criticize yourself?

Or are you speaking with yourself?

Are you speaking to yourself kindly and lovingly?

Are you giving yourself that space?

Okay, another one to think of beyond that is just think of your birthday.

I know a lot of people as they grow up, they start thinking around other

people and their birthdays become more important and somehow their own birthday

becomes like a little bit lesser deal.

Are you celebrating yourself?

It doesn't have to be the biggest, most pompous celebration, but

are you giving yourself time?

Are you celebrating?

Are you saying, hey, happy birthday to me?

Are you celebrating your birth?

Are you celebrating that you, as a really capable living person,

capable of infinite stuff, who's had this myriad of experiences,

are you celebrating that person?

Are you celebrating what you bring to this world?

Are you celebrating that?

Are you grateful, do you feel blessed for that?

If not, I encourage you to start doing it.

And it doesn't mean you have to go out and have a really big lavish thing,

but start out with the baby steps.

Start out with the smallest things that you can.

Maybe write a card to yourself, maybe write a letter to yourself,

maybe buy a gift for yourself.

And hey, and that's another one.

So when is the last time you got yourself something?

And I don't mean got yourself clothes that you really needed to get or got yourself.

You know, anything, food that you really needed to eat, not that, but when did

you last buy something for yourself?

When did you last give something to yourself?

And giving is lots of things.

It doesn't have to be material things.

It could be just giving yourself time.

Like if you rested when you needed to rest, did you say, I did a great job.

I looked after myself.

Or, did you wake up and go like, oh shucks, I shouldn't have slept

or just felt guilty about it.

It's okay, I've done all of that.

I'm just bringing up all of these examples because potentially these

are things that we are all doing.

And if anything, I just want you to rethink these general

talks, these general concepts or beliefs that we have regarding us.

Give yourself the permission to live.

Give yourself the permission to love yourself.

Love yourself.

Celebrate yourself.

Okay, so next question, does loving yourself mean being selfish?

On the one hand, it does sound selfish, right?

Loving yourself means you're prioritizing yourself.

What about all the people who love you?

What about all the people who depend on you?

You know, you are not giving them as much importance by loving yourself.

And usually, the people who will say that are people who actually

want you to do something for them that will make them happier.

So they're effectively asking you to live your life in a way or part of it in a

way so that they can feel more fulfilled and they can feel more satisfied.

You see the game here?

Once you switch it around, you realize that if anybody is actually asking

you why are you loving yourself?

And why are you putting yourself first?

How are you selfish?

Then, they're essentially doing exactly the same to you.

They're putting their needs, they're putting their desires first.

Now truth is, I believe that if you actually start looking after yourself,

when you value yourself, when you love yourself, when you hear yourself, you see

yourself, the highest chances are that the more compassion you have for yourself,

the more compassion flows through you.

And it flows just not for you, it flows for other people as well.

You really give out and you emanate that compassion, that love and

kindness for everybody else as well.

There will still be definitely a few people who will still be troubled,

bothered by your changed stance.

And perhaps they're not the people to align with because they were

tramping over your boundaries anyway.

Hehe.

So well, here, I think that you come in your body.

You did not come into somebody else's life first.

You first came into your body, your life.

Your first priority is your own skin, like just looking after yourself.

If you look at airlines and when they're giving their safety

announcements, they always say, hook yourself first, put on your safety

mask first before helping someone else.

It's literally that principle.

If you do not have enough to give out, if you have not loved yourself enough to give

out, you cannot love someone else enough.

If you do not have, let's say, one cup of water, you can't give

one cup of water to someone else.

But you need to first have that cup yourself.

So you need to first nourish yourself rather than depending

on somebody else to nourish you.

It's actually a really good principle around just nourishing yourself, being

self sustaining, being self complete.

Nourishing yourself, looking after yourself, looking after your own needs, so

that when your partner or when your loved ones, when they need you, if you've got

enough love, if you feel loved and cared and looked after, you can give them more.

Okay, so I hope that really helps you.

My last question for today is how loving yourself can change your life.

I wanted to give a few examples here on what happens when

you start loving yourself.

You'll notice that the more you do you, you're actually teaching the world to

treat yourself in that same way as well.

The universe gets that exact same command.

A shift happens and some people will feel uncomfortable with that shift.

Some people will feel that you've changed and essentially that is

because your new version doesn't suit their version and that's okay.

Sometimes they'll take some time, they might just change and they'll change their

way of dealing with you, their way of expecting with you and they'll stay there.

Some people will just leave and that's okay as well because if they were really

loving you, if they really saw you and heard you, if they really valued you,

they would just pat your back, they would be like, you, you go, you go.

So it's okay.

As you shift that vibration, as you shift this vibration of really

stepping into you, acknowledging yourself more, giving yourself more

space, you're raising your vibration.

New people will come, you will find new experiences coming into your life.

You'll find more people who resonate more with you.

You'll find more people where you can be really honest, authentic, and they

see your light and you see their light.

You create a much better world.

I'd like to leave you with this.

Think about the time when you were born.

You know, just imagine yourself up in the air and hopefully you're

the spirit and you're thinking, Okay, where do I want to go?

Who are my parents?

And you're looking at your life and you were just thinking if

you want to be born on Earth.

Now, back in that time, when you are wanting to be born, I bet you're

not thinking, well, I will go down there and I will serve X, Y, and Z.

And I will spend the rest of my life doing that and being really sad.

Probably your thought coming into this world was to create to create

a life that you really liked, to have joy, to really live this life.

So you owe that to yourself.

Owe your life, your life purpose, your life meaning, your life joy

to yourself, because that's how you bring out your fullest potential.

That's how you are your most enlightened self to be able to give

out that light and to be able to give out that love in this world.

I highly encourage you to just think about where you are at

in your equation with yourself.

How much you love yourself.

And then think around ways of how you can just do it a little bit more because

we all possibly can, including me.

If you're interested, I've got a really brilliant program.

It's called Life Makeover.

You'll find it at artoflifecenter.com/art.

In this program, Life Makeover program, I basically have five amazing modules.

We do a little bit of art, we do a little bit of visualization, and we play.

With every single session, I show you how you can have a little bit

more in your life, how you can have a little bit more abundant life.

I teach you everything from controlling or basically taking back your

ownership with time, to manifesting, to loving yourself, accepting

yourself more, healing past traumas.

It is absolutely amazing and it's gentle.

It's fun.

It's really art therapy based.

So you will have a blast.

If you're interested, just click on the link and you will know more.

I will see you there.

So till next time, I will see you next time at the Art of Life podcast.

Thank you so much for joining me today.

I will see you soon.