How often have you said, “I just want to be happy”? Everyone wants to be happy but how well do you know exactly what it is that would make you happy?  Would a bigger house, a new car or a new job make you happy? Many people would define happiness as having more of something that brings them pleasure, but what about the people you see who have very little but seem to enjoy every day life just where they are despite what they lack in material things? Happiness is a choice. Happiness is being content no matter what your circumstances might be. Happiness is having what you want and wanting what you do have. Having a lot of something won’t necessarily make you happy. One important key to happiness is to enjoy what you do have. Being frustrated about what you wish you had is pointless because it robs you of enjoying the present.

Happiness is an inside job and it begins with loving yourself. If I were to ask you to name all the things that you love, would you even think to include your own name? These are many things that are important in this life but nothing is more significant than loving yourself.  Everything else really falls in line behind this. Loving yourself means that you recognize that other people have opinions, anger, resentment, jealousy, fear and none of these feelings they have are about you even if they are directed at you. Loving yourself means being able to say no when someone else wants you to say yes. Loving yourself means not giving up before you get started because someone else said that you won’t be able to make it. Loving yourself means you might have to let go of some things (people, places and things) and embrace other things that you once thought were not important.   Most of all loving yourself means living in a state of forgiveness – which includes forgiving yourself.

Love yourself enough to make the changes in your life that will bring you true happiness. You deserve to be happy. You deserve to live a life you are excited about. Embrace and accept yourself including all of your imperfections. Stop hating yourself for everythings that you aren’t and start loving yourself for everything that you are. Work on loving the person in the mirror who has been through so much and is still standing. You have made it this far because there is so much more for you to do. You are special. You are unique. You have been courageous when fear tried to stop you. You have been honest when it would have been easier to lie. You have been compassionate when others were not. You have been real in a world filled with so many artificial things. You will never know how many people you have already inspired.  Love yourself and then you will have the blue print for loving others.

Learn to F. L.Y. – First Love Yourself