This is a lesson on love that I’m still learning every day.

Sometimes the hardest person to love, is ourselves.

Self love goes deeper than posting a selfie on Instagram or feeling pretty when you walk out the door.

It’s this contentment and confidence in who you are, in what you say, in your story.

I’m not good at this every day. Lately Satan has been working hard to make me feel like less than I am. 

I don’t think I really, truly love myself until I was married. And I didn’t even realize it. I thought I did, I told myself I didn’t care what people thought or said, and most of the time I didn’t.

But being married to Randy brought out another element of loving myself that I didn’t know I’d been missing. I was more than comfortable in my own skin, I relished in it. Of course I always wanted to be a better person, a better wife, friend, Latter-day Saint, etc. but I stopped feeling inhibited by people around me. 

I went to weddings and joked and danced like crazy and didn’t wonder if people thought I was weird looking. I told Randy stupid stories and laughed at myself. I was goofy with my family and didn’t mind that they told me I was being goofy. 

It was a different experience entirely. I stopped living my life with my guard up. I didn’t need to impress anyone and I didn’t need to worry what they thought.

It was an insanely wonderful experience. Now I’m not always like that, there are days that I am worried what people are saying or thinking. 

And again, I do always want to be the best version of myself that I can possibly be.

But I realized what being myself, and loving myself, really meant. And it’s easier to get back to that now that I know what to look for.

Self love is one of the most important loves in my opinion. Self love makes every other kind of love easier, and more worthwhile.