I’ve spent so much of my life looking outside myself for love. This week, I realized something unexpected: I might finally be learning what falling in love with yourself actually looks like. And it happened during the most ordinary, uncomfortable week.
For a long time, I thought one of the biggest things missing from my life was love.
Not love in the broad sense. Romantic love. Partnership. Being chosen by someone who saw me, wanted me, and decided that I was the person they wanted to build a life with.
I still want that.
I don’t think there is anything wrong with wanting companionship. I want to experience being deeply loved by another person. I want intimacy. I want partnership. I want someone to share life with.
But lately, something unexpected has been happening.
While I’ve been looking for someone else to love me, I’ve been falling in love with myself.
And strangely, it hasn’t happened through affirmations or standing in front of a mirror telling myself how amazing I am.
It’s been happening through ordinary, uncomfortable moments.
A difficult conversation with a client.
A payment I had to stop chasing.
A situation I wanted to explore but ultimately decided wasn’t right for me.
Someone I wanted to hear from who didn’t call.
Tiny moments. But each one has forced me to answer the same question:
What do I do when choosing myself might disappoint someone else?
And I think I’m finally beginning to understand that the answer to that question has a lot to do with self-love.
I Used to Think Being Kind Meant Being Accommodating
Earlier this week, I had a disagreement with a longtime client.
I started my business in 2020. Like many people starting something new, I learned as I went. My prices were low, I wanted to keep clients happy, and I probably gave far more than I charged for.
Over the years, my experience grew. My work improved. My prices changed.
But with this particular client, I had kept her on an old rate partly because she had referred other clients to me. I saw it as my way of appreciating what she had done for me.
Then she wanted additional work.
I gave her a price that was still significantly below what I would currently charge someone new.
And she pushed back.
She wanted the arrangement to be exactly what she remembered paying years ago.
I remember being genuinely shocked.
Part of me kept thinking: But can’t you see how much grace I’ve already extended here?
I felt angry. I felt unappreciated. And, because I’m me, another thought quickly appeared:
Was I too harsh?
I sent the conversation to people I trust and asked them to read it. They reassured me that I hadn’t been rude.
But something about that interaction stayed with me.
Eventually, I realized the bigger lesson wasn’t really about whether this client was right or wrong.
It was about me.
Why did advocating for myself make me so uncomfortable that I immediately needed reassurance that I was still a good person?
Maybe a Boundary Doesn’t Need an Apology
I knew what my work was worth.
I knew my current rates.
I knew I had already made accommodations.
Yet saying, No, I cannot do that for this amount anymore, still felt strangely uncomfortable.
That’s when I started thinking about how easily kindness can become self-abandonment when we don’t know where to stop.
Being generous is beautiful.
Being understanding is beautiful.
Being loyal is beautiful.
But none of those things require you to remain permanently available under conditions you have outgrown.
Someone can have helped you in the past, and you can genuinely appreciate them, without owing them indefinite access to an older version of you.
That realization felt important.
Gratitude does not require permanent indebtedness.
And maybe self-love sometimes looks incredibly unromantic.
Sometimes it looks like sending the price and not negotiating against yourself afterward.
Sometimes Self-Respect Looks Like a System
Then another client situation happened.
A payment was supposedly on its way, but I couldn’t see any evidence of it. I asked about it. I followed up.
Nothing.
Normally, I might have continued working while waiting for an explanation because I wouldn’t want to inconvenience anyone.
This time, I stopped posting.
Not dramatically. No angry message. No argument.
I simply decided that work would resume when payment did.
Eventually, the payment came through.
And something clicked.
I’ve spent years thinking being professional meant being endlessly accommodating.
But professionalism works both ways.
If I am expected to deliver work on time, it is reasonable for me to expect payment on time.
More importantly, I realized that I shouldn’t have to renegotiate this boundary emotionally every month.
I need systems.
Clear contracts. Clear payment dates. Clear policies about what happens when payment is late. Clear expectations about scope and additional work.
Because sometimes self-respect isn’t another difficult conversation.
Sometimes self-respect is creating a system that means you don’t have to keep having the conversation.
I’m Learning the Difference Between Desire and Decision
Something else happened this week that taught me an entirely different lesson.
I found myself in a social situation that was new, exciting and outside what I normally experience.
And it awakened some curiosity in me.
There were parts of it that I enjoyed. There were things I found intriguing. And if I’m being completely truthful, there were desires I had to admit to myself instead of pretending they weren’t there.
The old version of me might have immediately started worrying about what having those feelings meant about me.
I’m trying not to do that anymore.
I’m learning that I can observe myself without immediately judging myself.
I can say:
Interesting. I didn’t know that about myself.
But something even more important happened afterward.
When I got home and thought about the situation clearly, I realized that although part of me was curious, I didn’t want the complications surrounding that particular situation.
And for once, I didn’t need to make my desire wrong in order to make my decision right.
That felt like growth.
I can want something and still decide that the circumstances aren’t good for me.
I can be curious and have boundaries.
I can acknowledge attraction without acting on it.
I can enjoy an experience without deciding that every door it opens needs to be walked through.
Maybe knowing yourself isn’t about creating a perfectly neat identity.
Maybe it’s being able to say:
This is what I feel. This is what I want. And this is still what I choose.
Those three things don’t always have to be identical.
Why Knowing Yourself Is Part of Learning to Love Yourself
I’ve written before about my fear of being seen.
And I’m realizing there is another side to that conversation.
The more willing I become to see myself, the less frightened I am of what I find.
I’m discovering my boundaries.
My desires.
My anger.
My curiosity.
My insecurities.
The things that make me feel respected and the things that immediately make something inside me tighten.
I’m also learning that knowing myself doesn’t mean obeying every emotion I have.
Quite the opposite.
It means I can notice an emotion without letting it make the decision for me.
I can be angry and still communicate carefully.
I can desire something and still walk away.
I can miss someone and still not chase them.
I can want to be chosen and still choose myself.
That last one might be the biggest lesson of all.
My Life Cannot Be a Waiting Room
There is someone I’ve been seeing.
After we last spent time together, days passed without me hearing from him.
There was a time when something like that would have consumed me.
Why hasn’t he called?
Did I do something?
Does he still want me?
What does this mean?
I could have built an entire emotional crisis around somebody else’s silence.
And this time, I noticed something different happening inside me.
Of course I wondered about him.
Of course I would have liked to hear from him.
But underneath that was another voice that I’m only recently learning to recognize.
It said:
Your life still matters.
Whether this person calls or doesn’t call.
Whether this becomes something or doesn’t.
Whether somebody chooses you as their partner or nobody does right now.
Your life still matters.
And I don’t mean that in the motivational-poster way.
I mean I suddenly understood how much of my life I had unconsciously treated like a waiting room.
Waiting to be chosen.
Waiting for someone to recognize my value.
Waiting for romantic love to arrive and somehow confirm that my life had become complete.
But what happens to all the days before that?
They’re my life too.
I don’t want to spend them waiting.
I Still Want Love
This is important.
I’m not arriving at some conclusion that I don’t need anyone.
I don’t think independence requires pretending we don’t need connection.
I still want romantic love.
I still want companionship.
I still want someone to choose me.
But I no longer want being chosen to be the evidence that I am valuable.
I’m also learning that there may be something psychologically important about building worth that isn’t dependent on external approval. Research on self-compassion and self-worth has found that self-compassion is associated with a more stable sense of worth that is less dependent on outside validation.
Maybe falling in love with yourself doesn’t mean wanting other people less. Maybe it means no longer needing their love to prove that your own life is valuable.
Falling in Love With Yourself Changes the Assignment
For years, I thought the assignment was finding the right person.
Maybe I had it slightly wrong.
Because while I’ve been searching outward, life keeps turning me inward.
Every uncomfortable experience seems to hand me another piece of myself.
Oh. That’s a boundary.
That’s something that makes me angry.
That’s something I desire.
That’s something I’m afraid of.
That’s a situation I don’t want.
That’s where I still seek reassurance.
That’s where I need to speak up.
That’s where I need to stop waiting for permission.
I’m meeting myself through my reactions.
And the more I meet her, the more I like her.
Not because she’s perfect.
Actually, almost the opposite.
I’m beginning to love myself because I’m finally allowing myself to become a whole person rather than a carefully managed collection of acceptable qualities.
Maybe This Is What Falling in Love With Yourself Feels Like
I used to imagine self-love as reaching some beautiful emotional state where you wake up every morning feeling confident and completely secure.
I’m starting to think it’s much more practical than that.
Maybe self-love is noticing when you’re uncomfortable and asking why.
Maybe it’s admitting what you want without shaming yourself for wanting it.
Maybe it’s saying no even when someone preferred the version of you who always said yes.
Maybe it’s allowing somebody to misunderstand you without immediately abandoning your position.
Maybe it’s building systems that protect you.
Maybe it’s letting someone walk away without running after them to prove you’re worth staying for.
Maybe it’s making decisions you can respect yourself for afterward.
And maybe, slowly, all of those little choices create something much deeper than confidence.
They create self-trust.
I’m beginning to realize that self-love may have less to do with constantly feeling good about yourself and more to do with how you treat yourself when life gets uncomfortable. Research on self-compassion suggests something similar: learning to respond to ourselves with kindness during difficult moments can support psychological well-being.
What Falling in Love With Yourself Actually Looks Like
I’m still open to love.
Very open.
But something has changed.
I don’t want another person to become the place where I finally feel worthy, important or chosen.
I’m learning to build that home inside myself first.
And strangely, the more I do that, the less desperate love feels.
I can want it without waiting for it.
I can hope for it without organizing my worth around it.
I can meet people without asking them, consciously or unconsciously, to tell me who I am.
Because I’m beginning to know.
Maybe that was the assignment all along.
I went looking for someone to see me.
Someone to choose me.
Someone to love me.
And somewhere along the way, I started seeing, choosing and loving myself.
Maybe falling in love with yourself isn’t finally believing you’re perfect.
Maybe it’s finally knowing yourself well enough that you stop leaving yourself every time someone else enters the room.
I’m beginning to think falling in love with yourself happens exactly this way: one small decision at a time, every time you choose not to abandon yourself.
And right now, I think that’s the kind of love I’m learning. 🌱
Have you ever reached a point where you realized the love or validation you were searching for from other people was something you needed to start giving yourself? I’d genuinely love to hear what that looked like for you.
