THE SELF LOVE DECISION – WHAT IT ACTUALLY MEANS

 

This year I decided to go on a self-love journey. I wanted to really love myself finally. 

To want to love yourself and to actually love yourself are two different things, I always had the intent but didn’t really know how to execute it.

After praying to God about this one day I stood in front of the mirror – like okay God! Time to love myself! any minute now! As you can imagine I didn’t feel any different. So I knew something was wrong.

So I decided to change tactics. I read the famous Corinthians 13 and watched a few sermons. Which was when I had realised I had got it all wrong. I had completely miss understood what love was. I had reduced love to just an emotion, a tingling feeling in my body. For my whole life I had been waiting for an feeling of love. Not realising that love is way more than that.

Love is a conscious decision/demonstration, where conscious actions are made. To reduce love to just a feeling would be to massively underestimate its power, purpose and capability. It would reduce it to a temporary thing.

You can literally decide to love yourself. All this time I had been waiting for an emotion without realising that it was my actions towards myself that needed to change.

Making the decision to love yourself is easy, its the living in that decison that takes work.

Once you make that decision you need to:

1. Protect that decision: Maybe there are things you need to stop doing that make you lose confidence in that decision (for example social media) or things you need to start doing that grow your confidence in that decision. 
2. Trust that decision: Know that the love you are giving you are giving yourself isn’t what you feel at that time but what you know. 
3. Hope in that decision: Have hope that the decision you’ve made to love yourself will change your negative perspective of life to positive.
4. Persevere in that decision: In a world that tells you to compare yourself to others and makes you feel inadequate, you have to persevere and go against the norm in the decision you’ve made to know that you are good enough.

Once you fully master how to show love to yourself, you will be able to successfully reciprocate this unto other people.

I would encourage you to read 1 Corinthians 13: 4-7 make notes on how you can demonstrate love to God and to yourself. Also I have attached this video by transformation church that really helped me understand these concepts too!

With love always,

Temi xx

 

 

NO MORE WAITING FOR MR/MRS RIGHT…

You are not an afterthought. You are not there to serve someone as it pleases them. You are not there for when someone gets bored.

Why do we allow ourselves to be treated as such?

It is not worth losing part of yourself to accommodate someone else. You do not need to shrink back, so that someone else can fit. They can never complete you. Your DNA is not theirs. They can never fill up where you have lost yourself because they are not you.

And how many times have you said “One day I’ll find someone that treats me better”

Let’s take back control.

It’s not about waiting for someone to treat you better. Let’s stop relying on others to validate ourselves. We are always shifting our worth from one person’s opinion to the next. We need to stop giving other people the power to judge the way they think we should be treated but how you believe you should be treated. Do not believe you have to accept everything you are offered.

Instead of waiting for Mr/Mrs right to show us how to be treated; Let’s start focusing on how we are treating ourselves. We need to start setting new standards in our lives. Not just in relationships but in every aspect of our lives.

If you don’t give yourself the best you can’t expect anyone to else simply because you don’t know how it feels to be given the best. if we only accept the best from ourselves FIRST, it will be harder to accept anything less from others. This might be working out because you deserve to have the best body you can get. Putting in effort in your education because you deserve the best grade. It will be very hard to accept just anyone into your life when you uphold yourself to a high standard.

It’s so easy to settle when we meet a person, we think “well I don’t know when the next person will come along’. Low self-worth allows us to believe that we need to take what we can get. But regardless of  whether or not someone comes into your life, it’s important that you feel secure enough within yourself because you know how to give yourself the best. A person should never be a competition but only ever be an addition to your life.

It’s time to evaluate. Have you been giving yourself the best? Is this reflecting in your past and present relationships?

With love always

Temi xx

 

YOU ARE VALUABLE

To be valuable:

To have qualities worthy of respect, admiration, or esteem.

When you are valuable:

-Many see, but cannot attain;

– Some go above their means to attain;

– Only few can attain.

Many see, but cannot attain: When you have value you will not be attainable to everyone. When I was younger I used to quantify my worth by how much attention I got. But what I failed to realise is that when you are of high value, you become intimidating and not everyone has access to you. Attention is not a reflection of your worth. God is not going to reveal how valuable you are to everyone, so do not devalue yourself in order to become attainable to the masses.

Some go above their means to attain: These are probably the most dangerous ones. They know they do not deserve you, but when you do not know your worth they are able to get what they do not deserve. They may present themselves as worthy, but this image/lifestyle that they cannot sustain. This becomes apparent with time. Not everyone that gives you attention or shows interest deserves you.

Only a few can attain: To be able differentiate between these and the ones that go above their means takes patience and discernment from God. These people see your true worth and never make you feel less than that. They are not intimidated by your greatness but inspired by it.

You have to be careful of who you give yourself to. No matter how good their intentions may seem, not everyone deserves to know every part of you. You do not want to be left feeling robbed because you did not know your value.

This is not just focusing on relationships, but this can be applied to anything you have to offer. For example your craft, or your time etc. Don’t let people take advantage. Humans are opportunists. But think about it, if you could get something good for cheaper than it should be, why wouldn’t you?

One of the most important relationships you will ever have is the one you have with yourself however this is one of the most neglected. I urge you to take the time necessary to really begin to appreciate yourself and understand that you are valuable.

Know that you are beautiful in spite of what the world says.

Know that you are wonderfully and fearfully made.

Know that God has said that you are valuable, it is up to you whether you choose to accept it.

ARE YOU WILLING TO GIVE UP THE MAN OF YOUR DREAMS – FOR THE MAN OF GOD’S PLAN?

The man of our dreams is perfect and can do no wrong and has been idolised in our mind. Whereas the man of God’s plan lacks perfection, but is perfect in purpose.

The man of our dreams has been created by us. It is not a mystery why women upon entering relationships find themselves trying to mould and change the person they are with.

Are you too focused on your fantasy that you are ignoring what God has planned for you?

This is not to say that you shouldn’t have standards, but are your standards based on vanity or on God’s guidelines?

The man of your dreams is everything you want whereas the man of Gods plan is everything you need.

When you focus on the man of your dreams you look for what you want rather than what you need. The things that used to be important to YOU now seem so far away. At some point in your life you will experience a time where someone is presented to you that seems so right that it almost feels cruel for them not to have been sent by God.

One of life’s greatest tests is walking away from something you want because you know it’s not what you need.

Sometimes it’s not obvious as the person may tick all the superficial and skin deep boxes and if life was just about getting Instagram likes then this would be enough. But we have to think deeper than that. We have to think long-term. Are you on the same page spiritually? Do they see your weaknesses and build you up? Are they a partner in purpose?

When we shift our focus from things that we need to the things that we want we start making decisions based on emotions.

It’s hard to walk away from seeing everything you want in the flesh because we cannot see beyond what is in front of us. The fear of the unknown begins to strike. What if they are the one? What if I’m making a mistake? I know the bible says this isn’t right but then why would God bring them into my life?

You have to think of the costs of your compromises. Making a compromise is like buying something with a credit card. They allow you to enjoy now but sooner or later you have to pay up. Often, the paying up later hurts more as it leads to regrets and resentment.

God has designed our lives so that we can only take one day at a time. So it’s hard to have faith in what is to come. But we have to remember that God has made a person specifically for us. You won’t have to make costly compromises for this person, as they were made to match you perfectly.

So are you going to give up the man/woman of your dreams for the man/woman of Gods plan?

With love always,

Temi xx