Conversations these days teem with the trending buzzwords of self-love and self-care. Thanks to this newfound popularity, bolstered by social media and popular culture, the self-care industry has grown into a multi-billion-dollar industry. As a result, self-love has been commodified, such that people are being taught to believe that spending money is perhaps the only way to have a good time and care for oneself.
This is because social media algorithms peddle certain lifestyles, wherein self-care is understood as a result of undertaking exotic holidays and lighting expensive candles. However, self-love does not have to revolve around money. Instead, it is about healing oneself to make oneself happier and stronger, through nurturing a relationship based on care and kindness with one’s body and mind. We can then think of self-love as a skill in which we must train ourselves to become better.
Because of its personal nature, self-love can look like different things to different individuals. While some people prefer gardening to feel better, others might prefer walking, reading or singing. However, this is not what social media tells us because such activities are rather ordinary and therefore not sellable. Reading a book is not an activity that goes viral, while skydiving at foreign locations does.
It is then important to resist the version of self-love sold on social media and spend time introspecting. Introspection can help us develop a more authentic knowledge of ourselves and therefore spark a resilient flame of self-love within ourselves, which helps us heal and become better human beings.
