Becoming Your Own Best Friend

When you think of a best friend, you probably think of someone who is always there for you, who will always lift you up, and someone who always has your back. Best friends are the best. You can always rely on them for a compliment, for good advice, and for motivating you in times of need. Now when you think about all those positive attributes in a best friend and how well that friend treats you, it makes you wonder why we aren’t all our own best friends. Because when we think about how we treat and talk to ourselves, it’s very different to how we treat and talk to our best friends.

I don’t know where you are in your own life journey, but I know many MANY people (especially women) treat themselves pretty poorly and talk down to themselves on a daily basis. I see it on social media, I hear it within my own group of friends, and I witness it whenever I’m out and about at restaurants or bars. People talk shit about themselves all.the.time. They say they are fat, they say they aren’t worthy, they say they CAN’T. And even if they are joking about those things, their brain is hearing something different. The funny thing about the brain is if you tell it something enough times, even if it knows it’s not true, it may begin to believe exactly what you are saying.

So if you tell yourself you are ugly over and over and over again, your brain will begin to believe that. Period. That’s because your brain has relayed that information as truth and it is now believing what you told it. Our brains are wired to be given information, to pick through it all, then decide what is true and what is not. And if we are given the same information every day and every night, that information will just become truth, even if it is not.

Now the best part about the brain is that it can begin to believe something different when prompted to. You can rewire it! And that means you can tell yourself you are beautiful every day and every night, and with time, your brain will begin to believe it. It will forget all the times you called yourself ugly and not worthy, and it will take on a new set of ideas and values. That’s one of the coolest parts about being human – we get to reinvent ourselves as many times as we want, simply by telling ourselves a new storyline.

I want you to do something – I want you to create a new storyline by simply treating yourself like you would treat your best friend. You would never tell your friend they are ugly, you would always tell them the complete opposite. Because you love your best friend and you think only the best about them. You would never talk poorly about your friend’s cellulite or wrinkles or sagging boobs or whatever the fuck they (or you) might be insecure about. Because that’s not what best friends do. Best friends inspire, they compliment, they look you dead in the eye and they tell you they are proud of you. Best friends care. So today, and every day moving forward, I want you to look yourself in the mirror and say something your best friend would say to you. I want you to compliment yourself, I want you tell the person looking back that you are proud of their hard work, and I want you motivate yourself for a great day ahead and a great life in the future. Becoming your own best friend in life will change you for the better and there is no better time than the present to start. And if you think this is some woo-woo bullshit, it is. But it works.

Life is too damn short to hate yourself.