You are stronger than you think you are!

“Don’t worry, you’ll be fine”, “You’re stronger than you think you are. You’re brave, I’m proud of you!”

How often do we say these words? Not to others but to ourselves? How often are we kind to ourselves? How often do we ask ourselves to take it easy? How often do we comfort our own souls?

Comforting ourselves may seem like self-pity and a form of weakness. But we fail to realize is that the only person whose kindness we need the most is we ourselves. The one validation we need most is our own. The one love and care we need the most are ours. Because as long as we do not learn to love and respect ourselves, we cannot expect someone else to do it to us.

It is easier to be kind to others than to ourselves. Comforting ourselves seems like self-pity and a form of weakness. But what we fail to realize is that the first person whose kindness we need the most is we ourselves. As long as we do not learn to love and respect ourselves, we cannot expect someone else to do us the same to us. And it is essential, because we cannot afford to spend every minute of our lives blaming ourselves for all that has happened. For all that we think could have happened. For all the opportunities we thought we missed.

Amidst this blame game, we start losing ourselves. The person that makes us authentic gets lost in the process. The fragments of the person that is left frustrate us. Because somewhere deep down, we know that is not us. We know we are better than that. But hating on those fragments will not do any good to us, or to anyone else.

We must learn to love them because no matter how small they are, they are our own. It is only because of us that they are reduced to mere pieces of sorrow and oppression. It is because of us that they are hurting, bleeding and crying to us to love them. Forgiving them, loving them, and caring for them is the only way we can get them healed. Loving ourselves is the only way we can find the person we lost within us.

We must understand that our setbacks and defeats do not make our souls weak. They are mere fragments, that too, the most beautiful ones. They make our victories worth achieving. They make us realize we are stronger than we thought we were. Say this out loud to your heart, loud enough to make it echo in its deepest and darkest of corners, “I am better than this. I am brave. And I love myself.”