When do you get to the point where you can finally love yourself?

@CurWilliam Hmm.... In my experience, it's not my accomplishments and abilities that give me self-esteem. (Although there is a good video we watched in a group chat the other day I really liked about how to build self-esteem.) It did improve my self-confidence, though.

Learning to love myself unconditionally is what's really helped me to build self-esteem, though. I used the concepts on self-compassion.net and the guided meditations to change the way I talk to myself. It might sound really corny, but caring for yourself as you would a good friend is an excellent skill to build.

It's come in really handy for me as I've been managing a chronic illness the last few years and working "only" part time. Our culture values doing over being. (I was honestly surprised to learn that there are cultures that value being over doing!) Defining my worth by what I do only goes so far.

I also had something of an existential crises when my mother went to a nursing home. Visiting every week and seeing all these people who literally do nothing all day but sit in wheelchairs and wait for meals or meds.... God that was hard at first! And I continually asked myself, do I honestly believe human life is valuable on its own, even when you can't do ANYTHING? Eventually I've been able to bring the truth into my heart. Yes, there is intrinsic human worth in being alive. That every living being is worthy, and good enough, just as they are.

Okay, that got kind of heavy, but basically I think it's believing that everyone is worthy, and extending that same unconditional love to yourself.

@CurWilliam i went through a really hard time as a teen where i felt like a worthless burden to my family, and am currently going through another time in my life where i feel the same. but for a while, i had learned to really love myself and feel good about my life. i think the thing that really made me love myself during that time was doing things that i loved, without the expectation of doing them well. i got really in to hiking and rock climbing in my later teenage years, and it all started with me going on walks to get all my angst out. i lived in the middle of nowhere, and just let my feet carry me halfway up the side of a mountain for a couple hours. i didn't expect to reach the top, and i didn't particularly want to, but i went as far as i could make it and ended up so proud of myself. maybe just try a new hobby and explore a side of yourself that you don't really get to explore often. don't expect anything from it, just start it and if your feet carry you to a place where you feel proud of yourself at the end, keep doing that thing.

another thing that i struggled with (and still do) is body image. not sure if you feel the same, but i feel like this is applicable to self love in any aspect. try and find one thing about yourself that you love. for me, it was my eyes. i didn't really like anything else about my body, but i loved my eyes because they're an awesome green color. just having that one thing to focus on when everything else felt horrible helped a lot. eventually, after you learn to love one thing about yourself, you'll start finding lots of other little things you love too.

hope pe this helped.

@CurWilliam

There is a thin line between humble and denying yourself...
First You have to learn to love yourself..
How to love yourself ?
1. Accept you as you and not comparing to each others...
2.Understand that you were born that way and you should have fun and accept it (bad or good things about you)
3.Keep telling yourself that you are worthy to be love, if you are a religious man then keep remembering that Christ is die for you that means you are very important no matter what you think to GOD...
4.If you are really feel unworthy to be love or being taken care off then be the one for yourself, love yourself and take care yourself the best you can do.. show your body, your soul, yourself that you are in love by yourself... do the very best to love yourself for example, you are lazy to wake up in the morning but you awake in the moring to get jogging or else to make your body good is because you love yourself, accept yourself... When you are down or feel unworthy to be love, then show yourself by keep saying, you are being love by me(yourself) no matter how and then you should prove it by take care of yourself even if your don't want as a prove that you are love yourself...
5.Always accept yourself as it is...

*All is about accepting yourself as you, don't compare or even look to others when you are down, look to yourself and convice yourself to love yourself..

Hi @CurWilliam

I too have always struggled to love myself. I think being capable, skilled, talented doesn't have anything to do with self-love. It can help, sure. But doesn't mean that as you get competent/capable, you'll automatically love yourself. But what I think is, self-love can be learned much faster than learning any other skills.

I used to be an overachiever when I was a student, and having Asian parents, they also had this extremely high expectation on me. Good wasn't enough and they always wanted me to do better next time around. Whenever I failed to reach that expectation, I felt unworthy and depressed. My mom has always been the first one to put me down, insult me with my flaws and mistakes. Whenever I tried to be better, she had something negative to say about my action and how slow my progress was.

I lost motivation a hundred times. I quit things I loved to do because I didn't like being told that I'm no good at it, and I started to actually believe it. But just recently, I've come to learn that, listening to people's opinion (even from a family member's) will never help me. I started to change my thinking to "If I can't love myself, who else is going to love me?". I forced myself to love me first. And the first step was, I needed to accept all my flaws. It is part of me, it is me. Whatever I cannot change, I accepted. And whatever I can still make better, I started to make a change, even if it's a slow progress, it is still a progress and it is one step further than just being stuck in one place.