Let's talk about it. Let's talk about self-love. What is self-love? For me self-love is loving on yourself, doing things for you that brings you happiness. Brings you joy. Gives you that humph of I got to get my shit done type of thing. Taking care of your needs and putting more focus on what it is you need, versus what everybody else needs, because we all know we'll go so hard in the pain for everybody else. But when it comes to us, we neglect our needs. We neglect our happiness. We neglect being in positive spaces that we know we deserve.
And I just wonder all the time, why is it that we will go so hard for others than we do ourselves? And see, a lot of times it goes back to some of the things that we have endured in life. So for me, I look at it from a realm of me coming up. I came up in a not so great environment. That's what I think. I came up and my mom and my dad were always working. So I spent a lot of time with my grandparents, my granddad, who became my first best friend. And then life happened. I had all my great years with him. He passed on and then my grandmother became my next best friend. And being as coming up with them, they always taught me how to treat other people the way that I wanted to be treated.
And I think because I was put in this bubble to where I was always sweet and always kind, and I saw the things that my grandmother and my grandfather was doing for me. I just began to do it for so many people, to the point where it handicapped me in areas where I needed to do things for myself. So I think when it came to the self-love, I love myself, granted. I love myself whole heartedly, really love myself. But I found myself loving others too much, to the point where I got lost with the self-love for me. I always wanted to make sure I put smiles on people's faces. I wanted to stamp myself to where people would always remember Kiki is what they called me back in the day and still now, but I always wanted to leave a great impression upon myself.
So I made sure that I just did what I had to do for everybody. And it was like that all through my years, coming up. In relationships, I found myself doing so much, making sure that the man was happy, making sure that I was pleasing him in all the ways that I could please him. The gifts, the love, the affection, all of the things that you would want for yourself. But in this state I was giving it all to everybody else. And at the same time, I always would say to myself, this is how I want to be loved. And I would say that over and over and over, but yet I still found myself doing and loving and giving and showing up for everybody. Giving the needs to everybody else instead of my needs.
And over the years, I couldn't break it. So it went from relationships. Then it went to friendships. Then it went to family. And I know we all be surprised like, Hey, that's family, but you're going to do what you got to do for family. But still you giving and you doing and you showing love for everybody. When is it going to be the time where you show the love for yourself? So I was coming up, raised by my grandparents and they were helping out in all the areas. And then I began to find out things about myself that made me broken to now the love that I wanted for myself. I couldn't give it to myself because I was so gun honed on loving everybody else, filling gaps.
So again, we know that self-love is making sure that you're loving on yourself. But a lot of times we fall short and we fall victim to loving ourselves when we're not in those right spaces. So we also know that self-love is making sure that you're giving you the great positive attitude to yourself so that you can apply that to your life. Well, I was giving myself some positive attitudes. I was in some positive spaces a lot of times, but then I found myself to be in some dark spaces, some negative spaces, some spaces that did not align with my life. But yet I still entered those doors that were not for me. And I only did this because I wasn't in a great space.
So I asked you today my beautiful people, are you giving yourself the love that you deserve? Are you showing up for yourself? Do you recognize yourself when you look in the mirror. Do you recognize yourself when you're talking to other people? Do you find it to be you or do you find it to be a pretend you? Because we can mask up all the time. We can wear a mask today. The next day it'll be a different. Tomorrow it'll be another. And then the next day and so on and so on, to the point where people have to think and ask themselves, who is she today? She isn’t that person she was yesterday. He isn't who he said he was the other day. So who are you?
You cannot recognize who you are. The people around can't recognize who you are because you haven't found yourself. You haven't loved on yourself enough to where you can be in that right space. So when you start to love you, you start feeling a shift. You start feeling a change. You start having a different attitude. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. There go right there now. That's it. That's it. That's it. The voice start getting a little higher. The attitude start getting a little more positive. Now you're getting more confident with yourself. That chest starting to poke out. That head is held high. You see how I'm getting up there? Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's how it is.
So that's why you have to ask yourself on a day-to-day basis, am I giving myself the self-love that I need? Am I loving on myself the way I'm supposed to be? See when you wake up in the morning, we all know we start our day a certain way. See for me, I get up. I pray. I meditate. I thank God for so many things in my life. Then as I'm looking in the mirror and I'm getting my water together, because I like how water y'all. So you know, getting my water the way I want it to be. I'm looking in the mirror, waiting for me to wash my face, brush my teeth and all the things.
And I start saying to myself, hello, beautiful girl. I recognize you. I love you. And I start to examine myself from head to toe. And some things on me I can remember clear is day and it take me back. And then I start to understand why I was in that space at that moment. So now I say I'm loving myself because I didn't do right by myself in this space. I'm loving on myself now because I wasn't the great sister at this time. I'm loving my myself now because, and see you hear how you start to take the accountability for the things in your life that didn't sit well with you at the time.
But now because God is starting to align you, he's starting to give you clarity. He's starting to give you understanding. Now that self-love. Now you're gaining it back. That self-love, now you see it. That self-love, oh, I feel it now. Y'all feel it? I feel it now y'all. And so now you can embrace yourself. Now you can really actually feel and it's not easy. It's not a cake walk. It gets well over time. But you have to put in the work. You have to do what you got to do for you.
You got to break down those layers. One layer at a time. You got to peel back. Sometimes you got to get rough with it. And sometimes you even got to face reality for what it is. So you ask yourself the question, am I giving myself self-love? Or am I giving myself Hate? Am I hard on myself? Am I neglecting myself? Am I punishing myself? Don't be selfish. See we talk about self-care and self-love and how it's not selfish it's needed. So you can't be selfish with self. You just got to love self for who it is and what it is.
So again, self-love is loving on yourself, doing something that brings you happiness. That brings you joy. That brings you peace. Self-love is taking care of your needs and not putting others' needs before yours. Self-care gives you a positive attitude about yourself. So therefore you can be in a positive space and life. Self-love allows you to do better for you than you can do better for others because how do you expect someone to love on you, if you aren’t loving on yourself? How do I expect my husband to love me when I can't even love myself? My husband sees me out here, down in myself, being hard on myself. So therefore he’s going to be hard on me.
My friend, see me knocking myself down, tearing myself down, bullying myself, talking down on myself. So therefore my friend is going to do the same for me. My family, see me not in a good space. They see me keep tearing myself down. They see me keep putting myself in these dark spaces. So what are they going to do? They're going to put me in those dark spaces too. It's a pattern y'all. And if you see yourself in a pattern, everybody around you is going to see your in that pattern too. So we got to get with it. We got to start showing up for ourselves. We got to start loving ourselves more, so that we can know how to love others, so that we can know how to appreciate others.
Appreciate yourself is self-love y'all. It's not selfish. It's needed. Loving on yourself is not a job, where you got to clock in and clock out. Self-love is granted to you every day that you got breath in your body. If you woke up God granted you another day to love on you more. So why are you neglecting the fact?
It's your girl Tea and I'm spilling you the tea today, while I sip on my good old autumn bliss. It's about self-love today y'all. So today I asked you to go out, do something for yourself that's going to bring you some happiness, some joy, some peace, love on yourself more today than you have ever done. Let's talk about it. Until next time. Love you.