Learning to love yourself first, above all else, especially in this society is even more difficult than getting out of bed on a rainy Monday. First and foremost you need to realize that if you want someone to give you and show you love you must figure out what that means to you. Visualize what love looks like through your eyes. Look at your life as if through a piece of glass. Search for the ones who are trying to shatter that glass, the ones fighting for you just to hold your hand through life. And the ones who just try to cover up the smudges and wipe away all the values you hold so tight, my dear, they are stripping you of your happiness.

One of the most important steps in this journey is recognizing what made you feel like you weren't worthy of love anymore and use it to repair your heart. What seems to be the reason for why people are unable to love themselves is the idea that they are 'too broken' to be worthy of love. Whether it be a loss of relationship or friendship. A lust for something that stripped you of your values. Or maybe it's as simple as your own thoughts racing around telling you that you are not worthy. Whatever it may be, you are not alone. In this life we all experience it. The heartbreaks of life are not only excruciating at times, but essentially necessary. These trials are the times that we can begin to understand who we are by what breaks us. Finding yourself at your core is key in this process. By realizing who you are you are then able to love that part of yourself. Which, is loving yourself. So strip away all of the undesirables, the shameful, the fake, the hidden. Cut away all in your life that isn't allowing you to be the best you and revel in the beauty that is your life. Remind yourself what it is that made you love yourself once before. Your personality, the way you laugh at a really bad joke, your friends, your family, stopping in your tracks just because you saw a dog, the countless amount of days that you just laid in bed having your own movie marathon for fun. The things in life that make you happy, the things that make you smile from ear to ear are uniquely yours. Your own little pieces of a life of love and joy. Find it, and embrace it.

While it seems all great and lovely to think about what fills you with happiness, the fact of the matter is that when you are unable to love yourself it's MUCH easier to dwell on the wrongs and picks and pricks of each day. Especially the days of your past that you can't seem to be rid of. When you are on the road to loving yourself again you must consciously be aware each day of all the miracles present in your life. Rejoice in the blissful things that make you smile. The little things that make your spirits soar. No, I don’t mean just forget about the past like it never happened. You can choose to build a house in the past and dwell in it or you can choose to live for the now. For the past is a place of reference NOT a place of residence. Be reminded of what used to break you and use it to make you stronger. Because love, You are more. You are more than the choices you used to make. You are more than the problems you used to create. You are more than what people say about you and you are definitely more than what you used to think of yourself. Being broken doesn't make you weak or small or lesser than anybody else. It just means that you have a past. Then maybe we're all a little broken. Stop hating the experiences that made you who you are today and LOVE who you've become because of it all. Stronger. Wiser. Empowered. Stop letting yourself fall down at the feet of those who won't hold out their hand and start picking yourself up when you hit the ground.

"Beautiful are those whose brokenness gives birth to transformation and wisdom." -John Green.

These wise words from the fabulous John Green remind us that enduring brokenness and pain, on all scales, can turn into the renewing of your heart and mind; if you allow it.

Remember when you were younger and going to the playground or jumping on a trampoline filled you with such excitement? Or getting that extra scoop of ice cream made you feel a little rebellious? Find the things that exhilarate you like that again. And do it on your own. You don’t need anybody else to make you happy and you definitely don't need someone who is going to tell you what should and shouldn't make you smile. Eventually I think we all learn to define happiness on our own terms and I believe when you hit that point you should never look back. Be unapologetically yourself and never say sorry for loving what you love. Be someone who makes you proud to be alive. With each and every breath it's going to be a battle. On this journey you will learn that fighting for your happiness is fighting for your future, and more importantly, your life.