Self-Love: my personal Everest

So, I know that I am my own worst critic. I'm critical of nearly everything about myself. And I hate that! (Don't worry, the irony that I hate that, which is clearly a negative critique of myself, is not lost on me.) When the new year rolls around, like it does every 365 days, I tell myself all the things I'm going to improve. But I fail at almost all of it.

Why do I want to change myself so much????

This year I tried shifting my mindset a little bit. What I want to do for myself this year is give myself some grace. To not be so hard on myself. To not be so judgemental of the reflection in the mirror. I want to learn how to love myself. And the first step in doing that is to accept myself. To respect myself. To honor who I am. I want to love myself as I am today, and not some version I hope to be down the road.

My plan is this (and I hope I don't give up on myself just because this gets hard... it will get hard):
-to acknowledge not just my shortcomings (which I have no troubles doing), but to acknowledge and celebrate my strengths.
-to stop comparing myself to other women.
-to stop thinking that my beginning needs to look like someone else's middle.
-to remember why I start things, then let that passion drive me.
-to live in, and better appreciate, as many moments as I can seize.

Guys, this will be my Everest... self-love...

Life is messy and chaotic and challenging, but it's also beautiful. And I can only imagine it would be a more beautiful place if I could find that in myself.

Grace... that is what I want to give myself.