20+ sweet ways to be a friend to yourself
I got a letter from a reader the other day who asked the following:
Thanks, Friendly Subscriber for trying out my friendship affirmations kit and asking for more tips about how to be a good friend to yourself. Answers below…
Being a good friend to yourself is a practice, and how you demonstrate your self-friendship can take many forms. I'll share one example from my own life followed by a plethora of ideas you can mix and match…
Back on January 1 2005, I decided to start reading The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron. I chose to devote an entire month to each chapter because there was way too much homework in each chapter to complete in a week while I was also working full-time as an art director. So I would wake up at 6am to read part of a chapter and do some of the homework before I started getting ready for work at 7am. The book was life-changing — before I got halfway through, I decided to quit my job, quit my unsatisfying relationship, sell all my crap, and move all the way across the country.
Certainly making those massive changes was one way to be a good friend to myself — by deciding I wasn’t going to hold myself back any more in so many areas of my life— but the small choices were also integral to that time of deep self-friendship:
Waking up and making a cup of tea for myself at a time I knew no one would disturb me
Finding a cozy spot to read a magnificent paradigm-shifting book
Choosing to devote time and attention to learning about myself
Defining a framework for the life that I truly wanted to be living
The commitment to follow through on what I learned was also an act of self-friendship:
By making small uncomfortable choices (eg waking up before the sun)
By letting go of what I no longer needed in my life (eg. many belongings and a relationship that had run its course)
By trusting myself with a big risk (eg. driving across the country with an oversize Rand McNally Atlas because smartphones and map apps weren’t invented yet).
Being a better friend to yourself doesn’t have to mean making huge splashy life-upending changes though! It can happen in a myriad of small but mighty ways too…
😊 By taking a moment to place a hand softly on your heart and silently repeat an encouraging affirmation anytime you feel scared, frustrated, lonely, or nervous about heading into a new situation.
🔍 By being diligent as you seek out the kinds of community groups and gatherings you crave to attend. Giving yourself permission to step experimentally into new identities, new forms of expression, new conversations, and new ways of being, because you wouldn't want to hold a friend back so you won't hold yourself back either.
🕯 By having the courage to design and offer a gathering of your own.
☺️ By choosing to get to know yourself by simply spending time on your own, and learning to love and enjoy your own company.
😺 By embracing and loving your quirks because they make you who you are.
🏋️♂️ By pushing yourself to grow.
🔀 By gently course-correcting when you notice that you're devoting more time to scrolling social media than you are to nurturing your self-actualization (or whatever your bad habit du jour is).
🔒 By creating, honoring, and respecting your own boundaries, and asking other people to respect them too.
💗 By talking to yourself kindly, even when escorting your inner critic out the door.
📣 By speaking up about what you need, what you’re open to, and what you’re not open to.
🖐🏾 By sticking up for yourself, and being willing to walk away from people who consistently and reliably bring you down.
🙅🏽♀️ By not abandoning yourself, or letting yourself shrink, or disappearing into people-pleasing self-sabotage within your relationships.
🧠 By learning from your mistakes and giving yourself permission to not make That Very Specific Mistake anymore, no matter how easy and familiar your old patterns are.
🤗 By letting yourself fully unfold when you get the opportunity to be around the people and situations that light you up. Letting your shine be seen, and unfurling when the coast is clear and your heart wants to sing out, and the people around you are celebrating you in your immense and unique greatness.
💖 By letting yourself experience the fullness of life: the exciting moments that scare you while also pulling you closer like a magnet, and the quiet moments that might seem boring on the surface but are actually a reminder that you’re lucky to experience peace and safety, and the limbo moments when you’re not sure what to do next but where you have the freedom to savor your options in an unrushed way.
🍦 By letting yourself cut out of work early to get a chocolate-chip cookie-dough ice cream cone when you have a random craving on an unusually warm Friday at 3:27pm, because you’re the only adult in charge of your life and you’re allowed to do things that bring you joy.
🏥 By making sure you get the care and support you need from medical professionals, therapists, coaches, and spiritual guides, who can help you live your healthiest life inside and out.
💪🏾 By making the choice to commit with fervent dedication to the causes, communities, relationships, and missions that give your life meaning and that fill you with a sense of purpose that runs as deep as the sea.
🧱 By knowing what you want your legacy to be, and then committing yourself to building it, seed by seed, and brick by dusty red brick.
💞 By remembering that any of the thoughtful, compassionate, caring actions you'd do for a deeply-loved friend are also things you can do for yourself. And then doing those things for you both.
🕒 By making the choices, hour after hour, day after day, that guide you towards the life and memories you want to look back on with gratitude when your time to leave this earth arrives. We never know when that time will come, so you might as well try to be a good friend to yourself on every step of the journey.
I hope that helps. 💛
*This post was originally shared in the We Should Get Together newsletter from me, Kat Vellos. Subscribe below.
“Be good to yourself” Quotes
“Don’t forget yourself in the decisions you make.” – Yasmine Cheyenne in her book, The Sugar Jar: Create Boundaries, Embrace Self-Healing, and Enjoy the Sweet Things in Life
“Your no makes the way for your yes. Boundaries create the container within which your yes is authentic. Being able to say no makes yes a choice.” — adrienne maree brown in their book Pleasure Activism: The Politics of Feeling Good
“What if we measured our days not by how many minutes flitted by in distraction, but by what we pay attention to — what we hear, what we see, who we connect with, what we learn?” — Madeleine Dore in her book I Didn’t Do The Thing Today: Letting Go of Productivity Guilt
“Self-compassion: it’s hard at first. That’s normal. For some people, it stays hard. Also normal. But the result of practicing self-compassion is that you grow mighty.” — Emily Nagoski, PhD, and Amelia Nagoski, DMA, in their book Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle
“Owning your greatness means giving less power to your imposter syndrome and being able to consistently have more confidence in your abilities to succeed in life.” — Lisa Orbé-Austin, PhD, and Richard Orbé-Austin, PhD, in their book Own Your Greatness: Overcome Imposter Syndrome, Beat Self-Doubt, and Suceed in Life
“Draw the art you want to see, start the business you want to run, play the music you want to hear, write the books you want to read, build the products you want to use—do the work you want to see done.” — Austin Kleon in his book Steal Like An Artist: 10 Things Nobody Told You About Being Creative