A lack of self-love is at the root of a number of behaviours which can on the surface appear to be positive actions, and sometimes are. The key thing is becoming aware of what is motivating the behaviour i.e. what are the underlying thoughts and feelings, and whether the behaviour is intentional, or responsive and habitual.
There is no judgement here, only awareness that leads to understanding and expansion.
Use these signs as guideposts for awareness, rather than something that you beat yourself up about. Self-love is a life-long process of learning and growing. You don’t do one ‘learn to love yourself’ course and then you’re ‘fixed’ and have healthy self-esteem for the rest of your life. We are complex beings with many layers of subconscious programming, and life is forever bringing us new circumstances and challenges to navigate.
Sign 1. You Keep Yourself Very Busy
Do you feel unsettled when you are not actively doing something?
In our modern society busy-ness is usually viewed as a positive sign that you are taking action, being proactive, living life responsibly and/or making things happen.
However, when you feel like you always need to be doing something or planning something, that you can’t stop, and you go from one activity to another, to another, then it can indicate that you have a subconscious belief that you are not enough. Often the motivation for constantly doing things is a belief that you need to prove you are capable, or that you are worthy.
A need to DO more, often equates with a need to BE more.
Constantly keeping busy can also be used as a positive distraction tool. Things like taking drugs, consuming excessive alcohol and sex addiction are often destructive or negative behaviours that people use to distract themselves from having to deal with their uncomfortable feelings of pain, guilt, shame, doubt and fear. Busy-ness can be a positive form of this. When we are constantly doing things, then our mind is full of activity oriented thoughts and we can avoid listening to our deeper emotion based thoughts and feelings.
When we stop, and are still and quiet, we become conscious of our inner thoughts and feelings, and for some of us these can be very uncomfortable and we don’t want to listen to them, or deal with them. Busy-ness can be a way of distracting ourselves from that.
Sign 2: You Are Always Doing Things For Other People
While giving and serving others is a positive thing, you do need to be aware of why you are doing it.
When you do things for other people that you don’t want to do; or you serve others even though you are tired and you are sacrificing your own physical, mental and emotional needs; or when you help everybody who asks for it, especially if you feel a sense of obligation to always help; or you often feel over-committed to doing things for other people – then it is a sign that you don’t love yourself.
Usually the motivating beliefs behind giving to others in this way are:
“I need to be nice so that other people won’t think I’m a bad person.”
“I need to be nice so that other people will think I’m a good person”
“I need to help others to feel like I’m a good person”
“I feel like a bad person if I don’t help people when they ask or need it”
“I need to help others so that other people won’t feel disappointed or angry and reject me”
As with sign 1, the deeper drive behind constantly giving out to others is a sense that you need to earn or demonstrate that you are worthy.
You may not be aware of these unconscious underlying beliefs, but you may be aware of the resulting feelings of overwhelm, dissatisfaction, frustration, and/or resentment.
When these are your underlying reasons for doing things for other people you will feel like you are constantly seeking approval from other people in order to feel like a good, hard-working and kind person. You will also feel like you are often ‘running yourself ragged’ and that what you do is never really enough.
This can also express itself as a consistent desire to want to help other people be better, or to fix people and things.
An ongoing sense that other people need to be helped or fixed is often a sign that you believe that you need to be fixed somehow or be better somehow. This belief is usually subconscious and you are not consciously aware of it. Your sense of dissatisfaction with yourself causes you to look for ways in which the people and world around you are broken or in need of being fixed or made better. Taking action to make other people and things better eases the discomfort you feel about not being better yourself.
Sign 3. You Spend Money on Yourself Because You Think You Deserve It
On the surface this looks like a loving thing to do for yourself – giving yourself treats. However, usually a feeling like we deserve a treat, comes from an underlying sense of dissatisfaction and emptiness. If you were feeling emotionally fulfilled, then you would not feel the need to buy yourself a special treat to make yourself feel good.
Usually people engage in this behaviour when they have a sense of dissatisfaction or unease or emptiness, or feel an uncomfortable emotion. For example, buying yourself a McDonald’s sundae on the way home from work because you deserve it after the bad day you’ve had, or buying a new wardrobe of clothes after a relationship break-up, or buying a ticket to a concert because your partner said something critical to you.
It’s not wrong to buy things you enjoy or which give you pleasure. However, if you buy them because you think you deserve it in response to something unpleasant in your life, then you are trying to fix or fill an emotional need with a material, external object or circumstance, and that is not effectively addressing your emotional need.
Buying yourself a treat may give you a temporary lift, but it is really just a distraction.
The only way to truly feel better, to feel long-term joy and fulfilment, is to learn to love yourself and fill your own emotional needs.
Sign 4: You Keep Searching For The Perfect . . . Diet, Partner, Car, House etc.
Consistently looking to the next new thing to fix you or your life, or to make you happy, is a sure sign that you are not fully tuned in to the source of love, acceptance and peace within you.
If you are searching for something outside yourself to make you feel better it indicates that you are not aligned with your internal foundation of love, and that your emotional needs are not being met.
As with sign number 3, external things, or experiences, or other people may help you to feel better, but the lift is only temporary because you have no control over them, and the world around us is constantly changing. The only person completely dedicated to you, is you. The only source of consistent love, joy and fulfillment is that which you consistently give yourself.
Give this post a like if you can identify with any of these 4 positive behaviours that are actually signs you don’t love yourself:
1. You keep yourself constantly busy
2. You are always helping other people
3. You buy things for yourself because you think you deserve it
4. You keep searching for the next perfect thing, experience, or person
You may be just beginning your self-love journey and these signs may seem like a big revelation to you, or you may have already worked through a number of layers of limiting beliefs and past painful experiences, and these signs may show where you can grow further.
If you would like some more support to learn to love yourself more deeply and more effectively, and would like to learn some quick and easy skills to do that including new ways of thinking and responding to what is happening in your life, then I invite you to check out my book 10 Steps to Happiness.
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