*This is a collaborative post about the real you. What do you love about the real you?*
If you were asked to talk about yourself, what makes you, YOU, what you love about you, to describe your self to someone else, what would you say. If you had to write a blurb about yourself for a dating site, like welovedates.com because you were wanting to meet someone new, what would you share to give people an idea of the real you?
I don’t often think about myself, and what I love about me, that I would share with someone else. I asked my children what they loved about me and they said:
“they love that I make them cakes and that even if I’m a bit grumpy I always get up to help them when they are ill at night and they know that no matter what, I’ve always got their backs“
My family, we love real. We keep it real.
I recently started journaling again, which is has been helpful for me to think about myself, and work on areas of my life, and also to just put my thoughts into words. It’s cathartic and a lot more fun than I thought it would be. I jotted down some thoughts about the real me and thought I would share them.
When you are telling someone about yourself, it’s not just the exterior bits you want to share. They can see you might have nice hair, great legs, a lovely smile, or that you dress well or are sporty. It can be easy to pick up that someone is chatty, or shy. But what people want to know, to get to know you better is what you are like inside, what you are passionate about and what make you different and worth getting to know and be around. If online dating is something you are looking at then you need to make you stand out from the crowd. What would you say?
So, if I was to tell someone about me, the bits you don’t always see on first meeting me, then here is what I would say…
I’m passionate and fiery. This makes me a challenging person sometimes but it also means if I’m on your side you are STUCK with me.
I’m loyal and those I love are my most important thing. Don’t mess with those I love, or try to hurt them, is all I’ll say.
I take care of people. I love people and helping and caring for anyone who needs it.
I can cook. I feed people well.
I care about people not being treated well, and whilst my husband says I’m a socialist, I prefer to call it “wanting people to have what they should have, fairly”
I am good at seeing things sometimes before they happen and what other call cynical I call “perspective”
I have become very strong as I’ve walked my mental health journey.
I don’t ever give up. Stubborn, yes, but I also like to call it “sticking to something til it’s done or fixed”
I also love that I look a lot more like my mum than I ever imagined. That means a lot to me. She died when I was 18, and when I look in the mirror or take the very rare selfie that my children persuade me to, I see her, and that makes me happy.
It was not as hard as I thought to come up with some things about me. I think I am a fairly strong, feisty person with lots to offer life. Sometimes it can be hard to see the good in yourself. I have learned that I need to look after me, and something I do regularly now, every evening if I can, is take a few minutes, usually in the bath, with a glass of wine, some bubble bath, and candles and the door locked so I can’t be disturbed. I go through my day, think about the hard bits, and try and close them off and process them, then I think about the good bits, and what I did well. That helps me to process life, and to be more positive about me. Sometimes we are our best cheerleaders.
Taking time out, to reflect on you, look after yourself, and do positive things for you and remind yourself that you are pretty cool, and special, isn’t always easy but knowing our own worth and what we love about ourselves helps us to be more confident and means other people can get to know us too.
So, what do you love about the real you? Everyone has things they can share about themselves. Why not have a go, think about what you would say to someone else, to tell them about you? You might surprise yourself…