All good relationships begin with a healthy relationship with yourself. This is true for friendships too. One can only know what respect, loyalty, acceptance, care, validation and all the other factors that constitute a friendship are, when you practice them in your relationship with yourself.
Also, we cannot be around people all the time. Friends and family sometimes move away, or (sadly) die. Then you must be able to count on yourself and meet your own needs.
Even if you were able to always have someone around, such a person simply cannot provide everything you need to be happy and live a balanced life. That would be an unbearable burden on them.
You must be able to trust yourself, give yourself compassion and comfort, and rely on yourself when life is tough. In simpler terms: You need to be your own Best Friend Forever.
How to be a good friend to yourself
- A good friend does not compare you to other people and points out your strengths and accomplishments. Can you do this for yourself or are you self-critical and do you speak to yourself in a mean and degrading tone of voice?
- A good friend validates your feelings and opinions. Do you do this for yourself, or are you constantly down-playing your feelings, wants and needs?
- A good friend enjoys getting to know you better. Are you curious about your temperament, personality, character and physical attributes, and do you enjoy discovering more and more who you were created to be?
- Good friends do nice things for each other and enjoy fun things together. Do you take proper care of yourself and do you know your love language so that you can speak words of affirmation to yourself, or buy yourself a gift, or go on a special outing on your own?
- Good friends have healthy boundaries in place so that they don’t feel abused and do not start to resent each other. Are your boundaries in place so that you don’t get frustrated with or disappointed in yourself?
Now, for the hard part and doing the actual work …
Just like any other friendship you will have to put time, effort and commitment into your relationship with yourself. And for some, the hardest part will be that you need to be on your own for this.
Green and Blue temperaments sing hallelujah because they enjoy their own company, but Yellow and Red temperaments find this hard. If so, think of Jesus and the solitary times He had whilst on earth.
Green and Blue people may immediately think those times must have been wonderfully relaxing because not only did He escape the crowds, but He connected with His Father. And they are correct in this assumption.
But Yellow and Red people are also correct in their thinking that His solitude must have been tough and stressful, as it is for them. Because, you see, when He was alone, Jesus – in His humanity – was painfully aware how different He was from His people.
Spending time alone with His Father meant that He had to learn who He was and what He had come to accomplish here on earth. Just so, your times of solitude constitute getting to know your true self and your calling – always in the presence of your heavenly Father. This can be challenging, but will bring you inner peace.
When your relationship with yourself is in line with God’s plan for you, it will be a healthy and fulfilling friendship that will teach and guide you to be a good friend for others as well.
