The other night, while at dinner with a friend, I started talking about how I seek validation from outside sources before I am able to relish in my accomplishments. It’s as if the articles I write, or the jokes I make, or the waves I create don’t truly exist until someone else acknowledges them.

It makes very little sense, considering it’s irrational. Sometimes, though, our brains aren’t rational, and as a person with anxiety, I can absolutely say that the majority of the time, mine is not.

“I want people to validate me most of the time. Like, what I do.”

“Why?” she asked.

“Because I want people to think what I do is important.”

“Why?”

I wasn’t quite sure how to answer this question initially. Why do I care so much about how others perceive my accomplishments? Why do I care so much about what people think? I concluded after awhile that it stems from wanting to feel important. I want to make people proud. I want to feel like I matter and like I’d be missed if I weren’t here.

“Because being important matters to me. It means that I matter.”

“Why?”

“Because if I matter, then I won’t feel obsolete, and I fear being obsolete.”

“Why?”

I fear being obsolete, because I don’t want to leave the world and not be remembered. Some people want to live a simple life and fly under the radar, and that’s okay, but that’s never been me. I want to be in the middle of it all. I want people to know me. I want, as my grandmother would say, to see my name in lights one day.

“Because I want to be known. I want people to know who I am.”

“Why?

I looked at her with exhausted eyes, and then I realized why — because this was the fifth why. We’ve talked about this method of questioning before, asking the five whys to get down to the root of something plaguing us, or inspiring us, or whatever is on our minds. And we were playing the game before I realized it. And here I was on my fifth why.

Tears immediately filled my eyes as I found my answer to her fifth and final question. Why do I want to be known? Why do I want people to know who I am?

“Because if people know me, maybe they’ll love me.”

“You want to be loved.”

“Yeah.”

The more people who know me, the more people who might love me.

I seek validation, because I want to be loved.

I write articles in hopes they will resonate with someone, and maybe that someone will say that they loved the article, which means they might also love me.

I tell jokes to make people laugh, because people love to laugh, and people love people who make them laugh.

And I seek this outside validation because it’s easier than loving myself.

It’s easier to outsource the love than do the work for self-love most of the time. And it’s a pattern I’ve been noticing about myself, and one that I’m working actively to break.

The hardest thing I’ve ever done is learn to love myself — to truly love myself.

To love myself on days when a guy I’m “talking to” doesn’t text me.

To love myself when I receive, not one, but three rejection emails stating my work will not be published.

To love myself when I indulged in delicious foods three days in a row and don’t feel my best.

To love myself when I’m alone.

To love myself when I’m lonely.

To love myself when I’m not feeling inspired to create.

To love myself during all of these times, and to remember that and to have patience and grace, this… this is the hardest thing I have ever done.

At the end of the day, just like anyone else, I want to be loved, but I know now that love starts with me. And though I don’t believe that we must love ourselves first before anyone else will, I do believe that by loving ourselves, our ability to soak up love from others becomes sharper and stronger and fills us with even more joy. Joy that overflows. And the thought of that sounds kind of nice.

Overflowing with joy.

Even on our hardest days.

Especially on our hardest days.

So, like, I get it.

You don’t always have to like yourself, but you should love yourself, and not just on days when you feel like you’ve got it goin’ on. You should love yourself on days when your eyes are sad. You should love yourself on days when you have two pimples on your right cheek. You should love yourself on days when your hair is an oily mess because washing it just takes too much energy. Love yourself in those moments.

Give yourself some grace.

And I will try to give myself some grace, too.

We will try together to give ourselves grace together.

Because we all have our own reasons for doing things, and we all have our own answers to why. But, now, when someone asks us how we stay positive during the hard times, how we keep our heads up when faced with adversity, and how we stay optimistic about our futures in love and in our careers when everything is so uncertain… we can look at them, and we can say…

I can do this because I love myself, and it was the hardest thing I have ever done, but the work was worth it. And you can do it, too.