By: Ijeoma Mbah

Learning how to respect yourself is one of the best things you can ever do for yourself.

Self-respect is the sense of worth and personal value that you attach to yourself, as a human being.

According to Laurence Stone “Respect for ourselves guides our morals; but respect for others guides our manners.”

Respecting yourself is just like loving yourself, until you learn to love yourself, you cannot love someone else, in a similar vein until you learn to respect yourself, you cannot respect others.

— Respecting yourself means, attaching some degrees of personal value to your existence as an individual.

— It means taking care of your health.

— It means accepting yourself, your flaws and imperfections.

-It means not allowing yourself to be mistreated by anyone.

-Respecting yourself means knowing your limits, and setting healthy boundaries for yourself.

— It means protecting yourself from spiritual, emotional and physical harm.

—- It means telling yourself that you are enough and worthy to be alive.

-It also means protecting yourself from anything that can endanger your peace of mind and existence..

Until you start Respecting yourself nobody will respect you.

An African adage says, “once you tell the whole community that you have a useless calabash, they will certainly use it to pack rubbish.”

###

Ijeoma Mbah is a writer, philosopher and Tutor who hails from Enugu state, Nigeria. She holds a B.A degree in philosophy, from the University of Ibadan, Nigeria. She is a passionate writer and an avid reader. Her work has appeared on Kalahari review, Latunes publishers and Nnoko stories.