When you’re working on loving yourself, it can feel like an uphill battle. Self-doubt creeps in when we’re not looking, and it can be hard to remember that you are worth so much more than all those negative thoughts that creep into your head.

When you’re working on self-love, check-ins are a helpful way to stay accountable and keep moving forward. Check-ins can be done a few different ways; self-check-ins on the go, check-ins with a friend or check-ins via pen and paper.

Why Self-Love Is So Important

As humans, we all want to feel loved, accepted, and appreciated. And yet, we often forget to give ourselves the same love, acceptance, and appreciation that we’d give to others. It's important to be able to give yourself the love and acceptance you want from others as you'll find you won't go out looking for love in others and get left worse for wear.

When you love yourself, you can get closer to your purpose and make your dreams a reality. You can also create lasting and fulfilling relationships, be more confident and feel like you’re truly living your best life. When you don’t love yourself, you can feel stuck and like you’re not living up to your full potential. Self-love isn’t just something that’s nice to have—it’s something we all need!

The Importance of Check-Ins

Check-ins are weekly informal meetings with yourself to talk about how you’re feeling, where you’re at on your self-love journey and what you want to focus on next.

They can be helpful for anyone who’s trying to work on self-love, but they’re especially helpful if you’re the kind of person who has a hard time staying accountable to yourself, or if you don't have a stable level of positive mental health.

Many people find check-ins especially helpful when they’re working on something that’s hard, like changing habits or growing (and loving) yourself. Check-ins are a great way to stay on track with your self-love journey, and they can help you feel more in control.

4 Questions for Your First Self-Love Check-In

For check-ins specifically for self-love, you can ask yourself the following questions:

• How are you feeling? This is a great place to start your first self-love check-in. If you’re feeling super low and like you’re not getting anywhere on your self-love journey, it might be helpful to talk to a therapist.

• Where are you at on your self-love journey? This one can feel a little more forward-facing. Ask yourself where you are on your journey, and how you want to move forward from there.

• What are the hardest parts of loving yourself? When you’re starting to love yourself, there will probably be some hard parts. Ask yourself what those are, and how you can help yourself get through them.

• What do you want to focus on next? This question is a great way to focus on what’s next on your journey to loving yourself.

3 Check-In Questions to ask yourself every week – not self-love related

• How are you feeling? Same as on the self-love journey, but always the best place to start. You need to know how you are starting this check-in.
• What do you want your next goal to be in life? You can be as broad or as specific as you like. Working towards something in your personal life will give you a huge boost in mood.
• What do you appreciate about your life right now? It's good to stay in the present with the good in your life.

Start journaling your check-ins

If you’re someone who likes writing things down, journaling your check-ins can be a great way to stay on track with your self-love journey. Writing about your feelings and thoughts can be a great way to process how you’re feeling, and it can also be a helpful way to keep track of your progress.

Journaling doesn't have specific guidelines you must follow, but there are some guidelines to help you get started if you wish to use them. Some helpful guidelines on journaling are:

• Journal routinely – daily, weekly, monthly. It's more important to stick to a routine than aim for every day and have an irregular schedule because you can't keep up with doing it daily.
• Start your journal the same way – You can start with an affirmation, start with a quote, start with the date, start with the best thing that happened to you that day, or even what you want to achieve that day.
• Write un-inhibited – Make sure you write exactly what you feel. You need an outlet for your emotions, if you start to play down your feelings where you're meant to be able to let out your emotions, you'll find you get tense and short-tempered rather fast.

Check-in worksheets

Another great way to do check-ins is with worksheets like this one (please note that this is an affiliate link, I get a commission from this link at NO cost to you. I support this company for their great and useful products.) Worksheets are a great way to keep track of your check-ins, they are fun and exciting. The sheets in the link above are a collection of many different types of check-ins, once you buy the digital download, your whole family can use a sheet or two! Below is a preview of 9 pages out of their 19-page download.

Make your check-ins a time for yourself

When you’re working on loving yourself, it can sometimes feel like a struggle. It can be really tempting to compare yourself to other people and think that you’re not good enough.

When you make your check-ins a time for you, you can start making these feelings of struggle less about comparing yourself and more about loving yourself. Making your check-ins a time for you can be a great way to start doing that.

If you’re not sure where to start with self-love, don’t worry. We all have to start somewhere. These check-in questions are designed to walk you through the process of self-love so that you can get where you want to be.