How do you define love?

If you walk into any store right now,
 it looks like flowers.
 It looks like jewelry.
 It looks like chocolates in heart-shaped boxes.

We’ve learned to measure love in things.

If you care, you buy.
 If you love, you prove it.
 If it’s real, it has a receipt.

And I’m not against any of that.
 I love beautiful things too.

But I keep wondering…

What about the love that isn’t for sale?

The way you talk to yourself
 when you mess up.

The way you sit with yourself
 when you feel behind.

The way you stay kind to yourself
 when no one is clapping.

We spend so much time wanting to be loved.
 Wanting someone to choose us.
 To celebrate us.
 To reassure us.

But do we know how to do that for ourselves?

Privately.

When it’s just you and your own thoughts.

Maybe love isn’t something you find.
 Maybe it’s something you practice.

The most important relationship you’ll ever build
 is the one you have with yourself.

Everything else grows from that.