Thankfully the days of waiting for someone to love you are over with over – three quarters (79 percent) of single Australians believing that self-love has to come from within and cannot come from a romantic partner.
Bumble, the app where women make the first move, reveals its findings within this Self-Love Report ahead of Valentine’s Day.
The research examines the concept of self love; exploring how the relationship you have with yourself can set the foundation for healthy and equal romantic connections.
In the lead up to Valentine’s Day, 64 percent of single Australians admit to feeling more self conscious about not having a partner, and 27 percent wish that they could ‘unsubscribe’ from the holiday altogether, meaning now is the perfect time to remind people of the value of high self love.
Bumble’s Self-Love Report suggests that we do, in fact, need to love ourselves in order to love somebody else.
More than two thirds (67 percent) of single Australians strongly believe that having high self-love is one of the best ways to set you up for a healthy romantic relationship, and 61 percent agree that when you have higher levels of self love, you are more likely to feel equal in your romantic relationships.
More than half (54 percent) of single Australians mentioned that they prefer dating when they have a higher sense of self-love.
Over half (57 percent) of single Australians feel more sexually confident if they have high levels of self-love.
Almost 2 in 3 (63 percent) of single Australians feel more comfortable expressing their emotional and physical needs when they have high self-love.
Practising Self-Love
Self-love at its core is about putting yourself first and being in touch with your own needs, and it can look different to different people.
This Bumble Self-Love Report confirms that positive self-love can lead to more equitable relationships, better connections, greater sexual confidence and the ability to emotionally connect with partners.
The number one method single Australians use to practise self-love is time out to themselves (70 percent), followed by exercise (51 percent), and time with friends and family (50 percent).
A third of single Australians said they practise self-love through travel (33 percent), self care routines like beauty, skincare and massages (33 percent), and having strong boundaries (30 percent).
A quarter (24 percent) of single Australians practise self-love through self-pleasure and masturbation. Gen Z are the most likely to say so (31 percent) compared with Millennials (27 percent) and Gen X (21 percent).
Note to self (love)
What factors in life impact our ability to love ourselves? Everyone’s dating journeys are different and it can be easy to get hung up on comparing yourself to others, especially on days like Valentine’s Day. The research suggests your capacity to practise self-love isn’t dependent on your relationship status and that time alone can be beneficial for your sense of self.
More than half (58 percent) of single Australians said that being single for a period of time helped them develop a stronger sense of self-love and sense of self.
Almost 1 in 3 (29 percent) single Australians who are actively dating have high levels of self-love and 37 percent of Gen Z single Australians have high self-love when they are dating, compared to Millennials (28 percent) and Gen X (27 percent).
Olivia Molly Rogers, Bumble collaborator, said: “I wholeheartedly agree that being single helps you to develop a stronger sense of self, I am feeling that at the moment having recently been through a separation. I think it has taken me until now, at 30 years old, to really acknowledge and lean into the idea that you need to love yourself before you can love anyone else.
“It’s obviously something I had heard before many times, but I didn’t truly listen or practise this in my own love life. I now know, with hindsight, that in my 2 previous romantic relationships I have settled for less or accepted things that I wasn’t okay with, because my self worth was low. You accept what you think you deserve, so if you don’t love yourself, you might think it’s okay for someone to disrespect you and your boundaries. Learning to love myself, and back myself, now means that I won’t settle for less than I deserve, I am able to create stronger boundaries and I know that I will be okay whether I have a romantic partner, or not. Our relationship with ourselves is our most important relationship as it’s the longest one you’ll ever be in.”
