Love Yourself Like Your Life Depends on It

How often do you tell yourself that you love yourself, and genuinely mean it? In Love Yourself Like Your Life Depends on It, Kamal Ravikant argues that this simple act—repeated with fierce consistency—can save your life, reshape your mind, and unleash magic in every area. He insists that radical self-love isn’t fluffy self-help; it’s survival. Ravikant discovered this truth after his company failed, his health collapsed, a close relationship ended, and a friend died. From rock bottom, he made a desperate vow: to love himself completely. That vow, and the daily discipline it sparked, rebuilt his life from inside out.

This expanded edition builds on the viral version of Ravikant’s original essay. It’s structured in three parts: The Vow, The Manual, and The Lesson. Part I shares the humble yet potent beginnings of his journey. Part II outlines a clear, step-by-step manual for applying and sustaining radical self-love. Part III narrates how even after success, he fell again—and used the same practice to rise higher. Through this narrative, Ravikant positions loving oneself not as indulgence but a discipline as serious as breathing.

From Desperation to Discovery

Lying depressed on his bed in a dark apartment, sick and shattered, Ravikant realized that the only way out was inward. In one fierce moment, he wrote a vow: “This day, I vow to myself to love myself, to treat myself as someone I love truly and deeply.” That promise became his North Star. He didn’t know how—it was an act of faith. But repeating the phrase “I love myself” over and over, he discovered that words could change brain chemistry. Within a month, his health, mindset, and life radically improved.

Ravikant calls this practice a mental and emotional “groove.” Just as negativity loops wire us for fear, a new loop of self-love reprograms the mind toward light. Simplicity, he argues, is the secret—no complex rituals or therapy jargon, just relentless, purposeful repetition. His story proves that transformation doesn’t begin with external success; it begins with what you tell yourself when no one’s watching.

Why Loving Yourself Matters

Ravikant challenges a cultural myth: that self-love is selfish. He aligns with thinkers like Brené Brown and Louise Hay, showing that loving yourself is actually the foundation for loving others. It softens the ego, builds compassion, and rewires beliefs that drive unhealthy behavior. Loving yourself isn’t vanity—it’s maintenance, like oxygen before helping others on a plane. Without it, you give from emptiness. With it, you give from wholeness.

His core thesis is almost spiritual in its simplicity: life mirrors how you treat yourself. When you love yourself truly and deeply, life conspires to reflect that love back. Synchronicities appear. Health returns. Relationships improve. Work becomes aligned rather than forced. As he puts it, “As you love yourself, life loves you back.”

The Structure of the Practice

In Part II, “The Manual,” Ravikant breaks down the process into four core practices—the Mental Loop, Meditation, Mirror, and Question. These tools help you engrain self-love into your consciousness, daily habits, and decisions. They are supported by two foundational acts: forgiving yourself and making your vow. Forgiveness clears past weight; the vow ignites forward movement. Through rituals, tracking, and the “ten breaths” method, the practice becomes a sustainable lifestyle, not a temporary fix.

He emphasizes that loving yourself is a practice, like exercise or meditation—it must be cultivated, reinforced, and renewed. He also warns that after success, complacency (what he calls “coasting”) erodes momentum. His answer: constant recommitment, especially when life is good. Magic, he insists, belongs to those who expect it and nurture it through discipline.

The Second Fall: How the Lesson Reinforced the Vow

In the book’s final section, “The Lesson,” Ravikant recounts falling again after forgetting his own teaching. Following a breakup, he spiraled into despair, even considering suicide. The moment he returned to his vow—to love himself at all costs—life lifted him once more. Through this raw narrative, he demonstrates that self-love isn’t a one-time cure but an ongoing relationship with oneself. He blends compassion with accountability, showing how failure can be sacred if it rekindles self-trust.

Through stories of meditation, conversations with mentors like Cheryl Richardson, and lessons from pain, Ravikant synthesizes ancient wisdom (sayings of monks, Stoic acceptance, and even neuroscience) into modern clarity: you are the creator of your internal state. Thoughts repeated with emotion create your reality. Therefore, the most powerful choice in the universe is to direct your thoughts toward love.

Why This Matters

Ravikant’s message lands with urgency in a digital age of anxiety and self-rejection. We chase validation externally while neglecting the one relationship that shapes all others: the one with ourselves. By learning to say “I love myself” not as affirmation fluff but as intentional reprogramming, we reclaim agency over our minds. This vow, he insists, can shift not only your inner state but every aspect of your outer world—career, relationships, health, and purpose.

“Love yourself like your life depends on it,” Ravikant writes, “because it does.”

Ultimately, this book offers a simple but radical reframe: happiness and transformation aren’t something to chase; they’re cultivated through unwavering love for the self you already are. Everything else flows from there.

Kamal Ravikant’s journey begins with a single act of desperation that became a lifelong commitment: a vow to love himself. He didn’t know what “loving himself” meant, only that he couldn’t survive another day without learning how. That vow wasn’t a mere wish—it was a contract. He defines a vow as a sacred promise that leaves no room for retreat. Once made, every thought, choice, and experience aligns to fulfill it.

The Birth of a Vow

During his darkest nights, with his business failed and body failing, Ravikant grabbed a notebook and scribbled a few burning words. That single page—beginning “This day, I vow to myself…”—ignited his transformation. By declaring unconditional love for himself, he shifted from victimhood to agency. He describes the moment as drawing a line in the sand of his life: before the vow and after it.

Vows matter because they harness commitment. You’re no longer dabbling in change—you’ve picked a side. Ravikant likens it to a soldier’s oath or a marriage vow: failure isn’t absence of progress, it’s simply breaking truth with oneself. Even when you fall short, the vow pulls you back to your center.

Why Vows Work

A vow taps into the psychology of identity. Once you define yourself as “one who loves myself,” the subconscious aligns to sustain that identity. This is similar to James Clear’s argument in Atomic Habits: build identity first, then actions follow. To Ravikant, vows shift self-talk from desire—“I’d like to love myself”—to decision—“I do love myself.” Life reorganizes accordingly.

He also notes a spiritual dimension: a vow is a message to the universe that you’re ready to evolve. When you align intention with emotion and action, the world meets you halfway. This belief links Ravikant’s work to Viktor Frankl’s existential insight that meaning is chosen in suffering—it’s your vow that gives pain purpose.

Your Own Vow

Ravikant instructs readers to craft their own vow by hand—never on a phone—because writing encodes emotion into memory. The words should feel so honest they scare you. Read them aloud each morning and evening until you feel their vibration in your body. Emotions reinforce neural grooves; speaking engages both hemispheres of the brain. Through repetition, the vow becomes not affirmation but embodiment.

“When you truly commit to yourself,” Ravikant writes, “life ripples around you.”

Making a vow is how you decide to stop negotiating your worth. It’s a declaration that no matter what happens outside—failure, rejection, heartbreak—you will not abandon yourself inside. That’s the essence of this book’s power: transformation is born not from luck or willpower but from a vow you refuse to break.

To sustain self-love, Ravikant distilled his experience into four daily practices: the Mental Loop, Meditation, Mirror, and Question. Each targets a different layer of being—thoughts, emotions, body, and choice. Together, they form an elegant self-repair system that brings the mind back from darkness to light.

1. The Mental Loop

The Mental Loop is continuous repetition of the phrase “I love myself.” This isn’t positive thinking; it’s neurological reprogramming. Ravikant compares thought loops to grooves carved in stone by water—habits of mind reinforced through repetition. The more you repeat negative stories, the deeper those grooves run. By intentionally repeating “I love myself,” you create a stronger, brighter channel that overrides the old ones. You literally groove love into your brain. The goal is for your mind to default to love the same way it once defaulted to fear.

2. The Meditation

Ravikant’s meditation lasts only seven minutes. With soothing music playing, he imagines light from the universe flowing into his head and body while saying on each inhale, “I love myself.” On the exhale, he releases whatever arises—pain, memory, fear. The image of light activates what psychology calls embodied cognition: the brain treats imagery as real experience. The result is emotional cleansing and physiological calm. The repetition with breath aligns with mindfulness traditions (especially loving-kindness meditation in Buddhism) but translated into modern, practical language.

3. The Mirror

Standing nose-close to a mirror and looking straight into your eyes, you say “I love myself” for five minutes. Uncomfortable? Exactly. Ravikant admits he feared sharing this exercise because it sounds strange—but that discomfort reveals resistance. Looking into your own eyes bypasses denial; you confront the truth of how you see yourself. Over time, the judgment dissolves, replaced by genuine recognition. He calls this the fastest way to fall in love with your physical self. Neuroscientists show that seeing your own reflection triggers empathy regions of the brain—the same ones that activate when looking at someone you love.

4. The Question

The final tool integrates self-love into decisions and relationships. When facing emotions or actions, Ravikant asks: “If I loved myself truly and deeply, what would I do?” or “Would I let myself experience this?” These questions interrupt reactive loops and invite conscious choice. They turn theory into practice. As he writes, “Choice defines destiny.” (This mirrors Byron Katie’s or Viktor Frankl’s insight that between stimulus and response lies freedom.)

Together these four practices form a closed loop: repetition cements the mindset, meditation deepens feeling, mirror practice roots it viscerally, and questioning keeps it alive in behavior. The result isn’t forced positivity—it’s mental hygiene.

Use these tools daily, Ravikant advises. They are switches that bring light whenever darkness returns—and it always will.

Before love can grow, Ravikant argues, you must remove the thorns of guilt and self-blame. He discovered this through a literal ritual at a grove near the Pacific Ocean. On that beach, he wrote everything he still held against himself—missed chances, relationship regrets, professional failures—then read it aloud and threw it, wrapped around a heart-shaped stone, into the ocean. The act symbolized release. Forgiving himself, he writes, made him “clean and pure.”

Why Forgiveness First

Self-forgiveness is the foundation because you can’t build self-love on condemnation. It frees energy trapped in the past, making space for joy. Neuroscience supports this: letting go of guilt reduces activity in the brain’s threat systems. Ravikant notes that we often work hard to forgive others but never ourselves—the only person we have true power over.

The Five-Step Ritual

His manual version includes five steps. Go somewhere peaceful. Write every resentment against yourself. Feel the emotions that arise. State aloud, “I forgive myself.” Then destroy the paper—tear it, burn it, flush it, or, as Ravikant did, give it to nature. Symbolism matters less than sincerity. The act imprints closure in the body. Afterwards, you immediately write your vow to love yourself. This transitions from release to rebirth.

Forgiveness also dismantles perfectionism. Ravikant reminds us: no human is flawless, and falling short is part of “the contract of existence.” Joy returns when you stop demanding proof of worthiness from yourself. Forgiveness is not forgetting—it’s simply choosing, again and again, to drop the weight.

One of Ravikant’s readers wrote after trying this ritual: “I walked away lighter.” That, he says, is the feeling of a human who’s finally free to love.

Loving yourself, Ravikant warns, only works if you make it habitual. Like exercise, it strengthens through repetition. To keep the momentum alive long after the initial spark fades, he built what he calls “Ten Breaths” and daily rituals. These micro-practices bridge the gap between inspiration and discipline, turning self-love into a natural rhythm.

The Ten Breaths Technique

At random times during the day, Ravikant pauses everything and takes ten intentional breaths. On each inhale he says internally, “I love myself,” and imagines light pouring in. On the exhale he releases tension or darkness. It takes less than a minute but resets the mind’s loop. Whether at the gym mirror or outside his building, he practices it discreetly. Over time, these moments form new mental grooves that default to peace. It’s mindfulness simplified—portable, practical, and powerful.

Rituals as Anchors

Ravikant likens rituals to the push-ups army recruits perform before entering a barrack—small symbolic acts that hardwire discipline. He established fixed points: meditating each morning, saying “I love myself” before bed, doing the mirror practice daily. He encourages you to create your own: ten breaths before meetings, before eating, or when idle. These repetitions build subconscious consistency. In psychology, such repetition rewires neurons through “long-term potentiation.”

To avoid drifting, Ravikant introduced two accountability tools: tracking and a “line in the sand.” He recommends checking off completed practices on a calendar—no empty squares allowed—and defining one non-negotiable act you’ll never skip (like meditating once daily). When you hold this minimal line, you preserve momentum even in chaos. This reflects wisdom from habit experts like BJ Fogg: doing small steps reliably outweighs big bursts inconsistently.

“Even if you fall short of perfection,” Ravikant writes, “at least you’ve kept your promise to yourself.”

These rituals aren’t superstition—they are scaffolds to maintain the groove of love. Once your brain absorbs them, loving yourself stops being an act of effort and becomes your baseline state.

From his own depression to suicidal thoughts after heartbreak, Ravikant portrays fear and pain as mental darkness—absence of light. The solution, he says, isn’t to fight darkness but to turn on the lights. This simple metaphor, repeated throughout the book, transforms suffering into an opportunity for awareness.

The 'Hallucinated Snakes'

One story from NLP co-founder Richard Bandler illustrates this: a schizophrenic cured his hallucinations when Bandler asked him to identify which snakes around him were “real or not real.” The realization—hallucinations are see-through—broke his fear. Ravikant borrows this by labeling anxious thoughts “hallucinated snakes.” When fear arises, rather than wrestle with it, simply note: “not useful,” “not real,” or “hallucinated snake.” Naming restores power. (Cognitive therapists use a similar strategy called cognitive defusion.)

Saying Yes to What Is

When faced with failure or heartbreak, his lesson from a monk transformed his approach: “I say yes to what happens.” Acceptance disarms fear. Ravikant realized that his prior obsession with achievement was rooted in fear of failure. By saying “yes,” he stopped resisting life and shifted to loving presence. This is the heart of Stoicism and Buddhist mindfulness—don’t seek to control events, master your response.

Light, in his system, symbolizes self-love. Each act of turning toward love—mental loop, breath, forgiveness—“cleans the window” and lets light enter. As he writes, “Darkness is just the absence of light.” Practically, this translates to shifting focus: instead of analyzing pain, you return to love. Pain loses dominance not because it’s fought, but because it’s overshadowed by light.

When faced with fear, ask yourself: is this a real snake or a hallucinated one? Then flip your switch and turn on the light.

This attitude replaces judgment with curiosity, fear with compassion. Eventually, love becomes both your weapon and your shield—the light that fear can’t survive.

Six years after his first transformation, Ravikant fell again—this time after forgetting his own practice. The third part of the book, “The Lesson,” chronicles his fall after a painful breakup and his climb back using the same vow. The message: self-love isn’t a destination but a devotion renewed daily.

The Fall

After years of coasting, focusing on problems instead of gratitude, Ravikant’s inner grooves of love weakened. Then love ended abruptly: the woman he expected to build a life with left him. The shock triggered memories of childhood abandonment and self-hate. He spiraled into suicidal ideation. But one thought saved him: “Return to what works.” And so he did, brick by brick, practice by practice.

Building Back Through Practice

He rebuilt himself through strict daily “physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual” routines—working out, writing, connecting with loved ones, and returning to meditation. Each step mirrored principles he once taught but forgotten to live. Mentors like Cheryl Richardson reminded him to place his hand over his heart and whisper, “I got you.” This simple gesture grounded him in presence and love.

Throughout this section, Ravikant reveals emotional honesty rarely seen in self-help. He writes of loneliness, relapse, and recognizing his patterns—like falling for emotionally unavailable partners. His insight: coasting breeds collapse. Only recommitment sustains recovery.

From Pain to Power

By applying his vow again, he transforms the narrative. Pain becomes his personal trainer; the gym is his heart. With each repetition of “I love myself,” he rebuilds confidence, health, and joy. Along the way, he reframes suffering through gratitude, reminding himself to look for what’s working. Over weeks, his mind starts to shift. He documents his journey with brutal realism and growing faith, showing readers how relapse itself can be sacred if met with awareness.

The takeaway: you will fall. That’s human. What matters is whether you rise with more compassion than before. Ravikant closes the book restored, wiser, and grateful—not because life spared him pain, but because pain returned him to love.

“Fall. Get up. Dust yourself off. Love yourself even more. Life will love you back.”