Ahhh, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, you sure could rock a poem. (I hope you don’t mind how I made that slight but significant change from thee to ME. It just had to be done!)
Love has been on my mind lately. In particular, self-love. We’ve talked before about writing love letters to ourselves and we’ve differentiated between the words self-love and selfish. It is a concept that is fundamental to my beliefs and to my blog; indeed, it seems to be the theme for my life’s work and I’m finally coming to terms with it. Even embracing it. The idea that we must know ourselves and love ourselves in order for everything to fall into place is not new. I would go so far as to say that this is innate knowledge, common sense to, what I call on this blog, our creative Self and what others call their Soul, authentic Self, true Self, unconditioned Self etc.
Hay House founder and author, Louise Hay, summarizes it well in her book, You Can Heal Your Life:
“When we love, accept, approve of ourselves exactly as we are, then everything in life works. Our health improves, we attract more money, our relationships become much more fulfilling and we begin to express ourselves in creatively fulfilling ways”
It makes sense, doesn’t it? It’s not about recreating or changing yourself, but about remembering and honouring your Self as we talked about here.
[Tweet “You don’t need to change, you just need to love the heck out of yourself. “]
So, how does one do that? Well, I think it looks different for everyone. It depends on what you, in your uniqueness, need.
Today, I’d like you to count the ways you love yourself. Literally. Get out a piece of paper and a pen and make a numbered list of ways that you show yourself you are totally worth being loved and cared for. They can be piddly little things that would appear totally insignificant to someone else. Or they can be gigantic shows of affection that most people could appreciate. I’ll start my list here and then keep going in my own journal – this is just to give you an idea of the kinds of things that are important to ME that make ME feel loved.
- I respect myself as a writer by making it part of my outer identity and nurturing that part of me daily.
- I bought myself blue nail polish just because I really like blue nail polish.
- I am hiring part time childcare to help me stay balanced and sane.
- I dance in my kitchen almost every day. I don’t just mean I bop my head to the beat…I mean, I’m on a stage, dancing for a very appreciative audience! And I’m not shy about accepting the applause!
You get the picture, right? Some of these acts didn’t require a lot of psychological prep work, and some things required many sleepless nights and pep talks.
What’s on your list? Can you share one or two with us here? We’d love to hear it!
Speaking of showing love – voting for Top Mom Blogger Vancouver 2012 began yesterday and runs through until June 4. If you’d like to take a look at all 30 nominees, and vote for up to 5 of your favourites, please click here. I appreciate your support of mom bloggers!
