“You yourself, as much as anybody in the entire universe, deserve your love and affection.”
—Buddha
Since the beginning of the month, we’ve made a commitment to show up for ourselves with a little bit more love.
If you’ve been following along with us, we started off our December journey to self-love by practicing the spirit of giving—to others and to ourselves—paying particular attention to when we “over-give” or “under-give” so that we can achieve greater balance.
We followed with last week’s Act of Love No. 2, noticing specific areas of our lives—health, finances, relationships, personal development, career—that we may struggle in and finding a unique and simple way to give at least one area a little bit more tender loving care. That might have looked like spending more time than usual in the gym, prepping healthier meals in the kitchen or making that important business call that’s incessantly been put off.
So how are you doing thus far? More important, how are you feeling?
The journey to self-love can create a potpourri of emotions. We aren’t always taught to love ourselves, so when we actually begin the practice, oftentimes old, stored emotions begin to boil to the surface. In those moments, remember to engage your self-love practice of kindness, patience, compassion and no judgment.
This week, we’re going to continue the holiday tradition of giving by giving ourselves something we rarely, if ever, give to ourselves: compliments. Yes, compliments. Those things we generously pour out to others, but often fail to give to ourselves.
How easy is it for us to look in the mirror and immediately pick out the things we don’t like about ourselves?
“Oh, my skin is sagging. My eyebrows are too thick or too thin. My nose is too flat and wide. I’m too fat or too thin. I can’t get this or that thing right.” And on and on and on. Sound familiar?
Sadly, we aren’t generally taught to praise ourselves. So, instead, we often come up with a barrage of things we don’t like about ourselves, which, in turn, impacts our self-esteem and self-confidence.
But this week, we are going to create a new beat to our own drum. For our Act of Love No. 3, we’re going to sing ourselves praises. Not to be confused with self-conceit, which stems from self-doubt and insecurity. Self-praise is our opportunity to focus on our strengths and what we like about ourselves.
This week, each day, can you give yourself at least one compliment and write it down in a journal? It can include any of your attributes and strengths related to you physically, spiritually, personally, professionally, athletically, etc.
If you can come up with more than one each day, go for it! Sing yourself praises! You deserve it. And if you’re really feeling good about yourself, how about a little wink to yourself in the mirror? That’s right, flirt with yourself this week and bask in and enjoy all the self-love!