Self Care Practices Lead To Self Love
What a great day to share some of my self care and self love practices! Valentine’s Day always used to bother me. Mostly because I am always single. This day does not have to focus just on lovers! I like to use this day to really focus on myself and give myself some extra love and adornment. I want to share some practices I do that leads to me fully loving myself. These are actually out of my upcoming book “My Dynamic Emotional Relationship With Food.” These practices are a form of self care. Acts of self care have helped me to build confidence and self worth and self love. It is not selfish to take time to care for yourself before others. If we do not take care of ourselves, how can we show up to help someone else? If I let my self care practices go, this lessons my commitments to myself and brings up worthiness and insecure issues. And then here I am again out of acceptance and not fully loving myself. I want to mention that it took me years to realize it was not selfish to schedule in acts of self care for myself. I learned finally to put myself first. And it feels so yummy and delicious!
I also believe that it is impossible to nourish ourselves with the right foods and let go of those numbing tools if we are not in acceptance with our bodies and if we do not love ourselves. I have been sharing through IGTV, ways I pushed myself to start to accept my curves, my sensuality and everything about my body. This has been a major journey.
My intentions for 2021 are to experience total inner freedom and to embody unconditional self love. And I can not experience either of these if I am out of acceptance with myself or if I am not taking care of myself and my needs. I like to block one day every week to schedule self care dates. And throughout the week, I sprinkle in time for self care. Not all of these dates and acts need to cost a ton of money. Though I do like to splurge on manicures, massages, acupuncture, facials and the Korean Spa when it opens again. Other things I schedule and block time for: hiking with Sadie, time at the ocean, laying out in my backyard, buying myself fresh flowers weekly, breathwork, naps, times with friends, FaceTime dates, extra meditation, quiet time, finding time for play, cooking for myself or a friend, going out to dinner, tai chi and dancing!
I suggest you start by making a list of what makes you feel good. What acts of self care can you start to pepper in your day and week? Then from this list, I would commit to putting a couple of these into your days and week. I usually take Sunday as my quiet day and allow myself to do what brings me joy and pleasure. It is so easy to get caught up in life and work and forget about ourselves and the importance of play and taking care of ourselves. I am speaking from experience! 2020 I put myself last, lost myself in work, allowed my boundaries to be broken, blew out my adrenals, got back into my self numbing drugs; caffeine, alcohol and sugar and was not nourishing my body with the right foods. I committed this year, to really put myself first and create the life I want to live and experience. And so far, it is amazing and so many blessings have happened in 2021!
One blessing is that I finished my book during quarantine in January! My Dynamic Emotional Relationship With Food will be out this June followed by my cookbook this summer! So many exciting things I cannot wait to share with you. Stay connected and share with me some of your self care acts and what you are doing to honor and take care of yourself. Love to you all xoxo
