Coming into this new year, I spent several weeks defining goals, dreams and cravings and mapping out a road to success in achieving them (much thanks to my wonderful friend and founder of Stratejoy and her program, The Holiday Council…check it out!)  There is sooooo much awesomeness I could share about all of this, but one of the most important moments of clarity I gained from the experience was this:

I need to be LOVING MYSELF.

This might seem an obvious thing to do as a human, but somewhere along my journey, I completely missed that turn.  Now don’t misinterpret my feelings.  I don’t dislike myself.  In fact, I am a positive person with what I consider a fairly strong self-awareness and sincerity and I take pride in my strengths and accomplishments.  However, I have struggled to truly focus on myself in a way that nurtures my soul and instead focus on others with unbalanced abundance or walk straight into selfishness in an unhealthy way and then wonder why I still feel unfulfilled and even guilty.  My heart has been awakened to the reality that there is a distinction between selfishness and self-love and that I should be pursuing healthy self-love.
And so, I made loving myself one of my main goals for this year.  Figuring out how to do this took some time and brainstorming and is still developing, but one tool that I have created is what I call my self-love box.
I started by making a list of ways that I could love myself.  Then, I cut out a bunch of little hearts and wrote the items from my list on them.
Some of the things from my list?

buy yourself a special treat
reach out to an encouraging person
get dressed up
take a nap
do something that inspires you
forgive yourself
dream, plan and go on a personal retreat
stop. breathe deep.
write yourself a love note
get a massage
be grateful.  make a list of things you are thankful for.

Next, I found an inexpensive heart shaped box at a craft store and plastered it with some meaningful and inspiring pictures.  The little self-love list hearts went inside and I am challenging myself to use the box several times a month.
Creating this simple little box and using it has been a rewarding and wonderful experience thus far and I recommend doing something like this to absolutely anyone.  Whether you create a box or a list or not, though, please remember to LOVE YOURSELF!  You are worth it!
xoxo