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29 Ways to Love Yourself

Remember the song, 50 Ways to Leave Your Lover?  In this week’s post, I’m sharing 29 ways to love yourself.  Sounds a little more upbeat, don’t ya think?

Why 29?

Because I thought we should celebrate the fact that it’s a leap year — a year that only comes along once every four years, and includes an extra day.  That extra day is February 29.  Crazy cool fact: Both my sister-in-law and her first daughter were born on leap year…there’s only a 1 in 2-million chance of that happening!  I think there’s at least a 4 in 2-million chance of seeing a unicorn!

Since February is a month symbolizing and celebrating love, I thought we’d look inward and focus on ways to practice self-love.

Now, when I suggest we turn inward and focus on self-love, that’s a good thing and shouldn’t be confused with being self-centered or narcissistic.  Self-love is critical to maintaining a healthy, happy, and balanced life.  When we love ourselves well, we are more loveable to others too, so you can’t go wrong.

Loving yourself shouldn’t be complicated, but it can take intention and effort.  I’ve listed out 29 ways to show love to yourself. These suggestions are ones that I, personally, use or that may be beneficial to you.  Of course, there may be things that would better show love to yourself that aren’t on this list–focus on what will serve you best.

Some of the ideas below are easier and take less time than others–great!  Others will take some reflection, some soul-searching, and maybe some accountability or support in other ways.

Here’s how I suggest you use the list:

1.  Either print this post or get a notebook out to write down the items in step #3.

2.  Read through the list and place a check-mark next to the areas where you feel like you’re already showing yourself love in those ways.  Good job on those, by the way!

3.   Now go back through the list and circle 1-3 of the actions you’ll commit to working on throughout the next month.

4.  At the end of the month, review the 1-3 actions you’ve been working on and, if you’ve noticed great improvement, place a check-mark next to the item.  If you haven’t noticed great improvement, continue working on your love goal.

29 Ways to Love on Yourself 

  1. Surround yourself with people that lift you, inspire you, and make you feel good.
  2. Get rid of toxic people in your life.
  3. Speak kindly to yourself.  Don’t say things to yourself that you wouldn’t say to someone you respected or loved.
  4. Laugh often.  Laughter is salve for the soul.
  5. Take walks, on a regular basis, with no other goal but to notice the beauty around you.
  6. Sleep at least 7 hours every night.  The National Sleep Foundation recommends 7+ hours/night for adults.
  7. Exercise.  30-minutes per day is ideal.
  8. Stretch your body.  There’s a reason cats seem so content…they stretch a lot. Click here for 10 simple stretches to try today.
  9. Eat well.  Maybe this just means to add a salad to your diet every day.  Maybe it means consuming less sugar.  Maybe it means drink more milk.  Check out this book, Eat Right 4 Your Type, that’ll help you to choose foods that agree with you based on your blood type.
  10. Don’t compare yourself to others.  Focus on, and celebrate, your own special gifts and abilities.
  11. Read books that you enjoy or make you feel good.
  12. Say “no” more often.  Saying no to someone or something is not bad.  Saying no leaves you open to really good yes’s.
  13. Write a letter to God and pour your heart out.
  14. Spend five minutes writing down what your perfect day would look like.  Now, plan to make it happen.
  15. Skip the doughnut…start your day with a healthy, delicious green smoothie.  Try this one with only four ingredients.
  16. Write in a gratitude journal daily.  I have a bunch of journaling ideas here.
  17. Take a 24-hour social media break.  Better yet, take a week or a month away from all the screens that suck up time.
  18. Do more of what you love.  If you love to play cards, but rarely play, schedule a weekly or monthly card night.
  19. Learn something that you’ve always wanted to.  Take a class, teach yourself, or learn online.  Just Google, “How to (put a word(s) for whatever it is you want to learn here)” and see what strikes your fancy.
  20. Write a list of things other people say you do well, or they like about you.  Keep that list handy for when you need encouragement.
  21. Let go of a grudge you’ve held for far too long.  Releasing the grudge = your freedom and peace.
  22. Cut yourself some slack.  Have you noticed, we can be our own worst critic?  Just treat yourself fairly.
  23. Being an adult can be exhausting, so spend more time acting like a kid. Need some ideas on how? I wrote about it here.
  24. Accept who you are.  Change what you can and want to, and accept the rest.
  25. Go on a personal retreat where you will come away rested, renewed, re-energized, inspired, and clear on “stuff”.
  26. Be a blessing to someone else.  Funny thing is, you will be blessed yourself by this action.
  27. Keep a happiness jar (aka: blessing box & gratitude jar).  Just write down things you are thankful for, that make you happy or make you laugh, etc. on a little piece of paper and store them in a jar.  Pull them out and read when you need some encouragement.  Here’s a cute DIY Happiness Jar with step-by-step instructions.
  28. Invest in yourself.  This ties in to some of the earlier items on the list like taking a class, going on a retreat, etc.  It may be that you finally buy that Kitchen Aide mixer you’ve always dreamed of to start your cupcake business.  Maybe you’ve wanted to attend a conference, spend time learning something new, or buy a good camera to develop your photography hobby.
  29. Believe in yourself.  This will come more naturally the more you love yourself, but if you’re not there yet, try and be your own cheerleader.  If you’ve ever been an encouragement to someone else, then remember what that was like and do the same for yourself…you deserve it.

Here’s to loving ourselves and others!

Love,

Jill xx

 

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Learn the Best Way to Show Your Love

Today’s post is critically important!

I’m posting this on Valentine’s Day because it’s the big LOVE day of the year.  For many, this is a day set aside to shower your special love with romance, so this post will definitely help you, but this post is really intended to help anyone that loves someone and that has someone that loves them.  I hope that includes all of us.

The ideas shared here today will transform the relationships with those you love—spouses, friends, children, parents, siblings, co-workers, neighbors, roommates, etc.

Ok, think of someone you love…anyone from the list above.  How do you show them you love them? Hugs? Kind words? Gifts?

In general, most of us show our love, depending on the nature of the relationship, in a certain way.  If you’re a hugger, everyone you love is gonna get a hug, right?

Now think about what makes you feel most loved by others.  Hugs? Kind words? Gifts? Time spent together?

Do you realize that how you give and receive love can be different?  You may be a hugger, but when someone gives you a small thoughtful gift, you are over the moon.  This doesn’t mean you don’t love receiving a hug, it just means that there is a more direct, meaningful way in which you are designed to receive love.

Can you see how important it is to discover how those you love best experience and receive love?  You may think you know, but don’t leave that to chance.  I have been wrong on several occasions.

Lucky for us, author Gary Chapman wrote a book called, The Five Love Languages.  In his book, he explains the five “love languages” and teaches us how to express love in our loved one’s language.

Here’s how he breaks the five different languages down:

5 Love LanguagesYou really should get a copy of Dr. Chapman’s book, but here are some insights from me on the five different languages.

Words of Affirmation: “You are so awesome!” “You really look great today!” “I love the way you teach our kids to be kind.” “You are THE BEST cook in the world!”  “You are such a good friend, I’m so glad to know you.” You get where I’m going with this–A simple word of appreciation or praise can go a looooooong way.

Acts of Service:  “Let me help you take those groceries in.”  “Honey, I’m gonna take your car to get the oil changed.”  “Let me pick up your dry cleaning.”  “Son/Daughter, let me help you pick up your room today.”  Hint: You don’t have to tell your loved one what you’re gonna do–surprise them with an act of service: unload the dishwasher, pick up the house, mow the lawn, run an errand for them, clean up their mess without complaint.

Receiving Gifts:  This doesn’t need much explaining—shower your loved one with presents!  It doesn’t have to be big or expensive (well, maybe for some it may be!), you can make something too.  The main idea here is to be thoughtful with your gift.  If someone loves flowers, that may be your go-to gift.  Someone else may appreciate a hand-made card.

Quality Time:  The operative word here is quality.  Spend time together.  That means, put your phone down and give your undivided attention to your loved one.

This is my husband’s love language and it took me forever to figure it out, but one day we spent a big chunk of time in the garden planting and weeding.  Time in the garden for him is heaven, time in the garden, especially weeding, is not exactly my dream afternoon.  I was holding my tongue from complaining–my back hurt, the dang gnats where bugging me, and it was hot!!  Boy, was I glad I kept my mouth shut, because at the end of our gardening time, he told me that our time in the garden was one of the best days he’d had with me.  That was the day I learned his love language: quality time.  It may seem like this was an act of service, but for him, it was just about spending time together, whether we were chatting while pulling weeds or just being in the same space together silently.  I’m going to make up a new love language for him called “Productive Quality Time!”

Physical Touch:  Depending on who the loved one is, this can obviously be different.  With your spouse, this may be intimate touch, but it can also just be holding hands, or putting your arm around their shoulder.  For your child, this could be rubbing their head while you’re watching tv together.  For a friend, this could be a hug or just a touch to their arm when you’re talking to them.

Remember the point here is to speak the language of your loved one…not your own. 

Reread that last sentence—it’s really important.

Many of us will fall back into showing love the way we like to receive love.  Our intentions are good, but when we do this, we are actually spinning our wheels and minimizing the effect of our efforts.

What’s your love language?  Does one of the five jump right out at you?  Not sure?  Take this quick online quiz (click on the area where it says “Discover your love language.”)

Send this post to your loved ones, so they can take the quiz too.  If you are a parent of a younger child, the quiz I linked to will allow you to take the quiz for your child to figure out their language (note: their language will probably change as they get older.)

I really recommend you pick up a copy of the book because it’s a fun read and really dives into what we’ve talked about here.

If you’ve already read the book, today is your chance to revisit this crucial “formula” to building and strengthening the relationships with those you love the most.

Have a wonderful day filled with your kind of love!

Jill xx

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