More Self-love this Valentine's Day - Friday Focus

 Hello Friends,

I hope you are doing well. Happy Friday! It is almost Valentine's day and it is a time to celebrate all kinds of love. Love for others and love for yourself. I have been working on self-love over the years. It hasn't always been easy to feel the love for myself. I do love myself now and feel happy with how far I have come and I am doing things each day to keep working on this important relationship. I am posting below some tips I found online to practice more self-love, some of my own ideas, and my experiences with each tip. 

Choose a positive mindset. Psychology Today has a tip to "be a life coach to yourself". which is true and it made me think of a recent podcast I listened to from Natalie Bacon on her podcast Design your Dream Life called Three Default Mindsets. She discusses choosing the mindset that you have all the time. I have had different mindsets in the past sometimes it could be really negative and constant negative self talk. If you are easier on yourself if you make a mistake and treat yourself with the kindness and love then you can develop more self love.

Spend time on things you enjoy. I try to spend as much time doing the things I love and bring me joy like knitting, blogging, reading, and spending time with loved ones. I think by purposefully making time for the things you really love and that are important to you, you will send yourself the message that you matter.

Make peace with the past. This is one that I struggle with. If we dwell on our past mistakes, it makes us feel regret and shame. If we accept what happened and work hard each day to move forward, then we can understand ourselves better and to make better decisions for ourselves in the future. Our past selves were just learning as we went along, and we are the people we are today because of an accumulation of all of our experiences.

Thank you for visiting my blog today. I hope you are having a great week so far and enjoy your weekend!