For many of us, the idea of self-love makes us feel uncomfortable. We may have no clue what self-love looks like or feels like. Some of us may even confuse the concept of selfishness with self-love. If we grew up with rigid parents, our concepts of self-love may be rigid as well. This is not our fault, however, nothing changes until something changes. We can’t change our parents but we can change the programs they helped create in our minds as they pertain to self-love.

Becoming more self-loving means we allow ourselves to become less rigid in our thinking. We are learning to allow ourselves permission to not be so perfect. Perhaps this means we don’t make our bed one morning, or we dare to travel out without make-up. Maybe instead of working 10 hours a day, we knock off early to go sit in the park and feed some birds. For others, becoming less rigid might be not hounding our kids about cleaning their rooms. It also might include deliberately choosing to give our...

Many are celebrating a resurrection today.

Many are praising the cheating of death.

Many are giving thanks for salvation.

Self Care Tips to be Codependent No More

1. Start each day with a meaningful intention
2. Meditate every morning even for just ten minutes
3. Do deep breathing exercises to help calm your mind 
4. Get a calendar and schedule exercise time
5. Be sure to get enough sleep
6. Avoid negative and draining conversations
7. Make sure you eat well and perhaps speak to a nutritionist
8. Treat yourself the way you want others to treat you
9. Get out of the habit of defending yourself unnecessarily
10. Develop nightly routines that involve eating a good meal, reading a nurturing book, soaking in a warm Epsom Salt bath, and moisturizing your skin. 

Self-care is one of the greatest keys to emotional health. The more you care for your teeth, the stronger your teeth will be. This seems like common sense, so why do so many of us naturally ignore the self?

We are a society of unconscious minds who have been programmed to gain bonds and form attachments to other unconscious others.

Many of us have been indoctrinated to...

The HARDEST thing to do in life is to learn how to LOVE YOUR SELF!!!!

Why?

It is easy to love others because we don't know all of their flaws--like we know our own.

It is easy to love others--because it is easy to fantasize about the idea that someone else is totally freaking awesome--because we are not aware of their shadow side.

It is hard to love the self--because we know what our flaws are. We know what we look and smell like at 4 am. We know the way food gets stuck in our teeth. We know our hair and skin are thinning. We know we have cellulite and spider veins. We know our sisters, brother, mothers, fathers, and spouses have crappy opinions of us. We know we aren't always good with money. We know we sometimes scratch our asses and do the kinds of things that are socially unacceptable, like release a fart in public when no one is around. I mean come on--if you have ever farted in public you know the one you love has too. It's time to just get REAL!

Our brains are NOT...

We are all here on a journey and although each one of us seems to come from vastly different parts of the world, the undeniable truth is--we have all come here to learn the same lessons.

In nature, there is an intrinsic and divine beautiful and balanced relationship between the sky and the earth.

The sun delivers to our plants the energy it needs to manufacture within its cells the food and nutrients required to survive. Our plants and animals rely on the sky for the freshwater it needs to live. Our earth provides shelter for the animals in the forests and jungles and trees for animals with wings. And when one tree falls, the forest does not mourn--for it accepts the cycle of all things and rests in the knowledge that the carcass of the fallen tree--will inevitably decay and in so doing, even replenish the earth it rots upon.

All things have been born for one reason and one reason only--to live.

And while this sounds simple and even obvious--far too many beings are born--and...

There are many steps one must take in order to heal the emotional wounds of our pasts. While healing is a process, it is helpful to first come into some key understandings.

Most of our wounds occurred when we were defenseless children--powerless--and under the control of others. Because we were dependent upon those who may have been violating the innocence within us--we did not feel safe. As a result, our minds developed coping skills to help us survive the everyday abuses we may have experienced.

Perhaps we floated away--and disassociated ourselves from our immediate pain. We may have counted, cut, binged, purged, obsessed, ticked or sought love in places we could never have found it. It doesn't matter what survival skill we developed. What is most important is that we do not re-victimize ourselves by now judging the very miraculous survival skills that allowed us to endure the suffering we experienced as children.

The main ingredient to healing emotional abuse--is learning to...

It is unfortunate that so many of us have been so damaged that we need to learn how to love self. However, it is a miraculous thing to know that beings who have suffered incredible emotional hardships have in fact overcome.

Have you heard of people like Oprah Winfrey and Tony Robbins?

Yep—incredible humble and pretty tough beginnings.

It is probably one of the most emotionally challenging things to do as a human being who loves another human being. Setting boundaries with those we love can be difficult and anxiety provoking. So how do we know when we should set a boundary with someone we love?

It is certainly a complicated question and it has helped me to develop a certain protocol around boundary setting with people I love. It is not always fail proof, but having some type of concrete plan has helped me feel less anxious when put in a difficult spot by someone I care about.

My formula is fairly simple. If someone is talking poorly about me and not to me, that is something I generally brush off unless this person is someone who claims to love, honor and respect me. If I am spoken about poorly about someone who claims to care about me and our relationship, my general rule of thumb is to confront them personally, directly, and to let them know precisely how what I heard made me feel. If this person then reacts by...

Self love is the key to everything. 

When we set boundaries we are loving the self.

When we forgive, we are loving the self.

When we refuse to shame the self, we are loving the self.

When we invest in the self, we are loving the self.

When we meditate, we are loving the self.

When we rest, we are loving the self.

When we say ‘NO’ we are loving the self.

And when we say ‘YES’ and we mean it—we are loving the self.

Self love is absolutely the key to everything but the foundation for self love is healing any idea that ever had us believing we were not enough.

Love is a choice and a state of being.

Love is an action word as it reflects a nonphysical state that is acted upon by a physical being.

To help us understand what love truly is, it helps to rest one’s mind on the simplicity that abounds in nature.