Hello Beautiful Soul
Belated Happy Valentines to you ❤️
Have you finished opening all those cards yet?! I’m not 100% down with Valentine’s Day as I like to spread love every day, but any excuse to be kind to each other is OK in my book and I was lucky enough to enjoy some surprise love by mail 💌
I’m particularly happy to embrace any excuse for compassion, love and kindness in this climate. I don’t think there’s one person I have spoken to in the last 3 months that has not felt overwhelmed at some point. All triggered by a wide range of reasons, but ending in the same sense of lack of control over their emotions or personal situation.
Some of the usual things we do to soothe ourselves are simply not hitting the sides anymore, one of my friends calls me the queen of self care as I am always doing something nice to take care of myself. She says this longingly with two kids under the age of 5, I live on my own so I think I have no excuse not to have time to take care of myself quite frankly.
I also didn’t just start doing all those things at once, I built in these habits over time. Most of them felt like huge self indulgence (in a negative way!) to start with but are now an intuitive toolbox of loving habits I can pull out to take care of myself when I need it which I have been incredibly grateful for this year.
Baths at 11am 🛀🏻
3 hour meditation sessions 🧘🏻♀️
Ordering flowers for myself 💐
Cooking myself nourishing food (always the food!) 🍜
Making things for people (also normally food) 🎂
Creating things for the sake of creating – My creative women’s circle has been so supportive and encouraging to get me to play more 👩🏻🎨
Walks, lots of walks 🚶🏻♀️
Runs – when I am in my inner spring/summer only! 🏃🏻♀️
Ordering my favourite chocolate 🍫
Facetime with the littlest Potters or friends overseas 👧👦🇮🇹 🇨🇦 🇳🇬 🇺🇸
Doing nothing but watch incense or a candle burn ☮️🕯
Reading 📚
Bridgerton 😍😜
Women’s circles – an absolute gift from the goddesses in this wild time! ❤️
Reiki ⚡️
Lots of tea, hot water bottle and blanket time, to cosy up in lieu of hugs ☕️
Podcast length voice notes to my girls 📱
Dancing around the house to my favourite music 💃🏻
Calling a friend and having a good old fashioned chat ☎️
Writing, I look forward to reading my journals as an old lady! 📝
Yoga 🧘🏻♀️
Self Hypnotherapy 🎧
Sleep – glorious nidra naps 😴
Sometimes I did a few of these in one day and still felt treacly, as if everything was being slowed down by an unknown force. But I always felt at least marginally better for having done something to make me smile.
These are not normal times, so we can’t expect “normal” reactions or rewards every time (whatever normal means anyway!) But breaking the thought pattern of anxiety or stress is helpful no matter what the outcome. It gives your nervous system an opportunity to reset and focus on something positive, so at the very least you’ll jump back in feeling a teeny more relaxed &/or loved.
The tiny things, the tiny shifts, the tiny acts are all we can control and the more of those that we carry out with positive intent the better we are going to feel in ourselves.
Today’s love note comes with the most amount of kindness and compassion, maybe pick something off the list today and be kind to yourself without expecting anything. Just enjoy the act of self love and see what comes next, let me know how you get on it you do! ❤️
If you go down the self hypnosis route check out this guide to how virtual hypnosis works.
If you want to make one of these your new tiny habit and act of self love the Sweet Life Starter Pack can help