Express Unexpected Gratitude:
Happy U.S. Thanksgiving! In addition to showing gratitude to your family and closest friends today, thank someone who would not be expecting to hear from you. The self-love challenge is for you to look back since the beginning of 2013, and recall one time that you were having a bad day, and then someone showed up and, either knowingly or unknowingly brightened your day, and/or offered a helping hand.
Here are a few examples of situations that come to mind:
Tomorrow is Thanksgiving in the United States and we are likely going to be sharing what we are grateful for with each other. The self-love challenge today is for you to write a letter to yourself, expressing what you are grateful for within you. Express your gratitude towards where you are, who you are, how you are, and show yourself appreciation. While you are writing the letter, you may hear your inner critic expressing their opinion to you, mine did! I recommend that you tell the inner critic that you will keep her/his advice in mind, but that for now you are appreciating yourself anyway.
Here is an example from my own gratitude letter to myself. I kept my inner critic contributions out of my final letter, but wrote one down here, in case you can relate.
Dear Elisa,
Thank you for being you. Thank you for showing up. Thank you for taking the time to create the self-love challenge, for hosting it, and most of all, for committing to doing every challenge you post. Thank you for the new and healthier choices you are making in your life. Thank you for the daily meditation. [To which the inner critic said, you skipped it yesterday] Thank you for saying yes to spending the weekend away at friends’ house and for having fun. ...
Elisa
If you need additional inspiration to write the letter, breathe deeply, and connect with your heart space before you start writing it. This is the time for you to show appreciation for your own self. Have fun with it. If you feel like it, write a hand-written letter and actually mail it to yourself. I’m mailing the one I wrote to myself later today.
For those who celebrate, Happy Chanukah! And do expect miracles to happen.
Forgiveness of Self and OthersToday’s self-love challenge is about forgiveness, forgiving others through meditation and also forgiving oneself. Forgiving yourself can release pain that no longer serves you, and it can open space within your heart for deeper love of self and for practicing giving and receiving love.
I have a couple of meditations I’d like to suggest for you to consider as today's practice of forgiveness towards yourself and others. When considering the forgiveness meditation, connect with your heart space, and make sure you are ready to release and let go. If the time has not come yet to forgive a certain person in your life, pick someone who does not carry a heavy weight at this time, and go back to these tools when you feel it is time.
Take time to go within and cry or grieve:Each day that you practice self-love you are honoring yourself and your deepest feelings. Many of the challenges I shared so far could become a daily practice.
A big part of self-love is to connect within and to honor feelings you may have avoided for your own reasons. Today’s challenge is for you to allow some deep feelings you may have buried at some point in your life, to resurface and to feel them. You will need to set aside 10 to 15 minutes of alone time. Let your family, employees, co-workers or roommates know that you need some quiet and uninterrupted time. If you are going through a recent loss of any kind, skip the part of timing yourself, and feel and honor your feelings and be where you are.
What are the quotes that inspire you the most? Take some time today to write them down on an index card, or on a few post-its, and place them where you will see them often.
I tell myself “This Too Shall Pass”, when I’m feeling stuck and it helps to know that as long as I’m in the moment, and I allow the feelings to flow without resistance, it will pass. I also appreciate the quote “No problem can be solved from the same level of consciousness that created it.” by Albert Einsten . And last year I came up with my own mantra “I’m safe, I’m centered, I’m supported” and I still use it every now and then. (I shared why I came up with it here.)
What is it that you tell yourself when you need something to encourage you to keep going? Could you come up with a mantra that’s just for you that you can use it as needed? Feel free to post your favorite quote and/or your own original one here.
Today’s self-love challenge is to go outside and hug a tree with intention (I’ll explain what this means to me). I know that depending on where you live, it is really cold out, but it is worth the effort!
I remember reading a book that recommended that, at night, we should leave our problems outside our home, by leaving them with a tree and saying that we would pick it up in the morning. But by the morning, we would have forgotten to pick it up, or they would have lessened and we would go on with our day less worried. I don’t remember which book, and if you know it, please leave a comment below.
Although the idea of letting the problems outside my home appealed to me, I didn’t feel comfortable leaving my problems with a tree - “poor tree” I used to think. I know that tree hugging sure is healing, so I developed an extra step to make me feel at peace with it, and that’s what I call “hugging a tree with intention”. Every time my energy is feeling off, or I’m carrying some pain that I’m unable to shift for whatever reason, I make a point to hug a tree. Instead of simply sending the energy to the tree, I visualize the tree taking that energy, and sending it through its roots into the earth, so that it can be transformed. And I see the energy being returned as love for the tree and for myself. It always helps to shift my energy and to release whatever is stuck inside. If you don't have anything to release today, while hugging the tree, send it love and receive it back.
If you are shy, or if you think this is too weird, start experimenting with just touching a tree, placing both hands on it, or just one hand, and sensing how it feels. If you have a chance to go to the park, just stand still for a while, and sense which tree to hug. You could also invite your spouse and/or children, and/or a friend to go with you. This way you are not alone hugging trees. 😉 If you do bring someone with you, make sure to take pictures of each other and post them on Facebook.
How did you do with yesterday’s exercise? We will go back to what you most want to create in the next few days, but for today, we will focus on the super powers you will count on to get there.
Have you ever seen yourself as a super hero? What would you consider your super power(s)? Today’s self-love challenge is for you to see yourself as a super hero, and write down your super powers. They could be related to career, parenting, relationships, spirituality, creativity, mind, physical power, or anything else that you come up with.
Here are some examples of super powers to give you some ideas:
Clarify Your Priorities:Today’s self-love challenge is about clarifying what you are really prioritizing in your life. We are usually either moving towards what we want to create, or moving away from what we want to avoid. I know from personal experience that trying to move away from what we don’t want, tends to have the opposite effect.
I recently did an exercise from the book “No Bad Feelings! A Revolutionary Way of Relating to Your Emotions” by June and Jim Spencer, and it really resonated with me. It is a great book that helps you understand your feelings and the importance of feeling them; and it is available for download at the Let Go & Live Institute website. I’m reprinting the exercise (with permission) below, called “Clarifying Priorities” (pages 143 to 145). This exercise helps you to go deeper within to identify what your most important priorities in life are and what feelings you are committing to either creating or avoiding every day.
Feel and Name your Feelings:Today’s challenge is for you to connect within, check in with yourself and acknowledge your feelings in this moment. As you do it, you will probably notice that your feelings keep changing, as long as you don’t resist them. If you are having difficulty doing the tasks you need to get done, ask yourself: What am I feeling now? What am I resisting? Name your feeling, allow yourself to really feel it, and continue your day. As soon as you name your feeling, and you allow yourself to truly experience it, moving forward and experiencing another feeling will happen naturally. If you are not sure how you feel, you can name it as frustration or anything else that comes to you, and continue to check in a few times a day. Knowing and acknowledging how you feel in each moment, takes practice and it is one of the keys to self-love.
Tools and Commitment:
Congratulations on joining this self-love challenge. As we move towards the second half of the 30-day self-love challenge, some of the challenges may require you to go even deeper within. In order to be ready, you may want to review all the self-love challenges we have presented so far, so that you can bring those tools with you any time you need them. For today’s challenge, pick at least one challenge that you feel comfortable with to commit to a daily practice, here is a review:
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