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Community Counseling, Education, and Research Center

Self-Love on Valentine’s Day by Heather McAllister

February 5, 2019

Valentine’s day is supposed to be a day filled with celebrating love, right? We have been conditioned by media to think that this holiday will involve flowers, chocolates, and celebrating love in our intimate relationships. Then, when these expectations are not met, we can be left with a feeling of disappointment.

Why not take some time this Valentine’s Day to focus on self-love? Working on loving yourself can be difficult, especially during Valentine’s Day when it is easy to focus on what we are “missing” in our lives. Instead, we can celebrate and invest in our relationship with ourselves.

There are many different ways to practice self-love, but here are a few ideas:

  1. Practice Self-Care: One of the simplest ways to practice self-love is to engage in a self-care practice. Having a regular self-care practice is so important to your general wellbeing and your mental health. It does not have to involve anything elaborate and can be as simple as taking a couple moments to be grateful for something in your life.

Here are some simple ideas for self-care:

  • Watch your favorite movie or tv show
  • Make yourself your favorite meal
  • Light a candle
  • Buy yourself flowers
  • Go to bed early
  • Listen to music
  1. Self-appreciation: Try taking a couple deep breaths and then think about one thing that you appreciate about your body. An example could be, “I appreciate my smile,” or “I am thankful for my lungs.” This practice helps remind us that our bodies do so much for us. We can appreciate all the work our body does that usually goes unnoticed.
  2. Technology Time-Out: It is easy to become overstimulated in our world of social media, television, and other responsibilities that keep us glued to technology. Our brains rarely have a chance for some much-needed down time. See if you can dedicate some time to being technology free. It could be as short as five minutes. Take this time to check in with how you are feeling.

These are just a few ways to practice self-love, and hopefully this gives you ways to celebrate yourself this Valentine’s Day – and every day.