Develop Self-Love and Discover Your Own True Path in Life

We have all been placed on earth to discover our own path. We will never be happy if we live someone else's idea of life. ~James Van Praagh.

The best way to discover your own path is to develop a relationship with yourself, to cultivate self-love and to spend time in solitude.

There is a brilliant five minute video called, "How to be alone." Filmed by Andrea Dorfman and written and performed by poet/singer/songwriter, Tanya Davis, it explores the idea of nurturing and developing the skill of being alone.

We are not really taught that it is okay to be alone."You'll find, it's fine to be alone once you're embracing it" a quote from the video.

Tanya suggests we start by making a list of acceptable places to be alone. The bathroom, the coffee shop, the library. Prayer and meditation are more acceptable places.Then, her poem invites you to take yourself to dinner with linens and silverware. Take yourself dancing and dance like no one is watching.
In one of the scenes she is sitting on a bench alone and opens you to the idea of how this creates a space for an unexpected conversation. She says, "It may never have happened, if you weren't there sitting by yourself."

More quotes from the film, "If you're happy in your head, then solitude is best and alone is okay. It doesn't mean you're not connected.Take silence and respect it."

There is a tendency to look outside of ourselves to fill time that could be spent alone.

During the last year, I spent many hours in solitude. Walking on the beach, sitting in coffee shops by myself, going to plays in small theaters and finding the joy in getting to know myself better. I have more clarity, joy, wisdom and feel a sense of grounded freedom. I encourage everyone to go on this journey with themselves. You are a magnificent being. Open to this discovery.

There is a wave of self-love appearing in events and on the internet. The Agape Spiritual Center in Los Angeles sponsors an event on Valentine's Day with music, conversation, good food and hand massages. Self-love is encouraged and celebrated.

"The deep love you seek starts and ends with the love you have for you" ~Christine Arylo
Feb 13 has been declared an annual celebration called, Madly in Love with Me Day. Some of the suggestions for developing self-love first:

• Love yourself, all of you, especially the parts hard to love
• Settle for nothing less than your heart and soul desire
• Have only relationships full of unconditional love and respect
• Be nice to yourself (stop being so hard on you!) Develop compassion for who you are.
• Take care of yourself, without guilt (you give from the overflow)

Let's all send ourselves pure unconditional love and open to the true path we are guided to follow. Knowing yourself will heal inner loneliness and the fear of loneliness.

Open to the gift of who you are and Celebrate!

Creating Environments for Children to Learn About Loving Themselves

On Valentine’s Day, many women hope that their true love will appear in their lives with candy, flowers, a dinner reservation and a flowery card professing love to them. Then, the story goes, they will be truly valued, have worth and be loved. For some people, this is a holiday that feels like a death because once again, there is no one arriving on their doorstep with gifts of love. They may put on a brave face about it, but at some point,in almost every woman’s life she has experienced her worth based on someone else loving or not loving her.

Somehow, as a society, I think we have missed the opportunity to create environments for our children to learn the path of self-love. To create environments where they feel encouraged to discover things about themselves and have the opportunity to either fail or succeed, as a life exploration.

Almost every morning, I wake up with a song playing in my head. I lay in bed and I listen to the words. It is the springboard for my day. It is a clue and a message of what is stirring within me. I have learned to listen and to learn.

The song this morning was a Stevie Wonder song called As. The words begin: 

As around the sun the earth knows she's revolving

And the rosebuds know to bloom in early May,

Just as hate knows love's the cure,

You can rest your mind assured, 

That I'll be loving you always.

The song was released in 1976 during a time when I was healing my heart. I felt lost not knowing what was next for me. I was working as a maid, a summer job in between my 1^st and 2^nd year of college. It was the perfect job for me. Hard work and lots of time by myself to reflect on my life. Phil Donahue was the talk show host I listened to, as I changed the bed sheets and cleaned the bathrooms at the hotel.

One of the things I love about this song, is the way I feel about it. When I heard the song this morning, I felt so much love for myself. It is a love song I have sung to myself, professing my love and telling myself, I'll be loving you always. 

Looking back to the beginning of early grade school, I can see a conditioning when we ask children who their boyfriend or girlfriend is. Or we validate their exclamation about the love of their life. They are rewarded for having this love relationship. Sharing Valentine’s in grade school. There is an expectation.

How often does an adult ask a child, how is your self-love going? How is that relationship right now? Are you spending enough time nurturing yourself?

I had a boyfriend in the first grade who gave me a bubble gum ring. I also played wedding in the neighborhood. I remember throwing my shoe at a boy I had professed love to and we were having a pretend wedding. I am not sure why I got angry and ran away from the pretend wedding ceremony, but maybe deep down inside I knew that something was missing.

As crazy as this may sound, I did not go to my 5 year high school reunion because I was not engaged or married. I had graduated from college, I had a full-time job I loved. I was living with my boyfriend of almost three years, but I wasn’t engaged. And for some crazy reason, I thought I had not accomplished enough to go back to high school for a reunion. I did not value myself enough. In this moment, I have so much compassion for myself that I had so little self-love at that point to think that.

In every transition in my life, the end of my first marriage, the autoimmune condition I had, the loss of loved ones and all of the every day challenges, the path to recovery and healing has always been self-love.

I think we need a movement of self-love in grade school and talk about nurturing that relationship, then spreading the love to be of service in the world. The romantic love will develop later as a natural part of life. We don't need to encourage it with young children.

I proclaim a self-love movement now!