Love Me Some Me

Recently there is a movement for self love. And that’s a movement I am here for. As someone who spent years unsure of who she was and who still continues to struggle to show myself the love I so freely give others, I deeply appreciate this moment in time.

I love love. I love celebrating Valentine’s Day. I’m here for the engagement announcements, the weddings, the new relationship love - all of it is such a positive time. I’m here for celebrating love. And the love I want to celebrate most of all in life is self love.

For the 300th time, because I’ve certainly written about this before, if you do not love yourself, you will not have a successful relationship with anyone else. You may find a mate, marry them, spend the rest of your life with them - but unless you’re also deeply in love with yourself, that forever love is not at its best.

Self love is a constantly evolving process. I don’t know many people who feel rainbows and unicorns about themselves 100% of the time. I certainly have my off days and I think that’s ok. You can’t be on 100% of the time. But if most of the days you can say I love who I am, that’s a huge win.

For me, the first step in learning to love myself was to get honest with myself. I had to first drop all of the lies I told myself and I had to write down what I don’t love about who I am. For example, when I was in my 20’s and single, I would tell myself I loved that life. The truth? I wasn’t comfortable being single. I pretended to enjoy it but I was not happy without a partner, which is why I was always talking to or dating someone. Now, I’m very comfortable single because I understand that having a good relationship is what counts. Being single doesn’t make me less than like I thought it once did.

Writing down the things I dislike about myself is still to this day a really powerful thing for me. It’s saying out loud the pieces I think are awful. And then it’s understanding WHY I feel that way. Because a lot of those things are actually absurd or they’re things that others love about me. When you write these things out, they’re tangible and you’re forced to dive into perspective. I’m most often able to easily eliminate a few of those by simply working through the feelings behind the insecurity. And the rest, I take to therapy or I work on how I can adjust them to not be a daily hindrance to my self love.

Another example - I’ve been an athlete my entire life. That means a lot of my self worth is directly connected to my body. Having to train sometimes 4-5 hours a day, meant that for most of my life, I had a pretty dang bangin bod. I also am blessed to have great metabolism. But when I stopped being a competitive athlete, hit 30, didn’t always eat as healthy - my body shape changed. I’m not 130 pounds of pure muscle anymore. I’m curvy, sometimes I’d dare say I feel chubby. Body dysmorphia is something I’ve struggled with on and off since I can remember. I have to remind myself often that my body has been through a lot. And it’s given me some of the best moments of my life. And I make myself thankful for those things. I’m extra mindful when I’m not body positive and I do things that make me feel good about myself. I do fitness activities that make me feel confident. I don’t workout to punish myself, I workout because it’s something I love to do. I’ll change my diet to be a little healthier. And I cut myself a break during Holidays or vacations when I indulge more. I am patient with myself.

Something that is also really helpful for me is to write on post its things I love about myself and leave the notes around my home, car, and office where they’ll serve as reminders throughout the day. It’s silly and may not work for you, but I’m easily motivated. When I read these positive reinforcements I think to myself - HELL YEA YOU ARE! If I really need some love, I’ll ask my friends to tell me what they love most about me. Often times our friends love the quirks about us that we may even consider negative. Again, perspective helps.

I hope this Valentine’s Day you’re celebrating lots of love with the people around you that you love. I hope you see this day as a day for everyone, more specifically and most importantly - for YOU. Celebrate your love with those most important to you, but celebrate the most important relationship (the one with yourself) FIRST.

Happy hearts and love day sequins!

My 384th Mid Life Crisis

I’m really introspective. I’m constantly evaluating where I’m at, who I am, what I’m doing and how I can make adjustments to grow and be better. I want to maximize who I am and what I can do in this world. Because of that, I have a mid life crisis at least every other year. It’s so unnecessary and so annoying. And so me.

For someone who’s a all glitter, puppies, and sports - I’m quite the deep thinker. It’s never far from my mind that I’ve got a limited amount of time and I’m already about 1/3 into this thing and there’s no redo. It feels like walking up the stairs forever without seeing the top. And its not getting off on any of the floors to stop and see the sights. It’s just climbing and climbing and it never ends.

I don’t know why its at its most extra this year, but for some reason being 33 hit me really hard. I started thinking I was old. Too old for this, too young for that. Past my prime for this milestone. Too far from hitting that one. And the more I talked to friends in a similar life stage as I’m at, the more I realized I’m not alone. Everyone is out there questioning who they are, where they’re at, and what they should be doing differently.

I think part of living in a world where you have these really high expectations and you’re constantly thinking about every little detail of your life is that you hold it inside. You feel like a freak because that’s a heavy load of thoughts/feelings/fears. So it becomes this burden that you don’t dare speak out loud, making it heavier and heavier to carry inside. You fear speaking it out loud because it makes it real. And it makes it open for judgment.

Realistically, you’re not alone. Super not alone. I think a lot of people around you will say they’ve got the same exact fears at any given time. They’re worrying about their job, their finances, their relationships, their age, their skin, their clothes — every single thing — all the things! And there truly are so many things.

Now I’m not saying you should get out there and share all the thoughts in your head about this every time the mid life crisis creeps up. That’s next level and people have things they have to carry on their own. We all got a lot of shit to do. But you can confide in your people. You can say woah hey, this one is especially overwhelming can we hash some things out? And if you need more than a friendly ear and a glass of wine, call a therapist.

Therapy is my absolute favorite place for mid life crisis thirty. It’s a safe space with a neutral party who is ready to help talk you off the ledge and remind you that you’re not in fact crazy, you’re just really hard on yourself. You can make lists and do worksheets and its actual heaven for type A folks. I’m currently keeping a very detailed sleep journal for my therapist and I’m obsessed with the fact that it gives me an action point for helping myself.

If it’s a mini mid life crisis - you can take out your toolkit and manage that shit at home. Get in tune with where you’re at. Make your own list of things you love about yourself, things you’ve achieved, reasons people love you. Check off the bucket list items you’ve gone and done. And make a new list or vision board of where you want to go/what you want to achieve next. Setup a plan to achieve those things. I find when I can see a plan or a list in front of me, I’m able to get an idea for the bigger picture and calm myself the hell down. It gives me space to take a deep breath. To feel a little more in control of my situation and the path I’m on.

We also have to address the annoying societal standards in the world. I don’t know who invented these but sincerely stop. If I have to see one more Instagram model filtered and nipped and tucked and be told I have to be gorgeous and funny and smart and I’m going to lose it. Thankfully our generation is taking a stand and trying to move forward, but there are still a lot of life stages dictated by society/customs/religions/parents. It’s really hard to push back on these things. Especially when they’re family/faith/culturally based. At the end of the day though, you are in charge of your plan and your life. You have to understand that there are sincerely no rules to how life happens. Your stages might look differently than others and the expectations others have for you. And that’s okay. Remind yourself of this often. Life is hard enough, you don’t need the added pressure of pleasing others.

You also need to accept that you can’t control everything. The world is going to get wild and weird and you may have to zig where you planned to zag. Life has its own plan for you. That plan could involve more twists and turns than Carol who landed the dream job at 21 and found the dream guy at 22 and - you see what I’m saying? That’s not for you to plan. That’s for you to experience.

The mid life crisis life is hard. It’s not for the faint of heart. It’s also really manageable and becomes less of a looming cloud if you take control to the best of your ability. Do whatever you have to in order to maintain balance. Leave yourself notes, set reminders on your phone, get out and do more of what makes you feel alive and thriving - whatever it is, don’t allow those mid life crisis to steal your confidence. Chin up sequins, life is made to be designed, and you, you’re custom.