I feel like self-love is the perfect topic to cover right before Valentine’s Day.

Self-love has a different meaning for everyone, and this article isn’t to have you all collectively agree on what self-love is because let’s face it, self-love is a multitude of things. What we are going to get into, is how we can cultivate self-love in our everyday lives.

A very important aspect of self-love is growth. Growth creates room for you to enhance your understanding and appreciation for yourself. Without growth, self-love comes and goes and that’s not fair to YOU!

We all take care of our bodies differently, we all have different needs, but what is key is how you define your self-love.

For me, self-love is listening to my body. This could mean taking an extra day off at the gym because my body is telling me it needs rest. This could mean getting a Starbucks coffee before classes because I am extra excited for my day. This could also mean getting myself up early, eating healthy, and kicking ass at the gym because I know it makes me feel my best.

Self-love to me is being my own best friend and number one supporter. Self-love is knowing that no matter what, I am going to be okay.

It’s imperative that we prioritize ourselves and our needs. It’s so easy to get caught up caring for others whether it be a friend, coworker, significant other, etc. but we must always come back to ourselves and our needs too. Take time out of the day to focus on YOU. This can be in the form of reading, taking a walk, meditating, practicing yoga, taking a hot bath; you name it.  I think we fear that taking these blocks of time to ourselves will decrease our effectiveness or we are convinced we are so busy we don’t have time. Why is our personal time the first to be tossed during a busy day? Well, it’s because you have chosen to prioritize other things. Read that again.

Learning how to trust yourself will give you so much freedom. YOU are so capable of amazing things and YOU need to tell yourself that until you wholeheartedly believe it. No matter what stage you are in life, I’m sure there is some sort of stress about the future. This can create anxiety and can lead you to question your choices and decisions. Trusting yourself will allow you to decrease the amount of anxiety you feel when hurdling through tough decisions about the future.

Some ways to cultivate trust in yourself are

- Write down your goals and how you will accomplish them. What steps do YOU need to take to fulfill these goals?

-       Step out of your comfort zone. Your mind and body are amazing, push yourself. It will make you proud of what you can accomplish.

-       Manifest. Take time to visualize your most successful, happy, and healthy self. What does she/he look like? What is she/he doing? Visualizing is simply not enough. You must want to FEEL the change. Start showing up as this person. Start making the necessary changes to get to this envisioned self. You can do it.

Take February as the perfect time to start cultivating self-love into your everyday life. After all, you are your own built-in best friend. XO