The title of this post is both an expression of my gratitude for all of you as well as a directive. Too often, on our focus outward towards the rest of the family, we skip over acting loving towards ourselves. We get in the pattern of "give, give, give" (which we usually enjoy immensely) but don't take the opportunity to direct that compassion inwards or accept it from others. Raise your hand if, like me, your response when someone tries to do something nice for you or help you out is, "It's okay, I can handle it." And I fully believe you can handle it...it's just that you shouldn't always have to.
I think it's fair to say that we all want to get to a point where we have a better balance with our giving and accepting. It's not that we want to give up giving, but rather get in a better habit of accepting. The constant imbalanced giving, despite how much we love it, will eventually lead to burnout, resentment, and a loss of joy in the act of giving. But if we practice accepting help and allowing others to give to us, we will retain our joy for giving and know that we, too, are cared for which, in turn, will allow us to recharge and keep resentment from building.
The three steps of the "love you" directive this week are:
1. Accept help/giving from others
2. Say, "not this time" or some other form of "no" when asked to take on something extra
3. Do one activity that you've been putting off because of not having enough time for you. This could be as simple as taking a long, hot bath or it could be taking an hour to yourself one day to go have tea with another mom (don't worry, your significant others can handle an hour alone with the kids).
I'm going to pull double duty with my self love activity (like I do with everything else) and go to a dance fitness class tonight with another mom...we've actually been trying to do this a couple times a week for the past couple of weeks and it has been a sanity saver!
Leave a comment with the "love you" activities that you've come up with and, as always, feel welcome to reach out to me anytime! LOVE YOU!!!!!