“If we really love ourselves, everything in our life works.” ~Louise Hay
The heart chakra is the center of love. It opens us to experience love for ourselves and others. It lets us feel compassion, joy, and peace. As the heart expresses love, it permeates all aspects of our life and enriches our relationships.
The heart chakra also holds ideas and attitudes about our worthiness to give and receive love.
The more we love ourselves and accept the wounds of human fragility, the more we begin to love others.
I’ve been reading the book You are a Badass, How to Stop Doubting Your Greatness and Start Living an Awesome Life, by Jen Sincere, and loving it! The following is from this incredible book:
We’re born knowing how to trust our instincts, how to breathe deeply, how to eat only when we’re hungry, how to not care about what anyone thinks of our singing voices, dance moves, or hairdos. We know how to play, create, and love without holding back.
Then, as we grow and learn from the people around us, we replace many of these primal understandings with negative false beliefs, fear, shame and self doubt.
We arrive here as perfect little bundles of joy then set about learning to un-love ourselves!
Imagine how different your life would be if you woke up every morning certain of your own lovability and your critically important role on this planet? If you allowed yourself to be, do and have everything your heart desires?
Here are some of the best ways to make that happen:
Appreciate how special you are
- There will never be anyone exactly like you. You were given special gifts and talents to share with the world, and have a way of being in the world and a perspective that’s unique to you.
- You are the only you that will ever be. You are kind of a big deal.
Drown yourself in affirmations
- You don’t have to buy a special rainbow journal with a lock on it and write them down, but if you want to turn your ship around, you need to rewire your brain and train it to think differently. And this is what affirmations can do for you.
- Write them on post it notes and stick them around your house or on mirrors. Here are some examples, “My heart is open. Love pours in and out.” “I am brilliant, bright, and beautiful.”
- I encourage you to come up with your own, something that really resonates with and arises from your heart.
Do things you love
- Really listen to how you speak and pay attention to what you do, and make a conscious effort to increase your joy in whatever capacity you can.
- Be proactive about creating a life you love. Give yourself the gift of a joyous life. And if you’re the person who puts everyone else’s needs first, start putting yours up front.
- You aren’t a selfish person for taking care of yourself, just a happier one. Take care of yourself as if you’re the most awesome person you’ve ever met.
Find a replacement
- We’ve gotten so used to the ways we diminish ourselves that we never think to question them. But once we become aware of our thought patterns and behaviors, we can consciously change them. So start paying attention:
- What runs through your mind when you look in the mirror?
- What happens inside you when you see someone totally succeeding at something you’d love to do but have never let yourself try?
- When you let a friend down?
- Notice the verbiage that runs through your mind when you’re being the harshest towards yourself and come up with a new and improved response.
- For example, if every time you look in the mirror, your first thought is yikes, make a conscious effort to change it to hi, gorgeous!
- The most important thing is to free yourself from the drama and the conviction that your current version of yourself is the truth. Be kind. Be love. Start with yourself.
- We’ve gotten so used to the ways we diminish ourselves that we never think to question them. But once we become aware of our thought patterns and behaviors, we can consciously change them. So start paying attention:
Let the love in
- Receive compliments. Yes, you are beautiful and brilliant and funny and smart. Own it.
- Take care of your body. When we’re pressed for time it’s often the first thing to get overlooked. “I’ve got 5 meetings today, I’ll do my yoga tomorrow and have a power bar for lunch.” Meanwhile, during our little sojourn here on earth we need our bodies more than they need us.
- Say nice things about your body, dress it up, and take it out. Give it exercise, luxurious baths, and massages. Move it, stretch it, nourish it, hydrate it, pay attention to it. Love your body. How freakin amazing is it that you have the body you have and it takes care of you the way it does? Celebrate that. Love your incredible body.
Forgive yourself
- Get clear on this one truth: guilt, shame, and self-criticism are some of the most destructive forces in your life, which is why forgiving yourself is one of the most powerful.
- Here’s an excellent way to do it:
- Think of a specific thing that you did that you feel badly about. Call it up in your mind and feel it in your body. Repeat the following over and over while thinking of it and really feel what you’re saying to yourself:
- Holding on to my bad feelings about this is doing nothing but harming me, and everyone else, and preventing me from enjoying my life fully. I am an awesome person. I choose to enjoy my life. I choose to let this go.
- Repeat this until you feel a sense of lightness and freedom around your issue. It may take a day or a week or several months or it could happen right away. Love yourself by putting in the time to make this happen. You are worth it.
Love yourself
- Because it’s the holy grail of happiness. And we’re exploring the heart chakra. And the heart chakra is all about love. It’s the goddess of love. And it’s inside of you. You are a goddess. You are love. Never forget that.
- Every moment of every day, love yourself, no matter what.
The heart is the seat of joy. We bring healing to the heart when we allow life to be joyful and loving.
Start today.
You are beautiful. You are love. And you are worthy of your own love.
I Love You, I Am Listening Meditation
I know you have heard this meditation before, but I feel that it needs to be here, that it’s a reminder we can all use, especially as we explore the heart chakra.
Because I went into such depth today with powerful ways to love yourself (a spontaneous spur of the moment decision), for your journal prompts I encourage you to write some affirmations in your journal and on sticky notes and place them on mirrors or the fridge or cabinets or by your bed…be creative!
I also encourage you to practice forgiving yourself. That can be your own very personal meditation…