Spreading Self-Love This Valentine’s Day

Written by Sarah Criscuolo MS, RD, LDN, CSN, CPT

Each year on Valentine’s Day, there are often two camps – there are the couples celebrating their love for each other, and the single individuals who spend it feeling frustrated. What if we changed the narrative, so that rather than needing a significant other in order to enjoy Valentine’s Day, having yourself can be enough? This year, Valentine’s Day is all about you – whether you’re in a relationship, single, or something in between, try to make your own self-care your top priority. After all, you can’t give love to others if you don’t give enough to yourself! Below are some options for things that you can do on this upcoming holiday.

space

Journal

Journaling can be extremely grounding for many people, helping you to unpack your thoughts to an unbiased observer or work through things that you may be dealing with. Here are some journaling prompts that you can try this Valentine’s Day to help you get into the self-love mindset:

1. What are my top 3 favorite things about myself?
2. How have I grown over the past year?
3. What are my current short- and long-term goals? How can I achieve them?
4. If my past self could see me now, what things would they be proud of?

space

Recovery/Yoga Session

Our bodies do so much for us, and we often don’t give ourselves the time to rest and recover like we should. Take some time on this day (even just 5 minutes!) to perform some yoga poses, stretch, use a foam roller, etc. to help relieve your body of some of the tension that has built up. Yoga With Adrienne has a lot of great videos of different lengths and focuses depending on what feels right for your practice.

space

Meditate

Meditation is a great way to ground yourself in the present moment and increase awareness of both your physical and emotional body. There are many different guided meditations available (check out the Insight Timer app for some great free ones), but if you’d prefer to just sit in silence, feel free to do so. Even just taking some deep breaths can help slow your heart rate and bring you into this moment. Here’s a quick belly breathing exercise that you can try:

1. Find a comfortable seated or laying position and close your eyes.
2. Place one hand on your chest and one on your stomach, just below your ribcage.
3. Breathe in through your nose, feeling the hand on your stomach rise higher than your chest hand.
4. Exhale slowly and fully through your mouth, with your lips pursed as if you were blowing through a wide straw, or make an “ah” sighing shape.  You should feel your stomach hand sinking as your abs tighten and your stomach returns to its starting position.
5. Repeat for at least 10 breaths for a longer practice, or just take a few belly breaths as needed throughout the day!

space

Plan a Spa Session

Whether it’s going to get a massage or facial, taking a hot bath at home, or simply turning on an essential oil diffuser (lavender has been shown to be very calming), give your physical body some love on Valentine’s Day! Remember, this day is about YOU – take time for whatever spa activity feels best.

space

Eat The Foods You Love

We all have favorite foods! Unfortunately, diet culture has created a hostile environment around certain foods, and often around eating in general. Read this blog post, written by our RD Sarah Poling, for a little background on the negative impacts of diet culture and how to break free of it. Hopefully once you’re done reading, you’ll be empowered to begin on your journey of breaking free of this flawed system and focus on eating the foods that make YOU happy! However, we know that doing so takes a lot of time and hard work, and isn’t as easy as simply deciding to change your beliefs. A Karuna dietitian can help you to work on reframing your ideas surrounding foods, your food-body relationship, and more – use the link below to schedule an intake call!