Self – Love is essential to feeling nourished, thriving, and being at ease in yourself. Your well being is at the root of all of what you'd like to create, do, and offer in the world. Imagine, if we each loved ourselves, what a difference it would make!

Each week, I share a Self – Love Note for you to experiment with and add onto your own ways of treating yourself with love. These include ways to love and care for yourself on all levels — your physical being, your energy body, your emotional and spiritual self, and your development of consciousness. Feel free to share with me your experience and your favorites.

Body Love

Take sweet care of your body this week!

Your body is your home, your temple, and you only have one.

My very grandpa, who is now 87 and spent years of focusing on money and gain, reminded me recently of how important the body is. He said that if you don’t have your body, you don’t have anything. It’s true!

Five Simple Steps

So let’s give some Body Love today with five simple steps:

• Take a Moment to Pause and Bring Your Attention Inward
• Notice Your Body’s Sensations and any Tension
• Ask Your Body: How are you doing? What Do You Need Today?
• Listen Without Filtering
• Give to Your Body What it Asked for Today

Listen to your body’s story and expression. Sense into it. Allow yourself to listen to anything it says without judgment. Do whatever your body has asked for whether it be a time out, a bath, rest, movement, setting up an appointment to see your massage therapist, etc.! If your body has asked for something that may not be a reasonable or healthy reality, imagine giving it to your body in your mind and experience what happens.

The Koshas

The physical level of our entire physiology, annamayakosha in Sanskrit, is the outermost layer of our being. It is the concrete manifestation of our inner and spiritual beliefs and experiences. Anna means “food” and kosha means “sheath or layer.” This encompasses physical movement or exercise (yogasana/yoga poses for example), our living space, our surroundings and climate, daily rituals, and nutrition.

For this and the next 5 weeks, we will dive into one of the levels of the physiology from the outermost (physical) to the innermost (spiritual and pure consciousness). Follow along with me to get the inside scoop on your entire physiology!