Finding love is hard. And once you have it, it can be even harder to maintain. Healthy and satisfying relationships require a balance between those involved; however, self-responsibility has to come first. Self-responsibility is found through finding your own balance and then tweaking that balance as needed when you enter into a relationship. It doesn't always happen in this discrete and simple order, but it is as necessary to a successful relationship as the moon phases are to the tides.
Without an internal balance, we are unable to see how our actions, thoughts, perceptions, and feelings impact our decisions and reactions. Without a clear self-awareness of these aspects of our character, it is difficult for us to see and accept others as they are. Consider the following strategies for finding balance in your life, and reflect on how these techniques or others can help you improve your own balance and, thus, the love you bring into your life through all of your relationships.
1. Find Self Love First
If you don't like yourself, you'll probably find it really hard to have a stable relationship that is joyful and as fulfilling as it could be. Everyone has things about themselves they don't like, but regularly partaking in thoughts of self-loathing will cause this inner mood to impact all aspects of your life.
Here's one avenue to approach from: figure out what it is you need; figure out what it is you want. Are you loving yourself while trying to fulfill your wants and needs? If not, why? What characteristic is it that you don't love? Is it something you can change even if you don't want to? What would your life be like if that character trait was different? What can you do to change it? If you cannot change it, will changing your mindset toward it help? Are you truly aligned with your needs and wants? Sit down with these questions time and time again to weed out the things that are causing you malcontent. Writing out your answer to these questions will open up your pathway to self-love.
2. Slow Down
Slowing down one thing in your life can have an exponential impact on your day-to-day experiences. This may sound impossible, but it can be a very plausible route when you move in baby steps! What would happen if you stopped rushing just one of your regular activities? Let's take, for example, rushing out the door in the morning on your way to work. Do you do this every morning? Isn't it exhausting? What would happen if you just decided one day not to rush through that process?
Perhaps the first few days, you'll be late to work, but you'll adjust or lose your job. Why try this? To get the stress out of the routine. That is why we want to stop rushing at all, with all activities- to take the stress out of the situation. After you are adjusted to moving at a reasonable pace and managing your time more calmly in the morning, you'll find yourself more at ease in the morning, and then you'll take that ease to work with you, giving yourself the opportunity to observe the ripple effect slowing down has on your life.
3. Remove Distractions
What are you spending your time doing? Are you rushed because you have too much to do and not enough time to do it? Many of us are in this position daily, and yet we need our downtime too. Don't forget to keep a reasonable balance between downtime and work, and stay aware of yourself. Downtime is a healing time but becomes misused when we spend that time escaping and avoiding the difficulties in our lives.
Are you taking a reasonable amount of downtime or escaping through your outlet of choice? If you find yourself escaping into your chosen outlet in an unbalanced way, you'll find that removing one distraction at a time will open you up to making more intentional decisions, which in turn will allow you to guide your life rather than just be swept away by it. Once you remove a distraction, fill that spot with your Soul Work. Doing this will help you to naturally slow yourself down, manage time better, and stay in balance with yourself and the planet. Don't believe me? Try it for 30 days!
4. Remove Clutter
Removing clutter from your spaces and home is a ceremony of cleansing. As you cleanse out the space you dwell in, so too does your inner space empty out of things it no longer needs. Throw that junk out and declutter your life. Having too much stuff can be overstimulating, which keeps us surrounded by stress. Manage it by re-evaluating what you need, and once things are cleaned up, you'll find it easier to slow down and stay in balance.
5. Add in Personal Ceremony (to celebrate the self)
Personal Ceremony is a great way to begin or strengthen the cycle of self-love and to jump-start a healing journey. As you practice keeping sacred time and sacred space for yourself, you not only open yourself up to a set aside time to do your Soul Work, but you also remind yourself that you're an integral part of all that is around you. Staying consistent with Personal Ceremony reminds the body that there is an order to the Universe that can be used to heal. Check out my article, The Importance of Ceremony, to learn more about what it means to partake in this sacred dance.
6. Keep a Balanced Diet
We all know by now that keeping a balanced diet is essential to keeping a balanced life. We are what we eat, and what we put in our mouths tells our bodies what we think of it. If you want a certain body, you have to eat a certain way. If you want to think with clarity, you have to have a clear gut. Know your body, know your foods, and know your limits to keep a balanced diet and promote a balanced life outside of the body.
7. Pay Attention
A part of keeping a balanced life means regulating and monitoring how much time you are spending creating, motivating your efforts, feeling your feelings, and thinking your thoughts. If we become out of balance with these four aspects of our humanness, we find ourselves in disarray and struggling to keep ourselves afloat when things get tough.
If you are spending most of your time creating and not enough time reflecting on your thoughts and feelings, your creations will not emanate their potential. If you spend too much time motivating yourself but not enough time thinking and planning it out, you will never create it. All four of these aspects must stay in balance for our overall success.
8. Keep a Balanced Social Life
Don't forget, we were not meant to be alone. We are social creatures, and there is therapy in socializing. That's why the cashier at the store was so talkative, and that's why the older gentlemen at the DMV told you his life story. We live in a doing society that doesn't always support the amount of communion we all require for balance and happiness. Sometimes you may have to force yourself to socialize. You may even need to reteach yourself how to start conversations. Look at it as if were an adventure you're going on. Sometimes leaving the house at all can be better than nothing.
Keeping a balanced inner self can clear up issues that may be standing in the way of gaining and/or keeping lasting relationships of value. By finding ways to keep yourself in check, you will incorporate healthy habits that allow you to decide who you are compatible with and what types of partners you want to attract. If you are already in a relationship, finding this balance will provide a great tool for growth for each of you individually as well as the relationship as a whole.
Thank you for reading. Contact Jamelle at Bare Roots Energy for coaching and healing treatments to support your adventure to Self Love and Life Balance, and as always, Happy Healing!
Jamelle Zablow-Moloney
1.26.2023.7