Acts of self-love beget acts of self-love

(Many thanks to Rita Loyd for allowing me to use her artwork for this post.  Love this piece!)  

In August of last year I decided to join a local gym with my husband.  I decided I wanted more movement in my life and I had heard some really good things about a local gym so we checked it out.  Sure enough, it is an awesome gym.  So I don’t know a whole lot about gyms but this one fit what we were looking for.  It’s within 10 to 15 minutes of our house.  It’s open 24 hours 7 days a week.  It has all the equipment we could want and the treadmills, elipticals, etc…have tv’s on them.  We met with the owner and liked him and I got a discount because of where I work.  We signed up that day.

I took advantage of their offer to meet with their personal trainer one time and after that I decided to sign up with her and I worked with her for about a month and a half.  I really liked her as a trainer but I especially liked the fact that she listened to me.  I’m not going to her currently but may go back at some point.

We’ve been going to the gym and when I go regularly (sometimes you just can’t make it because of illness) I noticed my sciatica easing up and my bunion on my foot hurting less and less.  My brain even seemed less foggy most of the time.  I’ve really enjoyed the fact that I joined the gym.  It’s not a chore, it’s an act of self-love for me.  And the most amazing thing for me is…I miss working out when I don’t get to do it.  Being active and working out makes me want to be active and work out more. 

I say that to say this…

This past week I was feeling really blah.  You know, those days where you just really don’t care what happens in your life.  Go to work, do your job only because you have to and not because you enjoy it, go home and maybe do something for yourself but maybe not.  It just seemed things weren’t feeling right for me and that meant I didn’t feel “right”.  Something was askew.

Thankfully my co-author here picked up on it pretty quickly.  She questioned me about a couple of times but was patient enough with me and knows me well enough to know that when I was ready to spill it, I would spill it indeed.  Friday I spilled it.

I need a vacation or at least a break from work.  I need some self-love.  I need to voice more what I need from my husband.  I need to see me as a priority in my life.  I need to get back to taking hot foamy soaking baths and lathering up with lotion from head to toe.  I need to get back to going to bed early and catching up on reading what I like to read.

On top of just the general “working too hard and not getting paid enough” is the fact that one of my bosses started Weight Watchers last week and another co-worker is “gearing up” to start his diet on March 1.  Both of them are driving us all crazy with tips on how to lose weight.  (see AGRs blog below)  So not only do I need to get away from work, the job, but I also need to get away from work, the people.

AngryGrayRainbow asked me Friday what I was planning to do about all of this but more specifically, what was I going to do to show myself more self-care and attention.  At the time I didn’t know but I started working on it right then and there.

When I left work, I went home and told my husband I was going out for supper because I wasn’t going to cook and I didn’t want anything we had in the house.  He gladly joined me and we went to our local club where we saw and visited with some friends, ate good food and even had a couple delicious drinks.  Saturday we did absolutely nothing.  We lounged around all day long.  It was dark, dreary and cold, in other words, a perfect day to do nothing.  I took a 2 hour nap at one point and we just watched TV the rest of the day.

Sunday I slept in late and then we went shopping.  I bought new underwear!  5 new pairs of spiffy comfy panties and 2 new bras!  We went to Costco and had a blast trying all the samples and going through every aisle.  Last night we topped it off with a great workout at the gym and a great night’s sleep.

The act of self-love begets acts of self-love.  On Friday when I decided I needed some stuff and started putting it all into action, it just snowballed as if that was just the way it was supposed to be.  The acts of self-love on Friday, led me to the self-love on Saturday and then to Sunday.  Once you get the hang of it, you see where you really miss those little acts of self-love.

As far as a vacation…we’re both doing our research and seeing what we can do to remedy that.   Until it gets planned, I will be doing other things that make me happy.  I’m planning a retreat to the zoo soon and maybe a picnic!  The jaccuzi will be getting a good cleaning and I’m going to stock up on some moisturizers!

~sas