Screw Valentine’s Day

Feb 12, 2016 | Uncategorized

Screw Valentine’s Day, how do you love YOU?

Valentine’s day is stressful. It doesn’t matter if you’re single or the most in love you’ve ever been. It’s a little bit bloody stressful. Even if you don’t think it bothers you, the energy it takes to just not be bothered is as bad. If you’re single, it feels like the world is out to remind you that you’re not in the club. If you’re loved up, you feel judged for not participating, what a bore. Or you feel judged for participating too much; being all superficial and needing a day to celebrate your relationship…Aaaaaaaah, the judgment!

It’s not that I don’t believe in romance, of course I do! I don’t think us Irish are the best at PDAs so lately I’ve been finding ways to help my clients express their love in front of my camera in their own perfect way, and it’s working so frickin well! (l tell you, the excitement!) I believe in love with all of my (mostly behind-closed-doors, super-sappy) heart. And however you express that love is the pure personification of romance. And I don’t really hate Valentine’s day; what I hate is the guilt associated with it. I hate the pressure. I hate the stress and I hate the commercialism.

Really though, deep, deep down, I hate being told what to do and when to do it, how to do it…

But lately, I’ve been meditating on love, big time. And I figure now is the time to talk about it. We’re starting to come back to ourselves after winter, we’re taking stock of our resolutions and how they’ve been working out. We’re anticipating brighter mornings and the warmth of spring. And so yeah, let’s talk about love, self love.

We all have families who we worry about, jobs we work our asses off at, friends who need us, loves we want to spend time with, businesses to run. Adulting is tough. But what about you? What are you doing to take care of you? Do you love yourself? Sure you do, you’ve got that sorted. Do you show you how much you love you? Do you? You. You. You.

I’m not going to tell you how to do the daily V-day on yourself, that’s as unique as you. It could be that you need to schedule in some proper alone time, read for pleasure, pay someone to beautify you, have a dance party for one. (Talking to myself here too, for sure.) On this full-on in-your-face love weekend, I want to remind you (us) that you can’t pour from an empty cup. You can learn how to balance your happiness with the happiness of your people. Listen to inspiring people, talk about it, think on it. Prioritising yourself and putting yourself first is not selfish and you can learn how not to feel guilty about it. For me, one thing I’ve been working on lately is just scheduling; making time for work and only doing what’s on the list. It doesn’t always work like that but every day is a new round. And I’m trying.

Jada, (oh, how I loved you in Gotham) you speak a beautiful truth.