How being in LOVE with YOURSELF can impact your HORMONES!

The month of February always seems to revolve around the topic of LOVE!

We often get caught up with the fact of being in 'perfect relationship.' We often forget that the topic around love, doesn't have to be about our relationships (whether you are single or not). But instead we have to work on above all else BEING IN LOVE WITH YOURSELF!!!!

Being in love, especially with ourselves has some major health benefits - like lowering cholesterol and blood pressure. It can effect our HORMONES and release endorphins, those feel good chemicals that make us feel happier and in a euphoric state. Serotonin, dopamine, oxytocin, and endorphins are famously happy hormones that promote positive feelings like pleasure, happiness, and even love. Hormones and neurotransmitters are involved in lots of essential processes, like heart rate and digestion, but also your mood and feelings. These in turn, help to lower cortisol, the stress hormone, and make us feel less stressed, healthier and burn fat easier too. It is an amazing feeling to be in love with another person but I think the most important person to be in love with is YOURSELF.

I talk to woman everyday who don’t feel that are in love with themselves. There is always something that they are feeling not good enough about in their life or their body. Like many woman I speak to, I have also spent time not loving myself.

I will confess with you something from my past. I come from a background of dance and performing, with a dance company, across the island in hotels, theater stage and television (boy, did I try and avoid television performances as much as possible!!). Don't get me wrong, I LOVE dancing my heart out, plus the thrill and excitement of performing and some of my dance mates are still my closest friends to date even though I had to stop so many years ago. But put yourself in front of your worst judge = YOURSELF, when you see yourself on the play back on the TV and boy do you criticize!! Hence why I avoided doing television! We often avoid putting ourselves out there due to fear and especially fear of JUDGEMENT!

I would say things like ''Why do my arms look so big!!'' or ''the television really does add 10lbs - I look fat!!.'' How about putting yourself in a changing room with beautiful slim dancers and colourful bright costumes and tell me you wouldn't stop and compare yourself to others or wished your body part looked great in a costume the way it did on your team mate. When your going through a phase where you might have gained a few small lbs and you begin to see a slight tummy bulge over your skirt or dress, while your team mate has a solid flat stomach to die for! This was the reality, we all got along great, but all girls compared to how one another looked! With so many social media platforms nowadays, I find we are comparing ourselves to others even more!! We compare our looks, our lives, materialistic things, what kind of mothers we are..... you name it!!! Nowadays, although I still get that feeling of nerves or a little fear, I remind myself that getting out of my comfort zone is where the magic happens and I will be a lot stronger for it. As for judgement, I have let that go now. If people don't like what they see or what I say or what I post, they can chose to just stop following me! Simple As! And what they think, is none of my business really. In life, there will always be people who like you and some who don't - we cannot please everyone! That's OK!

We say things like, “If only I was 5 lb. lighter then I will love my body, or if only my tummy was flat or my boobs were smaller/bigger then I will really love myself.” And then if we lose those 5 lbs it would still feel the same and we would say, “When I lose the next 5 lbs I will really love myself.'' And so the cycle kept going round and round!

We have to finally put a stop to this and accepted ourselves and love ourselves for everything we are! When we finally realize that if we don't love our self now for who we are, at any weight, we would never really love our self no matter what the scale says. We need to start focusing on the things we really do love about our self, then we can truly understand that our self worth is not dependent on the size of clothes or the scale or even what relationship we are in. We have to truly love our self in order to really love others too. I wish that we all invest in first loving ourselves.

We spend so much energy looking for love and wanting to be loved but we don’t spend enough time working on loving ourselves. Self love is not selfish, we need to learn how to love ourselves.

GRATITUDE is the number one game changer in feeling and giving love. Start your day by listing a few things you are grateful about yourself and your life. When you come across a negative situation in life or you may be feeling down on yourself look at the gratitude in the situation. You can always put a positive spin on almost anything you are going through.

BE TRUE TO WHO YOU ARE. Stop trying to be someone else, there is only one you and you are amazing. Love yourself enough to be true to yourself and don’t be afraid to shine!

TAKE TIME FOR YOURSELF. What do you love to do? Read, get a massage, whatever it is, do more of it! You are important and you should do what you love and what makes you happy.

TRUST YOURSELF. You know more then you think you do. You know what you need, you know who you are so stop second guessing it all the time. Take time to sit with yourself and really tap into your intuition that we all have. Trust that you know what is right for you and believe in yourself.