A Year of Being: A Simple Strategy I’m Taking to Level Up & Love Myself More

It hasn’t always been easy to love myself. So, I’m dedicating the next 365 days to doing just that.

Do you love yourself? It’s a question I’ve battled with from the time I was a little chubby-cheeked toddler with curly bangs and plastic bow barrettes in my hair.

Learning to love all of me is a daily commitment and one that I have neglected for far too long over the last decade of my life.

This is my experiment, to see what one year of truly taking the time to love myself will get me. It’s time to level up in more ways than one and I’m sharing my strategy in the hopes that my self-love journey will inspire your own.

This article is dedicated to my simple strategy to level up and learn to love myself more this year & how you can too.

• Step 1: Recognize Who I am & How Far I’ve Come
• Step 2: Analyze My ‘Failures’, Release the Shame & Move On
• Step Three: Believe in My Future & Trust My Inner Self
• How Will I Do This & How Can You Too?

365 Days to Love Myself

Step One: Recognize Who I am & How Far I’ve Come

When I reflect on my life up until now, it’s easy for me to break it up into significant segments, all based on big life-changing moments.

Each segment of my life has highs and oh, so many lows. When I think of my childhood, I often think of the turbulence of my parent’s marriage. But tend to brush past all the fun and formative memories I had with my siblings and cousins during that same time.

It’s easy to reflect back and only see the bad and to dwell on how it set you up to become who you are today. Living with that identity, whether you overcome the ‘bad’ or you feel like you fell victim to it, is a lie.

You are not defined by what happens to you. You are who you choose to be, every single day, no matter what good or bad may come at you.

Step one in my year of being is to stop letting the bad of my past define the me that I am today. I’ve grown and now recognize that the pain oftentimes serves a great purpose. For me, it was my propellor. The more pain in my life, the harder I pushed myself to break free and overcome it.

That has served me well and protected me but that pain doesn’t define me and you shouldn’t let your pain define you either.

Recognition of who I am, innately, despite the fleeting moments of life that can sometimes bring great joy or pain, will allow me to look back on how far I’ve come and let the past be the past.

I am learning to remember who I was as a little girl. Before the tumultuous storyline of my parents became so deeply intertwined with my own.

• Who was that girl?
• What was her compass?
• How was she so peaceful?
• What brought her joy?

I invite you to ask yourself similar questions and hope you will start to remember and recognize who you are.

Step Two: Analyze My ‘Failures’, Release the Shame & Move On

Do you find it easy to think about things you’ve failed at? Much easier than your achievements or accomplishments? Same girl, same.

I’m not sure what it is, but most of us are hardwired to dwell on the negative and just sit in the shame that comes from it.

Every single ‘failure’ in my life has added a layer of shame to my skin. Sometimes it feels like a literal weight is added to my body every time I shoot for the stars and come crashing down again. But it’s not the failure that weighs me down, it’s the shame, rejection, embarrassment aka emotion that comes with it.

Failure is scary but it’s also very relative. They say beauty is in the eye of the beholder but I think failure is. Because what may look and feel like embarrassment and shame to me, others have watched from their perspective and seen only bravery and courage.

My personal example of this is my entrepreneurship journey. I have tried to turn so many of my creative ideas into businesses over the last decade of my life and from my perspective, they have all failed.

From after-school kids cooking classes, custom dance costumes, paleo cupcakes, and more… I look back and see failure after failure after failure. But I’ve had outsiders, non-relatives or friends tell me time and again, how brave I am and that I have inspired them to follow their hearts as well.

Let it Go Boo Boo

So, for the next 365 days, I say, FUCK THE SHAME. Do you have an idea? Try it out, give it your all, and see where it takes you.

Enjoy the journey, feel the joy that this project, business, relationship, etc., brings to your life, and just enjoy it. No strings attached.

There is no failure. There is only what you choose and what you don’t. Each decision will lead you to the next right step for YOU.

Shame is a lying ass hoe and I’m not going to let her ruin my life anymore. Let it go and move on. As Aaliyah once said, “If at first you don’t succeed… dust yourself off and try again, try again, again, again”.

Step Three: Believe in My Future & Trust My Inner Self

The last part of my master plan to love myself more and level up this year is so simple, it’s hard. I am going to believe in myself, trust my inner intuition and *gasp* have hope for the future.

Yea, I’m going to do all of that for the next 365 days. I’m sure you’re thinking, “that sounds great and all but it’s not realistic”. And I agree with you, it’s not realistic but every day, I get to shape my own reality by the thoughts I focus on and the choices I make.

So, for 365 days, I am going to choose to believe that where I am going is far better than where I have been.

I choose to trust myself and let my inner child be my guide. Baby Sharae had the right idea. She created intuitively and had no fear attached to anything. Because she knew nothing of failure, shame, or pain. That’s who I really am and who I am trying to get back to.

On the hardest of days, when the bills feel debilitating or my PCOS-induced mood swings are making me feel like I want to punch my husband in the face (sorry babe), I will choose to believe in my future instead of letting the stresses of the fleeting day define me.

How Will I Do This & How Can You Too?

Here’s how to conquer the fear and let go of the past so you can finally love yourself and level up:

1. Read my post about the 6 Transformative Self-Love Habits to Practice Now, and start putting them to good use!

2. Write down 3 truths about yourself that are not defined by failure, pain, shame, or regret. Put this somewhere that you can look back on the hardest of days:

• in a journal by your bed that you can reach for when the negative thoughts start to take over
• on a sticky note on your desk that you can see when the stresses of the day-to-day start to get to you
• or type up an email and auto-send it to yourself every week or every day, so you can consistently be reminded about who you really are and where you’re heading

3. Write down your dream life, whatever that may look like, big or small.

• Stand in front of a mirror and read that dream to yourself, out loud, making eye contact with Y-O-U. I don’t care who is around! This is about you.
• Read it to yourself, every day until you believe you deserve it.
• Then, start living your life in accordance with that dream.

4. Lastly, keep coming back to moraraestudio.com to follow along on my self-love journey. This is my great experiment, a year of being, dedicated to being exactly who I want to be and remembering who I always was.

This is my one-year strategy to level up and love myself. Today is the day to accept yourself for who you are and never look back.