Love Myself 2020

Love Myself 2020 Journal Challenge: Conclusion

February 28, 2020

How is it already almost March? This month had an extra day in it and I still feel like we just started this journal challenge? All good things must come to an end, so I’m told. It’s definitely a bittersweet ending. I had a lot of revelations throughout this challenge in my personal life. I want to know your experience though. If you participated in this journaling challenge, even if it was just for part of it, leave me a comment and tell me your thoughts.

Before I go into my takeaways and end this challenge I wanted to take a pause to say thank you. Thank you to everyone who participated in or supported me in this challenge. I’d like to say thank you most of all to Jessica, Morgan, Sam, Ruth and Katie. I’ve never worked with this many bloggers at once or planned a challenge as long as this one. You ladies helped me bring this vision to life and made it 10 times as better than I could have imagined, and 10 times as fun as well. I’ve enjoyed working with you all!

Lessons In Self Care & Self Love

As I’m sure you are aware of by now, I’ve also been participating in this challenge alongside of you all, at least as much as I possibly could. I learned a lot about myself, my blog, and self-care and self-love through participating in the journal prompts and co-running this challenge behind-the-scenes. It was uncomfortable, empowering, thought-provoking and rewarding all at once. Here are some of the lessons I learned through this journaling challenge.

You Not Only Deserve A Break – You Need One

I didn’t realize how burnt out I was until talking with my counselor a few weeks ago. Despite feeling like I’m not busy, because I’m currently unemployed, I sure did have a knack for finding busyness.

Before two weeks ago I couldn’t tell you the last time I sat down to watch a movie or Netflix without having a computer in my lap or phone in my hand. It was clear that I needed to follow my own advice and take the time to purposely go through this challenge and learn how to relax again.

The reason that resting is so important is that it affects a lot of things if you don’t. Not only does your mental health suffer, but so can your relationships and how you view your work, It can even make you tired, or even worse, sick. Here are more reasons to make relaxing a priority.

Being Brutally Honest About How You Feel About Yourself Can Be Uncomfortable, But It’s The Best Thing You Can Do For Yourself

Some of these journal prompts were tough! Your first instinct could be to breeze through journaling to avoid getting deep, but that’s the wrong move to do here. By doing that you are not allowing yourself to grow, which could eventually lead to a setback. If you truly want to know how to not only better yourself, but love yourself through that process, you’ve got to be honest about your starting point.

If that means admitting to yourself that you can only come up with three qualities you like about yourself, instead of five, that’s okay. Now you know what to work on. In this situation, I like to ask others what they like about me. Seeing yourself from someone else’s perspective can be a game-changer to learning to have a better view of yourself. Self-love may not come naturally to you, I know it doesn’t for me, but if you keep working on it, over time you’ll find yourself loving more and more of who you are. I hope the Love Myself 2020 journaling challenge has helped you start that process.

Nobody’s Perfect, So Why Do You Put So Much Pressure On Yourself

Do you ever get frustrated when you don’t do well in something you feel you should excel in? Yeah, me too. This is something that sneaks up on me. I know I’m not perfect, but I also know how I get when I mess up. We are all our own worst critic’s right? Instead of accepting the mistake and moving on I tend to sulk in my imperfections a little longer than I’d like to admit.

I caught myself doing this throughout the challenge when I noticed I missed a few daily prompts. I didn’t expect anyone to do this challenge perfectly by participating every day. So why was I putting that on myself? This is where self-love and self-compassion come into play. I’m currently reading Kristen Neff’s book Self-Compassion, so I believe this book is going to help me further with this problem of too much self-criticism.

Concluding Thoughts

It’s about time to wrap this journaling challenge up. Before we do, I want to talk to the person that has come here for the first time. It’s not too late to go through this challenge. While it is Valentine’s Day themed, you can do this journaling challenge at any time. You could even repeat it sometime later in the year. All you have to do is download this e-book, check out the blog posts down below, and visit any one of our Instagrams to view our Love Yourself 2020 Highlight on our profile.

I want to thank you again for going on this journey of self care and self love with us. Take your breakthroughs and lessons you learned in this journaling challenge with you. Remember to take care of yourself. Your mental health is just as important as your physical health. If you feel yourself lacking in self-care again, repeat this challenge to rediscover the importance of self care and self love. I’ll leave you with one final quote, because you know we love a good quote here. Share this with a friend who needs a dose of self love and a reminder to take care of her/himself.

What did you learn during the Love Myself 2020 challenge? Would you like to see more challenges like this in the future? Let me know in the comments below or connect with me on Instagram.

This post is a part of the Love Myself 2020 challenge. Go follow Sam from Here I Mum Again, Morgan from Chica Confident, Jessica from Sweet & Spicy Essentials, Katie from Between The Lines and Ruth from Colourful Hope, for more self-love/self-care content. If you’ve missed any of our posts so far, catch up here.

Intro

Healthy Eats: Valentine’s Day Edition

How To Achieve With SMART Goals In 5 Simple Steps (via Here I Mum Again)

5 Ways Busy Entrepreneurs Can Keep the Passion Alive in their Relationships (via Chica Confident)

Why Self-Love Is So Hard For Me

30 Positive Affirmations For Self Love (via Colourful Hope)

Create: Easy Vision Board (via Sweet & Spicy Essentials)

Ways To Take A Break & Destress (via Between The Lines)

Stretching Video (via Sweet & Spicy Essentials)

Week 1 Recap (via Sweet & Spicy Essentials)

10 Exciting Valentine’s Day Ideas for Parents (via Here I Mum Again)

The Ultimate Self-Love Spotify Playlist