What if we simply devoted this month to loving ourselves more? What might that change in our life? Might we see deeper beauty in ourselves that we had not noticed? Might we soothe our cracks and flaws with acceptance, forgiveness, and love instead of shame and hate? Might we better understand just how worthy of love we are from anyone, especially ourselves? We won’t know until we try…
So here begins the Me v PMDD Self-Love September Challenge!
When: Thursday, September 7th to Saturday, September 30th
(9/30 is also the proposed Me v PMDD app launch day!!! It’s our hope that this will get us all jived for app launch — the app even includes a Self-Love Journal — my personal favorite feature!)
So that means 24 lovely self-love challenges, one per day!
I, Co-founder Brett, will be doing all of these daily challenges myself and sharing on the @mevpmdd Instagram, as well as on my personal Instagram account, @brettfb_v_pmdd to see how actively practicing self-love can change my life and outlook.
#SelfLoveSeptember Rules
- There are no rules. Post along with the theme every day on Instagram or other social media, post every so often if there’s a challenge you particularly like, or maybe just follow along and pour Self-Love into your personal journal. Anything goes! Love is love!
- Tag @mevpmdd in your posts on Instagram if you’d like to be featured on our page so that we can share the love even more.
The Challenges
9.7.17–5 Things You Love About Yourself
Let’s start this love off right with well, love. What are five things about you, character traits, physical traits, a talent, a memory, etc. that you love? This can be surprisingly hard, but that’s not to be ashamed of. In the past, I went through a period of depression beyond the PMDD which made it hard to love anything about myself. But if you’re feeling that way today, it’s just another reason to be thankful to yourself that you’re doing this challenge. We do recover from the darkness though, I did, active love helped.
9.8.17 — Your Favorite Empowering Quote
9.9.17 — Your Role Model
Who inspires you to shine more and love more? What can you learn from them?
9.10.17 — What does self-love mean to you?
Ooh, Brett, you’re asking those tough questions… This could be differently beautiful for all of us.
9.11.17–5 Core Values
9.12.17 — What makes you happy?
9.13.17–10 Things We Don’t Know About You
I will still love all of you, no matter how crazy, silly, quirky, or weird these facts might reveal that you are. I am stranger! We are all worthy of love for all that we are.
9.14.17 — Mirror Smile Challenge
Alright loves, take your beautiful self to the mirror and look into your eyes, at your face, to your body and send love to every part. Do this for 1 to 5 minutes. If judging comes, accept those thoughts, but then counter them with love.
9.15.17 — What’s your dream?
What’s one or a few of your biggest dreams for yourself and your family at this point in your life? What are a few things you can do today to head in the path of that dream? Share that with us or write it down to keep for you.
9.16.17 — Self-Love Date
Take yourself Out, or In, and do something you love to do. Or even bring a Honey or a friend along, as long as they contribute to the loving atmosphere. Go to your favorite coffee shop, take a beach walk, order take out and watch your favorite movie, take a bath (with bubbles and all that smelly wonderful stuff and candles)…
9.17.17 — Love Letter to Yourself
Do this one when you’re feeling good. Write to yourself like you’re a lover who adores you and wants the best for you. Put in some tips and self-care tricks to remind yourself to use on a darker day. Save the letter and read it when you need it.
9.18.17 — Pet Love
Love for our furry friends. Share a pic of your pets and all you love about them! I’m sitting next to my guy, Fuzzy, as I write this. He’s the cuddle King, and no I am not biased…
9.19.17 — Nature Love
Share a post (even if its #tbt) of one of your favorite spots in nature and let the memory of it envelop you like you’re there. Or get out in nature right in your own neighborhood, backyard, or town and see what beauty lies in the living beings beyond your home.
9.20.17 — Love for your Loves!
Here’s a day to share extra love with the one’s you love and the ones who love you. Our people (honeys, kids, parents, siblings, friends) can be an amazing resource to us in difficult times and remind us of all the reasons they love us so that we can learn to embrace those reasons too.
9.21.17 — Gratitude List
Make a list of everything in the universe that you are thankful for. Yes, there are many things we wish we didn’t have to have or deal with, but there are also many things we are blessed to have or not have in our lives. Keep this list near, and maybe consider adding something to it every day.
9.22.17 — Say “Yes” and Say “No”
Here’s a day to pay attention to the requests that constantly come our way. Say “Yes” to something new (Yes, I will try that sample of chocolate, chocolate fudge ice cream!”) On the same day, say “No” to something you’d usually do, but it’s really been cramping your style (“No, I can’t watch your dog for 3 weeks while you visit Tahiti.”) It’s okay to say No sometimes, especially when saying Yes might get in the way of more important priorities.
9.23.17 — #TreatYoSelf
This is a two-part challenge. 1. Treat yo self to the original #treatyoself pioneers by watching Park’s and Recreation: Pawnee Rangers (Season 4, Episode 4). You will not be disappointed. Better yet, binge the entire show. 2. Treat yo self to something that you want — a new dress, a piece of cake from Publix, a new puppy! Sometimes we need a treat too!
9.24.17 — Share the Love
This day is for random acts of kindness and charitable donations. Give some love to those who need it!
9.25.17 — Accept Yourself
Now begins the nitty-gritty, hard-core, I-really-want-to-love-me-in-so-many-greater-ways-than-just-treating-myself challenges. Ponder for a while who you are, flaws and all. Accept everything. Nothing you are or could do is unworthy of acceptance. Read up a little on Unconditional Positive Regard and see if you can do that with yourself.
9.26.17 — Forgive Yourself
No one said it would be easy, but I am saying it will be worth it. Forgive yourself for the little stuff, forgive yourself for the big stuff. Not being able to forgive means that you have to continue to hold onto all the pain of whatever the stuff was. Let go. If other people were involved, do all you can to earn their forgiveness, but know that it will never serve them for you to hold pain in your heart. That only really affects you.
9.27.17 — Let It Go
Write down the things you are holding onto which have become too heavy to carry any longer. Then, let these things go. Drop the list in the trash, burn away all the burdens, rip the list to shreds. Let it go. Listen to Frozen’s “Let it Go!” for inspiration, if you are not too sick of that wonderful song already.
9.28.17 — Light of Self-Love
Light a candle for yourself, the full you, perfectly imperfect, and send active love, and positive self-talk, to every part of yourself while the flame shines.
9.29.17 — Self-Love Plan
By this point we’ll be nearing the end of the challenge, but just the beginning of our life-long self-love journey. I’ll be providing a template for a self-love plan we all can make on this day.
9.30.17 — You are You!
This is a day of reflection and selfie posting. What have you learned through this challenge? How has practicing self-love affected your life? Is self-love worth it? What do you think?
I think Self-Love is needed by everyone. It’s not narcissistic to accept yourself, and treat yourself every so often, and just in general love yourself, even when you have other people in your life that you must also actively accept, treat, and love. We can’t neglect ourselves in life, because we are the vessel from which all of our good can come. How can we give to our loves and our passions if we do not have a loved and whole foundation from which to give? For PMDD Warriors, like myself, it’s extra important to practice self-love. PMDD tells me to believe I am ugly, broken, and unlovable, but that is not true. We need to surround ourselves with more acceptance, forgiveness, and compassion, so that we can tune out PMDD and just focus on taking care of ourselves when we are low.
So, that being said, let’s see what this challenge can do!
