Category: Self-esteem

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Virtue and coming back to life

I’ve been working on writing the second edition of The Princess Guide to Healing a Broken Heart, and I’ve been thinking a lot lately about royalty. This #FlashbackFriday post explains how our character is what makes us righteous (and in my opinion, royal) …

I was walking down an aisle in a store the other day, and next to the As Seen on TV products jumped out the words on a box BACK TO LIFE … My first thought was, “I wish I could slather on a product to bring ME back to life!”

Virtue and coming back to life

We all go through seasons in life where our faith is tried, but how we react to the negative things happening to us determines who we really are. I’ve been thinking a lot lately about character and virtue.

Several years ago when I was working as an editor of a weakly publication for “The Dallas Morning News,” I was going through a really difficult time in my personal life. The only guy on our team walked up as I was talking about my situation with another girl on our team. He said something to me that has never left me. He had only been working with me for a couple of months but said I was the most virtuous person he’s ever known.

Michael Tyrrell, musician and creator of the Wholetones music project, put it like this in a recent e-mail, “Virtue is the cornerstone of character. It is the manifestation of moral principles or ethics that define one’s statue. In other words,it’s the ‘you’ in you! It’s who you are when nobody’s around to impress.”

My grandfather always told us, “A man is only as good as his word.” I took that to heart and always try not to commit to something unless I know I can do it and keep my promises. I’ve found out in my lifetime that very few people keep their promises — even really important ones like wedding vows or governmental oaths.

One of my friends in graduate school calls me her ”Little Southern Belle.” One night during a break in class as the professor was walking back in the room, my friend was telling everyone out loud, “Senée is the epitome of a Southern Belle. She can tell you to go to hell and make you look forward to the journey!” To that, our professor turned around and shook her head. (She wasn’t from Texas and had told us she didn’t understand our hospitality or etiquette.)

I have never viewed myself as a Southern Belle. I just know deep down inside me that I am called to live to a higher standard in which I keep my promises, tell the truth at all costs and do my best to do things in love.

Being a follower of Christ sets this standard for me, but I’m amazed at how many people who say they are Christians live just like the rest of the world doing things to please themselves. It shouldn’t be surprising to see the conduct of people today because it was written about hundreds of years ago, and we were told exactly what to do.

“BUT UNDERSTAND this, that in the last days will come (set in) perilous times of great stress and trouble [hard to deal with and hard to bear]. For people will be lovers of self and [utterly] self-centered, lovers of money and aroused by an inordinate [greedy] desire for wealth, proud and arrogant and contemptuous boasters. They will be abusive (blasphemous, scoffing), disobedient to parents, ungrateful, unholy and profane. [They will be] without natural [human] affection (callous and inhuman), relentless (admitting of no truce or appeasement); [they will be] slanderers (false accusers, troublemakers), intemperate and loose in morals and conduct, uncontrolled and fierce, haters of good. [They will be] treacherous [betrayers], rash, [and] inflated with self-conceit. [They will be] lovers of sensual pleasures and vain amusements more than and rather than lovers of God. For [although] they hold a form of piety (true religion), they deny and reject and are strangers to the power of it [their conduct belies the genuineness of their profession]. Avoid [all] such people [turn away from them],” 2 Timothy 3:1-5 AMP

One reason I choose to live to a higher standard is because of the great promise associated with it. “Let your character or moral disposition be free from love of money [including greed, avarice, lust, and craving for earthly possessions] and be satisfied with your present [circumstances and with what you have]; for He [God] Himself has said, I will not in any way fail you nor give you up nor leave you without support. [I will] not, [I will] not, [I will] not in any degree leave you helpless nor forsake nor let [you] down (relax My hold on you)! [Assuredly not!],” Hebrews 13:5 AMP.

In his book Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man, Steve Harvey said men like standards, so get some. So how can we start to raise our standards? Jesus told us the greatest commandment is to love one another. The Apostle Paul broke it down even further in Philippians 2:3-4 GNT:

  • Don’t do anything from selfish ambition or from a cheap desire to boast;
  • Be humble toward one another;
  • Always considering others better than yourselves;
  • And look out for one another’s interests, not just for your own.

How do you live life to a higher standard, or how do you plan to raise your standards?

You can find these Flashback Friday blogs posted every Friday. If you want to know more how to have successful relationships and peace of mind, you can get a free PDF sample chapter of “The Princess Guide to Healing a Broken Heart” by filling out the form in the sidebar on this page.

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How to trust again

We’re on the topic of trust issues this week, and as I wrote about in the previous post, this issue isn’t just one for personal relationships … It can spill over into business and every other area of your life. Learning to trust others after you’ve been hurt takes time, but can be very beneficial. Here’s today’s Flashback Friday post from 2014 …

Often, people who have been in relationships with substance users or physical and psychological abusers find it hard to trust. Repeated times of trusting people who have proven to be less than trustworthy makes it hard to believe in others or even ourselves.

The first step to trusting again is forgiveness.

“Forgiveness is a powerful friend … It simply means to drop the charges,” wrote Rev. Mark T. Barclay in his book How to Survive a Betrayal. “To forgive is to put it in God’s hands, and not seek personal vengeance. If you don’t forgive, you will become bitter, hurting only yourself.”

You’ll often hear that you have to forgive and forget. I believe forgetting is a mistake that leads to being duped again. But I’ve found, over time, when you become healthier you let go of the pain and forget much of the wrongs that have been done to you.

“You must find a way to forgive. ‘Forget’ will come even harder and much slower. Even so, for your own sake, you must deal with this deep wound, ” Barclay wrote.

In her book The Language of Letting Go, Melody Beattie said the key to trusting others is to trust yourself first.

“The most important trust issue we face is learning to trust ourselves. The most detrimental thing that’s happened to us is that we came to believe we couldn’t trust ourselves,” she explained.

Psychology Today offers these expert tips on how to trust others again:

  • Give it time. Over a period of time, your trust can be rebuilt with repeated positive experiences … when a man consistently demonstrates his reliability, despite your more critical evaluation of his actions, he might earn your trust.
  • Acknowledge and evaluate. To trust a partner again, betrayal must be acknowledged. The wrongdoer must admit that he or she has inflicted a deep hurt, and the victim must look at what he or she could have done to make things different.
  • Look for the good. Trust yourself to stop damning people as a whole, no matter how badly they now behave. Then you may help them to become more trustworthy.
  • Go inside. The way back to trust is counterintuitive: The issue is whether we can trust ourselves to make wise decisions.

Beattie agreed, “Self-trust is a healing gift we can give ourselves. How do we acquire it? We learn it. What do we do about our mistakes, about those times we thought we could trust ourselves but were wrong? We accept them, and trust ourselves anyway.

“Trust ourselves, and we will know whom to trust. Trust ourselves, and we will know what to do. When we feel we absolutely cannot trust ourselves, trust that God will guide us into truth,” Beattie advised.

How have you learned to trust again?

You can find these Flashback Friday blogs posted every Friday. If you want to know more how to have successful relationships and peace of mind, you can get a free PDF sample chapter of “The Princess Guide to Healing a Broken Heart” by filling out the form in the sidebar on this page.

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Do you have trust issues?

I’m constantly educating myself and trying to learn how to do things better. I was listening to a very successful entrepreneur the other day taking questions from audience members at one of his talks, and when he asked a woman if she had considered getting a business partner who had more experience in business than she did, her response was, “I have trust issues!” Can you relate? I admired her self-awareness and honesty.

The next day I ran across this quote from Rev. Mike Murdoch, “Trust God. Love people. God never commanded you to trust people. God commanded you to love people and trust Him. Know the difference. Your joy and victory depend on it …”

I spent some time writing about trust in my book The Princess Guide to Healing a Broken Heart because it’s a big issue for many people. Since publishing the book, I’ve been thinking a lot about something, “After your broken heart has healed, how do you know if it’s safe to let someone back into your life? How do you know if you can trust the person who broke your heart?”

Now, I know a lot of people will say you can never trust someone who hurt you. You most definitely need to exhibit caution in these circumstances, but I don’t believe you should write someone off altogether. People can change … It doesn’t happen often, but it does happen.

Do you have trust issues

When thinking about this topic, I went to my tried and true source – Hallmark Channel movies. Yes, go ahead and laugh because I am giggling as I’m writing this post! But hear me out because there is some wisdom to gleam from these cheesy movies.

One of the new Spring 2018 movies dealt with the return of an old boyfriend who had promised to marry the lead character 14 years earlier after he completed medical school. He broke it off instead, and she was, understandably, skittish about being in a relationship with anyone much less dating. (This is a theme my recently divorced girlfriends and I have been discussing lately. When you make the ultimate commitment of marriage and the man still leaves or mistreats you or you have to ask him to leave, how can you trust your own judgment of someone new or even allow the same person back Into your life since you were the one who allowed him into your life in the first place to reek havoc on you?)

Back to the movie … As I was watching the story unfold, I found myself saying out loud to myself so my ears could hear it, “Pay attention! He came back trying to help her succeed in her business because it was the most valuable thing to her at that moment. He didn’t come back wanting anything from her accept her permission to help her and her friendship. He didn’t come back demanding she do anything for him or give him anything.” This is how you know someone is true. By paying attention to their actions over time, you will see their real intentions. Unfortunately, you have to take a gamble and allow that person into your life – at least on a limited basis – before you can obtain any of this information.

It was a Hallmark movie, and a happy ending is always guaranteed and love always wins out – That’s why I watch them. That’s Hollywood, though. Is there a way to ensure your own happy ending if you have trust issues?

In the movie, the lead character asked her best friend, “Do you think I’m crazy for giving him another chance? I don’t know how it’s going to go.” The best friend’s response was, “Hey, are you happy?” She said, “I am.” And the best friend said, “Then trust in that.”

Just before publishing this post, I was reminded of the lyrics of a song I used to sing as a teenager, “I see Jesus in your eyes and it makes me love you. I feel Jesus in your touch and I know He cares. I hear Jesus in your voice and it makes me listen. And I trust you with my love because you’re His. I see Him in you.” Maybe that’s all we need to look for, but instead of manufacturing it or using a magnifying glass to see what isn’t there, we need to be real with ourselves and see people for who they actually are and not for who they tell us they are or who we want them to be.

I hear people say all the time, “Trust is earned” or “Trust but verify.” Both are true and words of wisdom, but sometimes we just have to trust ourselves enough to give people a chance. It’s our job to give the chance and the other person’s job to prove themselves worthy of being in our lives.

We can trust the process. We can also trust that no matter how much people hurt us, there is a greater plan for our lives. Part of that plan may be to learn the lesson this terrible experience is trying to teach us so that we can help others through similar situations and get to the good part of our lives.

If you want some practical advice on how to go about trusting again, check out the upcoming blog post this Friday.

Catch these first-run Write About It Wednesday blogs every Wednesday. If you want to know how to have successful relationships and peace of mind, you can get a free PDF sample chapter of “The Princess Guide to Healing a Broken Heart” by filling out the form in the sidebar on this page.

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The show must go on: How to take action while waiting

I began singing in public in church when I was 2-and-a-half. I sang on television for the first time when I was 9. It was a live broadcast in the Dallas market, and wouldn’t you know that there would have to be an audio problem when the 9-year-old got up to sing!

I did what seemed logical … I waited until I could hear the music again, then started singing where it picked up. Before they sorted it out in the control booth, I just stood there under the blazing lights and glaring cameras pointed straight at me, not to mention a studio full of audience members staring at me. I didn’t throw a Toddlers and Tiaras fit and storm off the set. I didn’t burst into tears in front of the viewers in the number 7 market (at the time). I stood there and waited.

I think I had a deep inner knowing even at that early age that the show must go on and that I had to adjust as quickly as I could to accommodate myself to any problem. The same is true in life. We have ZERO control over other people or outside forces. Some of the time, we have zero control over what happens to us … In such a case, all we can control is how we choose to react to the problem. Do we throw a tantrum on live TV and storm off the set, or do we stand there until we hear the music and begin singing wherever it picks up? At age 9, I chose to do the latter, and I’ve spent the majority of my life doing the same.

Now, I’m not saying that you’ll never have moments of meltdown. Any time we experience a great loss or significant change, we have to allow our minds time to realize what happened, to process the event, to heal emotionally and come up with a new plan. Depending on the severity of the situation. that could take some time. It took me seconds when I was 9 singing on live TV, but as a 42-year-old dealing with a major relationship issue it took me three years to get through the grieving process then start to heal and feel like myself again.

It takes time to figure out what you want your life to look like once you have a major life change. It takes time to remember your worth and value, and then to realize that there must be someone out there who will treat you with the love and respect that you deserve and will give in return, or the right life/career situation that will benefit you rather than break you down.

What happens when we refuse to be flexible and adjust? Bitterness sets in and totally changes our lives … for the worse. It can rob us of our peace, joy and happiness. It can also cause us to do something just to have something to do instead of waiting for the right timing to sing our beautiful song.

Here’s what I had to say about it in my book The Princess Guide to Healing a Broken Heart and how it relates to relationships:

Joy/happiness are attraction magnets—they attract the right people, opportunities, and circumstances into your life, just like bitterness and negativity repel them. The people I enjoy being around most are happy/joyous people who may not be where they want to be in life, but they are grateful for where they are and are working on plans they have devised to go further and do more. Being happy/joyous while single is alright too—It doesn’t mean you’ll be alone forever, it just means that you are fine with it for now and are in no hurry to bring the wrong person into your life to fill the space.

I haven’t thought a lot about that first time singing on television, but as I have been writing this post, it really jumped out at me that I waited … I waited until the music started playing again. I stood there in that very uncomfortable space with all eyes in Dallas on me and I waited. I beat up on myself a lot for being impatient. I feel like I’ve spent most of my existence on this planet waiting for my life to start and for things to happen for me that seem so easy for everyone else. I get frustrated wondering, “When is it finally going to be my turn?!? When are things going to change in my favor?”

Maybe I’m the only one who’s ever felt this way … I’m just being honest and real.

My trusted advisor has been telling me lately that I need to celebrate the little victories. The truth is, I’ve been looking for (and needing) such big victories that the little ones just get ignored by me. But I’ve been working on paying closer attention and giving credit where it is due. So, I have to celebrate the fact that in some areas of my life, I have been patient and waited just like I did on that TV set when I was 9.

During this process, I’ve learned that there’s two types of waiting: active waiting and passive waiting. Passive waiting is when you just sit there and let life pass you by. Active waiting is preparing for the next steps (or what you think or hope are the next steps) while you are waiting.

  • Are you hoping to move to a new home or location?
    • Start packing up the stuff you aren’t using on a regular basis.
    • Begin looking at available places to live in that area.
  • Are you wanting a permanent relationship in your life?
    • Start fixing yourself up on a regular basis and looking like the best version of yourself.
    • Make a list of the qualities you want in a person, and begin practicing being the kind of person you want to attract into your life.
  • Are you looking for a job?
    • Start applying for as many positions as you can qualify for.
    • Pick out your interview outfit and hang it where you can see it every day.

All of these little things have something in common — they involve taking action in a forward, positive motion. I’m constantly striving to educate myself, and I’m always listening to podcasts and watching videos on business tactics. I recently heard someone say that you have to take action and not allow yourself to put things off until tomorrow. Within the last week, I’ve heard more than one person say that the timing will never be right … You have to take action any way. It reminds me of what one of my Substance Abuse Counseling professors would always say to us, “Do it afraid!” She said we should never let fear stop us from taking positive action.

Even a baby step in the right direction is better than being stuck or moving backward. What  one thing can you do today to actively wait and allow the show to go on?

Catch these first-run Write About It Wednesday blogs every Wednesday. If you want to know how to have successful relationships and peace of mind, you can get a free PDF sample chapter of “The Princess Guide to Healing a Broken Heart” by filling out the form in the sidebar on this page.

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How to love yourself this Valentines (season and all year long)

It’s still love month, and we’re focusing on loving yourself here at The Princess Guide. This post from three years ago is appropriate for today’s Flashback Friday …

February can be one of the hardest months if you’re single. It seems like everyone around you and everyone on social media is being celebrated and loved.

how to love yourself, loving yourself,

I dated a couple of guys who disappeared around Thanksgiving and didn’t reappear until the flowers began blooming. Make no mistake … They disappeared so they wouldn’t have to do anything for me during Christmas and Valentines. It made me feel terrible and less than important. I began making one of the qualifying questions to get a date with me, “Do you celebrate holidays and look for ways to make it special for the woman you’re dating?”

Being in a long-term relationship with someone who chooses not to do things for you can make you feel even worse.

In my Lifecycles class (in graduate school), we learned that women who are highly educated and professionals have a higher rate of divorce. My instructor said it has something to do with women having more choices today with increased income. (Previous generations of women got married to have an income.) While being married appears to be the goal for many women, some find that staying married is a lot more work than anyone will tell you about.

“We see Christian young women who love the Lord, get confused about their role in marriage or whether marriage is even worth it to start with. And you take that into sexuality, they’re very confused about sexuality and how to express that in a way that honors the Lord,” author Juli Slattery told Focus on the Family.

So, what can you do to honor yourself if you’re all alone this Valentines Day (season or any time during the year)? Relationship expert Dr. Margaret Paul gave the Huffington Post these suggestions:

  1. Listen within to your own feelings. Many people easily tune into others’ feelings yet have no idea what they feel. If you ignore a child’s feelings, that child will feel unloved. Ignoring your own feelings has the same result — your inner child feels rejected, abandoned and unloved by you.
  2. Be compassionate with your feelings. If you judge your feelings, telling yourself you are wrong for having them, your inner child will feel rejected and abandoned by you. If you are kind, gentle, tender, understanding and accepting of your feelings, your inner child will feel loved by you.
  3. Be open to learning about what your feelings are telling you. Just as an actual child feels loved when you are compassionately interested in why he or she is hurting, your inner child will feel loved when you explore what your feelings are telling you. All feelings are informational. Just as physical pain alerts you to a problem that needs attention, so does emotional pain. Painful feelings are telling you that you are abandoning yourself, or that someone is being unloving to you, or to themselves or to others, or that a situation is not good for you. Compassionately attending to your feelings, learning what they are telling you, and then taking action to remedy the situation, will make you feel loved.
  4. Create a solid connection with a spiritual source of love, wisdom and comfort. Love is not a feeling we generate from our mind. It comes from the heart when our heart is open to our source of love. When you open to learning with your higher power about loving yourself and others, love flows into your heart and you feel loved.
  5. Choose to be around loving people. We don’t always have a choice — such as in work relationships — but when we do have a choice — such as in personal relationships — choosing to be around caring, supportive and accepting people will make you feel loved. If, when you have a choice, you consistently engage with unkind, judgmental or abusive people, the message you are sending to yourself is that you are not worth loving.
  6. Take loving actions for yourself around others. When you are around someone who is being unkind, speak up for yourself, letting the person know that you don’t like being treated that way, and then either open to learning about what is going on, or lovingly disengage from the interaction. Allowing others to treat you badly sends a message to your inner child that he or she is not worth loving.
  7. Take care of your body, your time, your space and your finances. You will feel loved and lovable when you feed yourself healthy food, and get exercise and sleep. When you ignore your health, you are giving yourself the message that you are not worth loving. When you respect your own and others’ time and space, you are letting yourself know that you are worth it. When you overspend, putting yourself in unnecessary debt, you are not taking loving care of yourself, and your inner child will feel scared, alone and unloved. Just as an actual child needs to feel safe regarding the necessities of life, your inner child needs to feel the same way.
  8. Find work you love. Since work takes up a big part of your day, finding or creating work that fulfills you is vitally important. If you continue to force yourself to stay at jobs you hate, the message to yourself is that you are not worth doing whatever it is you need to do to create a fulfilling work life.
  9. Create balance. We need balance in our life to feel loved and lovable. We need time to work and time to rest and rejuvenate. We also need time to nurture our body and soul through activities that bring us joy.

Loving yourself and practicing those loving actions will not only help you get healthy self-esteem that no one can take away from you, but it will also give you the skills you need to love others when the right relationship comes into your life.

You can find these Flashback Friday blogs posted every Friday. If you want to know more how to have successful relationships and peace of mind, you can get a free PDF sample chapter of “The Princess Guide to Healing a Broken Heart” by filling out the form in the sidebar on this page.

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Learning to love yourself first

Loving yourself is, in my personal and professional opinion, the most important key to happiness in life and relationships. I know what it’s like to have people in your life tell you through their words and actions that you have no worth and are not lovable. But I also know what it’s like to break out of that programming and no longer allow them to control your thinking and life …

Let me say this upfront—There is nothing wrong with wanting to be loved. I believe we were created to love and be loved. The problem occurs when we give that power of love to another person outside of ourselves—when the love from another person is more important than how we feel about and love ourselves. If given to the wrong people, they can and will use it to control, dominate, and hurt us. I’ve seen it time and time again and experienced it personally.

The answer to this problem is to love yourself first. That way, no one can take love away from you when the main source of it comes from within yourself. A few months after publishing The Princess Guide to Healing a Broken Heart where I devoted a chapter to this topic, I read Christian Mickelsen’s book Abundance Unleashed where he seems to share my opinion.

“The more attachments you have to being loved, the more neediness, the more you’re going to be searching for that love out in the world, and it’s always going to be elusive,” he wrote.

When you’ve had your heart broken—especially if it’s happened more than once or the situation was very traumatic—it’s easy to blame yourself and let the other person off the hook. While I don’t want you to plot revenge nor look for ways to get even, I do want you to give credit where credit is due and place responsibility where responsibility is due. If you are the person responsible for the demise of the relationship, then you need to own it, repent, and change your behavior.

If you’re anything like me, you wouldn’t go anywhere in the vicinity of a snake, even if it’s behind a glass wall. So, why do we end up letting them (in human form) into our precious lives and sacred beds? Because they come disguised as handsome men or beautiful women promising us everything of which we’ve ever dreamed. By the time we realize they’re actually snakes, it’s too late—we’re already head-over-heels in love and/or engaged.

When someone leaves you—a severe form of rejection, in my personal and professional opinion—you’re put in a tough spot. It feels more like being stuck than anything else because the love you have for that person—if it’s genuine love—doesn’t go away just because he or she did. If you’re a person of faith you believe in the impossible, no matter how “crazy” it may seem or feel. (NOTE: It’s been drilled into me from graduate school studying psychotherapy that “crazy” isn’t a clinical term, but it can be a genuine feeling nonetheless.) But you’re still left all alone—waiting for love to come back to you either from the person who left or someone new. I’m just going to say what you’re not supposed to say—What about YOU? What do you do during the in-between time?

I would dare to suggest that you take all that love, concern, and obsession you’ve freely given to the other person and give it all back to yourself. “We often forget that the ultimate source of love is within us,” Mickelsen wrote. “The more love you feel for yourself, the more other people will naturally love you and gravitate toward you.”

Now, let me be very clear—I am in no way talking about nor condoning the self-love that researchers have found leads to inflated egos and Narcissism. What I am suggesting is learning to love and nurture yourself in a way that uplifts your emotional state and increases your confidence which, in turn, will increase your confidence in all areas of your life and project a positive frequency to the outside world.

It’s incredible how we can often desperately want love and acceptance from the very people who have hurt us the most. Albert Einstein said, “We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.” I will go further to say that the person who hurt you cannot heal you—only you (through the help and power of God) can heal you!

If someone hurt you, they need Jesus and obviously don’t know Him and aren’t following Him—“Where the Spirit of the Lord is present, there is freedom” (2 Corinthians 3:17). Freedom cannot exist when confusion, torment, hurt, and pain are dominant. We must forgive them and focus on getting healing and wholeness for ourselves while letting God do whatever He wants to do in the life of the other person. We don’t get to decide if they will straighten up and treat us right, but we can let go of our obsession of them and focus on loving and appreciating ourselves.

As defined by the clinical term of Dependency—aka Co-dependency or Self Love Deficit Disorder—some people are afraid to be alone because that means they have to be responsible for their own financial, physical, and spiritual wellbeing. Counting on another person to provide for these things or even your own happiness is very dangerous.  What another person gives to you, they can take away. If you give something to yourself, however, it’s yours as along as you exist.

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A key to loving yourself is actually liking yourself. You can only like a person if you spend time getting to know them. We can often be bombarded by our own thoughts and become used to our ways of talking and reacting, that we don’t even know that we are funny, charming, the life of the party, beautiful, etc. It helps when other people point these things out to get our attention, but even that isn’t necessary. Treating ourselves like we’re getting to know a new person is all it really takes.

“Be alone. Eat alone. Take yourself on dates. You will learn about yourself. You will grow. You will figure out what inspires you. You will curate your own dreams, your own beliefs, your own stunning clarity. And when you do meet the person who makes your cells dance, you will be sure of it because you will be sure of yourself,” instructed an Instagram meme attributed to Bianca Sparacino.

Stella had to go to Jamaica to get her groove back in the book How Stella Got Her Groove Back. Not all of us can afford such an extravagant trip, but you don’t need an island vacation nor a younger man to get your confidence back. In fact, those things are actually detrimental to the long-term survival of your confidence because they are outside things—real, lasting confidence is totally an inside job. Like the song says, “The world didn’t give it to me, and the world can’t take it away.” If you do the hard, internal work yourself, then no one can take the credit or take the confidence away.

People may come and go out of your life, but your core will not be destroyed because you will know without a shadow of a doubt that you are precious, worthy, and lovable. You will know that if you have been loved once, it can happen again and be even better than before!

You must also remember that you are deeply loved and cherished by the lover of your soul, Jesus. “It is a fact that many believers feel overwhelmed by the situations they face in life. In fact, they often feel so confused and weighed down that they wonder if God is still near to them. This is precisely why Paul adds (in Romans 8:38-39) that even life cannot separate a believer from the love of Jesus Christ,” wrote Rick Renner in Sparkling Gems from the Greek. Let’s take a look at how much you’re worth.

Do you want to get started on this (self) love train? This is just the introduction, but you can get the full e-book downloaded instantly to read on Kindle or any PDF reader.

Catch these first-run Write About It Wednesday blogs every Wednesday. If you want to know how to have successful relationships and peace of mind, you can get a free PDF sample chapter of “The Princess Guide to Healing a Broken Heart” by filling out the form in the sidebar on this page.

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How to heal a Valentine’s Day broken heart

I was grocery shopping the other day, and I was slapped in the face with Valentine’s Day items when I walked in every store … OK, so I wasn’t literally hit with the items, but it sure felt like it emotionally. My first thought (as I quickly got away from all of it) was, “Can’t we just skip Valentines this year?” Have you ever felt like that?

Now, I’m not as bad as the group of friends in the movie Valentine’s Day who gathered for the anti-Valentines party getting all their aggression and hurt feelings out by pounding a heart-shaped pinata with a baseball bat. I actually like celebrating the holiday, but the only time I’ve actually gotten to celebrate was when I was married. Seriously, when I was in the dating scene, guys would literally disappear during Christmas and Valentines then magically reappear like nothing ever happened. Something happened alright — my worth was attacked! By their actions, I was told that I wasn’t worth buying flowers or dinner for.

The truth is this: at some point in your life you have to learn to love yourself and do the things for yourself that you wish others would do for you.

If you have a Valentine’s Day broken heart, or are just alone and trying to figure out what you could do differently to have healthier relationships, now is the perfect time to learn new behaviors and make positive changes. The Princess Guide to Healing a Broken Heart is a great tool to help you do just that. Whether you’ve been heart from romantic relationships, family relationships, friend relationships, etc., this book can help you transform and heal yourself.

I discovered some really insightful things when researching and writing this book, the first one is that being alone is not a death sentence, nor is it something of which to fear.

In a 2016 New York Times OpEd piece on why people marry the wrong person, Book Author Alain de Botton gave some profound insight into loneliness and how it can cause us to make wrong decisions. “We make mistakes, too, because we are so lonely,” she explained. “No one can be in an optimal frame of mind to choose a partner when remaining single feels unbearable. We have to be wholly at peace with the prospect of many years of solitude in order to be appropriately picky; otherwise, we risk loving no longer being single rather more than we love the partner who spared us that fate.”

Another insight I gained during my research was that you really have to learn how to love yourself. I know some people who it seems to come naturally for them. I credit that to good parenting, but not all of us are so lucky. We have to work daily on knowing and loving ourselves. If we aren’t our biggest cheerleader and promoter, who else is going to be?

Let’s face it, people are human beings and they don’t always treat us the way they should. We have no control over their actions, but we can love and support ourselves first, then allow our significant others to be the icing on top.

If you’re having trouble getting started on the self-love thing, here are some ideas from The Princess Guide to Healing a Broken Heart:

One way to change your focus is to use affirmations. Reading these every day will begin to reprogram your brain and replace the negative tapes with positive ones. Life Coach Che Garman offers these suggestions to focus on daily:

  • “I allow love to find me easily and effortlessly.
  • I am cherished and valued.
  • I am loving and compassionate to myself and others.
  • I am surrounded by people who love me.
  • I am totally lovable, just the way I am.
  • I am willing to love myself unconditionally.
  • I am worthy of love, just as everyone else is.
  • I love the negative people in my life, and let them go on their way.
  • I radiate love and happiness wherever I go.
  • I receive all the love I need to feel cherished and appreciated.
  • Love and peace surrounds my life at all times.
  • My love life just keeps getting better and better.
  • My thoughts are always loving and truthful.
  • My true love is on his way to me.”

While reading these statements may feel strange, and it may even feel “wrong” to say these things out loud, you need to speak them into the atmosphere so that your ears can hear them and your brain can process them. The Bible tells us to call those things that are not as though they are (Romans 4:17). While it may feel like a lie or fake at first, the more you practice saying these things out loud to yourself, the sooner your heart and mind will change.

My hope for you is that you feel the love you long for. I believe that if you begin giving it to yourself first, you will attract it from others and you will be able to fully receive it and reciprocate it.

Catch these first-run Write About It Wednesday blogs every Wednesday. If you want to know more about the healing and transformation process, you can get a free PDF sample chapter of “The Princess Guide to Healing a Broken Heart” by filling out the form in the sidebar on this page.