Valentine’s Day: Celebrating The Love Of You. Be Your Own Valentine Everyday This Year.

By the time I was a mother, I had not even completed the process of becoming a woman first. I didn’t know who I was, what I was, what made me the way I was, or who I wanted to become or not become. I was simply a list of particles floating around, trying to find a wholeness that I often looked for in everyone else except myself.  I was not enough for me and so I thought that a great love could give me answers, complete me, and fulfill me in a way that would make me feel just as grown as I thought I was. I was a kid, with a kid. No grown adult could tell me that I wasn’t grown.

I was 19 and that legally made me an adult. I was a broken one but one nonetheless. I knew everything; which in hindsight meant I knew very little. At the time, I didn’t realize that I was broken. One has to know what feeling whole is like before they can realize they are broken. Wholeness for me was an abstract concept that wasn’t real because I had no frame of reference to that state of being, wholeness. In a way, we all feel broken at some point; and quite often the source of that brokenness comes from either loving someone more than we love ourselves or never getting the love we so deparately wanted or knew we deserved.

February is often known as the “mother of love” because of Valentine’s Day. Candies, chocolate, flowers, gifts, and cards often fill our hearts with validations that someone loves us and thinks that we are special. We watch, wait for, hope, and sometimes envy those whose loved ones have showered them with gifts, showing others how much they care while showing some how little they do. Some people hate Valentine’s Day more than any other holiday because it either reminds them of the great love they don’t have, love they have lost, or simply love that they have not been lucky enough to discover. In the words of Scrooge, “Ba humbug”.

This Valentine’s Day I want to challenge you to celebrate the greatest love of all.  In the words of Whitney Houston, “Learning to love yourself it is the greatest love of all”.  Allow yourself to love you this Valentine’s Day. If you are sharing the day with someone, then love both you and them. Don’t pick them over youself and most importantly, don’t let their love for you be more important to you than the love you have for yourself. If you are spending it alone, then embrace the things that you are certain of, the things you haven’t compromised, and celebrate loving yourself enough to not just settle to prevent being alone on Valentine’s Day.

There was a time when I hated being asked the question, “Why are you single?” Now I only answer, “No one has given me a convincing enough reason not to be.”  This is a far stretch from the responses I use to give.  I used to feel like I had an emotional fanny pack that I would issue justifications as to why I no longer wanted to settle, negotiate my non-negotiables, and worst of all wake up next to someone I knew I was settling for. At times, we crave the love of someone so much, we neglect the most important relationship that is the cornerstone of any successful relationship. That is the relationship with ourselves.

“If you are not able to understand who you are, what you want, what you need, what you deserve, what makes you a better person, or what makes you, then you may not necessarily be in a position to love or to be loved in the context of a relationship. If you are just a part of your best self, you may never get your whole best love. Being just a part of your best you may limit your options.  Without your whole self, you may not have the right tools in place to measure, decipher, weigh, or accurately determine if what you are getting is what you need or just what you are getting”.

As you think and reflect this month on love, past lovers, future possibilities, and soul mates, take some time to nourish your soul, love yourself, and learn from your reflections.  Lessons of the past can be used as an opportunity to prepare you for future desires, needs, and wants. Use your reflections in your pursuit of finding someone who adds to you, not someone who completes you.  This year be your own Valentine, not just in February but every day of the year.  “Happy Valentine’s Day” from your greatest love; you.

D’annie Grandison is an author and practicing life enhancement specialist who is available for sessions, speaking engagements, and consultations. Contact her via email at danniegrandison@gmail.com or via phone at 1.888.988.8331.

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Twenty4Seven Magazine Twenty4Seven Magazine is a monthly digital and quarterly print publication founded in 2009. Though we cover a little bit of everything, our primary focus is urban entertainment and lifestyle.

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