Love, love, love

When I led a cancer support group a few years ago, I opened the Valentine week meeting with the question: Are you having an affair?

People shuffled their feet and squirmed a bit in their seats, not quite sure where the topic was going and what they had gotten in to.

I went on to show why it was important for them to have the most wonderful love affair of all- with themselves. Especially when we're focused so deeply on healing-we need a lot of love.

So I ask the same question of you today: are you having a wonderful love affair with yourself?

There is so much public pressure around Valentine's day for loved ones to 'perform for the public': will flowers show up at work just like all the other girls have? Will dinner out be special and not a trip through the drive-thru at McDonald's? As if that is what true love is all about!

When we grieve we most certainly need to be extra good to ourselves, recognizing the wide variety of emotions that are swirling around us. So I encourage you to let this Valentine's day be the beginning of a renewed commitment to yourself to love yourself.

You might even want to send yourself a Valentine!