A trending topic in "spiritual social media" is self love. While essential and wise, the concept of what it means to truly love one's self is as elusive to many clients I work with each week as it has always been to me. But what the dark has already begun to teach me is that nurture is a beautiful opening towards understanding how to love ourselves. Sitting in stillness, in the silence of a room in my home, a blackout mask removing any distractions from the world around me, I find that the mind wants to go first to fear, then to wandering, sometimes frustration, then boredom, then nurture. I think (and I've heard from past retreatants) after a constant 7 days of this it will land on love. One reason I've found the conceptualization of self love to be so elusive is that the feeling of being loved is tailored specifically to each of us. No one can explain what it really means to love ourselves, nor can they help us understand how to do it, because no one knows what each unique person needs to start doing, stop doing, think, feel or become to be more loving to themselves. Only I can discover this for myself. Only you can discover this for yourself. Only we can unearth what truly loving ourselves means to each and every one of us, uniquely.

The love that is here for each and every one of us is more plentiful than oxygen. Each of us gets the full amount unless we have some kind of ego impairment which impedes us from receiving our full share. Imagine that the entire world is a blank canvas, upon which the Divine is attempting to paint pure love.  When we refuse to accept all the love intended for us, we leave our little spot on the canvas a glaring blank void.