Let Your Inner Love Shine

It’s February and love is in the air.

I’ve decided to focus on love this month – in my communications and in my thoughts and meditations and inspirations!

Won’t you join me?? Let’s have a LOVE IN!

“We cultivate love when we allow our most vulnerable and powerful selves to be deeply seen and known, and when we honor the spiritual connection that grows from that offering with trust, respect, kindness, and affection.” – Brené Brown

I had an experience recently during a meditation class I was taking where the leader led us through a guided meditation on love.

She got us in the right frame of mind – grounded and centered and relaxed. Then she asked us to imagine someone or something that we truly loved. To bring the person or animal or place to mind and focus there for 5 minutes, taking in every detail-and experiencing fully the feeling of love and appreciation we had inside us.

Then she asked us to remember a time when we felt fully loved and appreciated by someone.

It could have been a friend or a parent or a partner or a child. She asked us to focus in on that experience, taking in the full measure of that feeling and focusing there for the next 5 minutes.

Pure. Bliss.

I realized in that moment that I could feel love and loved all by myself.

I didn’t need anyone in the here and now to offer me that. I could conjure that up all on my own! Like magic.

Valentine’s Day can be a hard one for many people who don’t have a special someone in their lives right now…

But what if we focused on love all month?

What if we allowed ourselves to give in to that delicious feeling in the various forms and places that we find it? Sort of like gratitude but with a bit more juicy-ness.

There are so many times where I have experienced loving moments both big and small. I hold in my heart the times I looked into my husband’s sweet brown eyes and shared the love we had for our newborn baby. I remember the love I felt as I sat with my lifelong friends as we grieved the loss of our dear sister to cancer. I remember the love I felt for my loyal and faithful doggie as she gave me her wet-nosed, tail-wagging lip slurping welcome each morning.

I think back to the love I have always felt from my Mom as she tended us all in such sacrificial ways. I savor the unconditional love I experience as I sit in my pew at church and the words and hymns pour down their full measure of grace on my sometimes weary soul.

I’m going to be sharing on my Instagram and my Pinterest account this month the things and people and experiences I love with you. I invite you to do the same.

Share with me what brings that full- bodied experience of love in your life. Share with me your peeps, your pups, and the places that bring you joy!

Here’s to love in all it’s many forms and splendors!


Looking for a little more self-love skills, to quiet that inner critic a bit so you can let your own inner shine? Join me for the Rising Strong Island Retreat on Whidbey Island in April. Get all the details here »

Meet Cynthia Benge

A therapist for over 20 years, I guide people from their own “stuck” places to a life full of adventure, meaning and satisfying relationships.

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