Can you feel the love?
And embodiment practices to experience more.
Ahhh, Valentine’s day. A day of love. Love of all kinds!
Moving through Valentine’s day in the online sphere, I noticed two core narratives: appreciating the people you love and focusing on loving yourself. I love that Valentine’s Day has evolved from just couples and romance and flowers and expensive jewelry — it’s like we found our roots in love again. Love of all kinds.
And this really got me thinking (as most things do — triple-ruled by Mercury over here!).
Love is experienced! When people do lovely things for us (external representations of their inner love), we experience love within us. We actually generate it ourselves, yet it can be sparked externally.
I’ll say this again in another way:
Love is an internal experience that’s shared as an external experience.
So really, others can ignite feelings of love, but it’s you that actually creates them.
And the same goes for a lack of love. When you’ve been hurt or traumatized, you’ve learned to protect yourself by turning down the dial on your inner capacity to experience love, so as not to get hurt again. And the less love you experience, the less you feel as though you belong. It feels isolating, lonely, and painful to experience this, right?
A lot of my clients come to me with similar issues:
They want to experience more love from others yet have a hard time experiencing love for themselves.
They feel like they don’t belong yet yearn for more connection.
They’re surrounded by people they love yet feel unworthy of it.
Sound familiar?
It all comes back to this core idea: we seek love outside ourselves when it’s really an internal experience that we open or close ourselves to.
The more you experience love, the more love you experience.
So let’s take this to ~science~ shall we?
Everyone and their dog has heard of it: Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs.
Yet, today I looked at that triangle a little differently when I was drafting this post. Take a gander at what I saw:
Love & belonging are placed together, RIGHT in the middle of the pyramid.
They’re holding down the fort between the basic needs (physiological & safety) and fulfillment needs (self-esteem & self-actualization).
Love & belonging is the bridge between your deeper roots and your expansive bloom.
If you experience a lack of love or a lack of belonging, it’ll be MUCH harder for you to bloom and experience self-esteem & self-actualization.
If you focus too much on this lack, you’re also likely going to find it harder to meet your basic needs too.
And this perspective, this belief that you lack love or belonging, is it true? Do you really not belong? Do you really not experience love?
Because if you take a step back… you always belong to SOMETHING. You belong to yourself. You belong to your friends and family (blood or chosen). You belong to nature, to this Earth, to all of creation.
But if you ignore this, if you focus too much on how you don’t belong, your experience of love will lessen. Have you felt this before?
And if you’re a human like me, what you really crave is MORE love and MORE belonging.
And to experience more love and more belonging, you need to remember that you are the one creating that feeling within.
Find evidence of love.
Find evidence of belonging.
Practice generating those feelings and creating those experiences within you.
I guarantee that you’ll attract experiences that help you feel it even MORE.
And from this love & belonging it’ll produce a trickle-down effect on your physiological & security needs, where you’ll feel more secure within yourself and your life, better able to meet your deepest needs. And it’ll also have a rising-up effect on your self-esteem & self-actualization needs, where you’ll feel yourself expand and feel more fulfilled by your life.
And your roots grow stronger.
And your bloom opens wider.
And then you just are:
Love.
WAYS TO EXPERIENCE MORE LOVE
Feel it in there: There are certain emotions that are generated by the heart space like gratitude, compassion, care, and appreciation. Each day, choose one of those emotions and for a few minutes, generate that feeling within you. Breathe into that feeling, and let it expand, focusing on the experience of the sensation.
Write it out: Writing is a form of embodiment too, it’s the embodied act of turning internal thoughts and feelings into physical form (letters on a page), which you can step back & take in (much harder to do with your internal world). Each week, write down all of the things you love about yourself and your life, things you’re grateful for, things you’re looking forward to. Notice how you feel in your body (especially your heart) as you do this.
Make it art: Creativity itself is an embodiment of love, from what I’ve learned & experienced for myself! Make a piece of art all about love. Whether it’s a poem, a drawing or painting, a dance, or whatever form your creativity takes, create the embodiment of YOUR experience with love.
Notice them: The next time you’re with someone you love, intentionally notice all the things you love about them as they chat with you. Perhaps you notice their smile or the way their eyes light up when they say certain things. Perhaps you reflect on amazing memories you’ve shared or how it feels to be with them in this moment. Take in their full self through the lens of love, and once again really, really notice the sensation of love in your body.
Nature time: Take a walk outside. As if you haven’t heard that advice before! But really, go outside and take in the trees, the sky, the air, the sun, the ground. Look around and notice which planets or animals you’re drawn to. Pay attention to the parts of being outside you love most and focus in on that. Be with nature in the most loving & attentive way.
As you can tell, all of these practices will help you build the experience of love within you — at first it might feel awkward or try-hard, but overtime it’ll feel so much more natural. And one day you’ll likely be experiencing more love without you even having to try. You’ll just BE in the frequency of love.
And the more you’re in the frequency of love, the more you’ll feel a sense of belonging — belonging to yourself, to your friends and family, to nature, to this Earth, and to all of creation.
You belong, because you are love.
Share these practices with a friend to spread the love!
I hope this post ignited some feelings of love within you! In fact, as I was creating this, I checked off practices 1, 2, and 3! My internal love mechanisms at work to ignite yours.
Wishing you a lovely week! See you at the Full Moon.
Until next time…
With love,
Bry
Your Witchy Healer Friend
www.brythehealer.com / @brythehealer
For more personalized and in-depth support on your journey of self-discovery, check out my 1:1 offerings that weave Soul Guidance, MindBody Healing, and Astrology to help you root deep and bloom wide.
Loved this! Some studies suggest that Maslow got it wrong, and that love and belonging actually belong at the base of the triangle, underneath/before physiological needs. I believe it <3