On this Valentine’s Day- commit. Commit to yourself. Commit to all of yourself. Not only the shiny parts you present to the world, but the parts you struggle to accept and embrace about yourself. The parts you want someone to see, smile and say “I love that about you” all while you are grimacing and anticipating them to run away.

Commit to not numbing yourself. Feel. Everything. Be with your emotions in the present. Fully.

Life tricks you to put up a wall. It coaxes you behind the wall because it will be safe from emotional battle blows. It tells you “If you never want to feel this again, then come here.”

If you fight your emotions, you will fight against loving and committing to yourself. One day, you will wake up and you won’t feel anything and, yes, you will be safe. But your life is not meant to be safe. You were meant to live boldly.

Acknowledge your fears, hopes, dreams, hurt, desires…and then own them. All of it is beautiful because it is a part of you.

Give yourself permission to just be.

Lay on your bed and listen to Bon Iver for hours.

Put on that dress and wear it around the house just because.

Write. Doodle. Sing.

Go wander into a new crevice of your neighborhood and discover a beautiful house you didn’t know existed.

Just be.

Today and from this day forth, commit to yourself and believe you are radiant, irreplaceable and unstoppable.

Happy Valentine’s Day.