Are you being loving toward yourself? Really? Here is a good way to tell: when you are kind and loving toward yourself, your home is organized, clean, beautiful and filled with love, naturally. What do you see where you live? Some people believe that your home reflects who you are – but it doesn’t! Your home can reflect your taste, your personality, or your current circumstances, but it does not reflect who you truly are.  It couldn’t possibly. You are so much more than your home.

Your home tells you a lot, though, about how you are and how well you are taking care of yourself. It’s simply not possible to be truly kind to yourself and live in other than order, beauty and “good energy.” So it should be easy, right? Think happy thoughts and poof! your home is perfect! Here’s the challenge: knowing that self-love matters does not make it suddenly happen. Living from love requires learning and practice.

So, what is it to love yourself at home? Reading a novel? Taking a bubble bath? Getting new bedding? Possibly, at times, but what you “do” at home is only one piece. Love begins with your thoughts. Does your home reflect thoughts of “I am out of control. What happened to my life?” or does it hold the energy of “I am a powerful, creative delighting in the details of my life.”

Self-love is a way of being that inspires what you do. Here are three things you can “be” to bring more love into your home:

1. Be gentle with your thoughts. Notice discouraging thoughts at home, and change them to ones that feel better. You might be shocked to notice the self-criticism you’ve been heaping on yourself without even realizing it. Be gentle with yourself, one thought at a time, beginning at home.
2. Be aware and active. Take a few minutes every day to clear up low-level clutter at home, especially in areas of self-care such as bathroom, kitchen and bedroom.  Set a timer for five minutes and go! Return things to cupboards, wipe surfaces clean, toss papers, put clothes and shoes away. Several times a day of this will “raise the bar” energetically in your home and pretty soon you will no longer be able to tolerate clutter! Love flows better when the path is clear!
3. Be welcoming of help. Get help with cleaning, even if you live in a small space. Unless you have large chunks of time and energy to dedicate to cleaning your home every week, you are living in more dirt than is emotionally and physically healthy for you. Scrutinize your budget to make it work, even once a month. If you already have a cleaner, look for what might be getting missed – there will be something! A sparkling home is good for the soul.

Loving yourself begins with your thoughts and flows into the active details of life at home.

You can learn lots more about loving yourself, beginning at home, in the award-winning book HouseHeal: Transform Your Life through the Power of Home, available through Amazon.

Sara Brown Crowder, B.A. is the founder and principal of HouseHeal and the award-winning author of HouseHeal: Transform Your Life through the Power of Home. Find out more at www.househeal.com.