****Please note: This movement  may have started on September 1, but it is ongoing and you may join at any time. Simply begin commenting on the daily 30 days posts or comment below that you're interested and I'll add you to the contact list so you can get daily emails with a link to the post, as well as any other correspondence. I look forward to working with you to promote a positive environment in the blogosphere and beyond. 🙂

CHECK OUT THE ANNOUNCEMENT if you haven’t already!! That is the main post that shares what I have planned for September (and hopefully beyond) on my blog. This short post strictly serves as the “sign-up” for those interested in joining the 30 days of self reflection. Participating in this challenge of sorts requires only 3 simple steps.

1. Comment on this post letting me know of your interest. Please do this! It will help me know who is involved and be able to more easily reach those participating if needed. Plus, it will be a form of investment in yourself and let us all know who plans to support each other. You don’t HAVE to comment here to be able to comment on reflection posts, but I would appreciate knowing who plans to participate or is participating.

2. For each of the 30 days, take about 5 minutes to reflect on the daily topic. I will send out a monthly schedule of the topics to those who comment on this post so if you are unable to read the blog you can still experience the peace of the reflection.

3. Comment on as many posts as possible to share your insights/experiences and uplift others. I don’t expect everyone involving themselves in this to have the time to read and comment on every single morning post. I don’t want this to become a “to-do” in peoples’ lives. I want there to be more focus on taking the few minutes for reflection over anything else. However, participating with comments helps you to declare the affirmations and something about having them in writing makes it feel more real. Also, I’m hoping for this to continue in future months and plan to include thoughts/quotes from other bloggers in future reflection posts.

Peter & I spent a few hours creating a button for this movement of self reflection. If you believe this can help others as much as I do, I would be truly honored if you would include it on the sidebar of your blog.

To do so…simply copy the code from the textbox below and paste in a text widget for your sidebar. Let me know if you put the button on your site. I’ll be sure to check it out and give you a special shout out. 🙂

<a href="http://www.faithfitnessfun.com/?page_id=3454"><img src="http://www.faithfitnessfun.com/challengebutton.png" /></a>

ARE YOU IN?

**You can join whenever – before September, right at the start, or anytime during the month. This post’s comments will remain open for people to share their participation.

I think I have alluded to the things going through my head and what I’ve been planning out (with God’s help) enough. Now it’s time to officially get this show on the road. I’m admittedly nervous. Okay…make that very, very nervous. Why? Because I care about this A LOT. It has been put on my heart for awhile now to do something to bring us closer to fully loving ourselves. Self- love is such a difficult thing for many to grasp and truly believe. I’m still a work in progress and always will be. However, I know I have made tremendous strides in past years. A lot of that came from participating in what I am about to propose here. Bear with me as I go through a bit of background and then get to the nitty gritty details. Kay?

The Background
Many of you know, I struggled with binge eating in my past. I can vividly recall times driving home from work where I would stop at the store to pick something up to shove down my throat to hide other emotions and a strong feeling of worthlessness in the process. Or staying home “sick” from work to have a day to just wallow with food. I hid it for years. From early 2004 until the very end of 2007. I can recall my first binge in detail as well as my last one before recovery.

How did recovery happen for me? I stopped expecting to just be able to suddenly make that change and finally decided to take a long hard look at myself. I took time every morning to reflect on things about life and how to appreciate myself more fully. For me, this time was prayer to God, but I also believe any personal reflection would have helped in the process to save me from myself. Even after conceiving little M, which solidified my efforts in becoming binge-free, I depended on that personal reflection. Lately, wonderful friends – from church, from everyday life, from blogs (LISA!!) – have mentioned time and time again how my decision to use prayer and self reflection to overcome my personal image issues also helped them. My original thinking was simply, “Cool! I’m glad it helped”. Then, in no other way to describe it besides God working through me, I couldn’t deny that I could share this in a more widespread manner. So here comes the details…as short and pain-free as possible. I know this post is uber-long.

What: 30 Days of Reflection for Self-Love

Who: Anyone!! Literally – pass this along to whoever. Share it on your blog or with people outside of the blogosphere. Everyone can participate. This is NOT a prayer or Christian only cause. It is for every person who wants to take time to love him or herself and gain a new perspective on their value. Call it prayer, meditation, self reflection, quiet time…whatever. It is for EVERYBODY!

Where: Here on Faith, Fitness, Fun with a very short post published every morning with the brief message to reflect on each day.

When: I will begin the daily reflection posts on September 1 and they will continue for the 30 days of the month of September. Take literally 5 minutes sometime throughout each day to reflect on the topic.

Why: To help us all learn to love ourselves more and to uplift one another in the process. To begin to realize our true beauty and value. To battle the inner dialogue that strives to bring us down.

I fought taking this step. Purely out of fear. That no one will care. That no one will see the point. That no one will participate. Then, I came to the realization, it doesn’t matter how many this helps. It matters if it helps just one person understand their worth more. I trust God to reach who He wants to reach. And I pray that you fabulous ladies help support this. If you know you want to participate and feel like this can reach others the same way I believe, look for a special (SHORT) post in the morning strictly for stating your interest. It’s not a huge commitment, but could be one very worth each of our while. Let’s do this together - sharing a community of love and recognizing just how wonderful each of us are!