Self-love is a word we hear a lot these days, and for good reason. But what does it really mean to work with a self-love coach? And what can you expect from a self-love course? I share my experience of Release your Radiance, a self-love course facilitated by the incredible coach Sabi Kerr.
The importance of self-love
I think people often forget the true meaning of self-love and why it’s so important. It’s not about being egotistical. It’s deep inner work and it really is the cornerstone to living a fulfilling life. So what is real self-love?
It is about having self-respect and knowing what you deserve. Why should you put up with bad behaviour from anyone?
It’s honouring your needs and realising when you need to take time out for yourself. You can’t be in service to everyone else all the time and not take care of your needs too.
It’s knowing that you are already deeply worthy of everything you desire, instead of feeling like you are not enough.
It’s learning to accept all of your shadows and being compassionate with yourself even when you make mistakes, because you’re human at the end of the day.
It’s about prioritising time daily to practise self-care and look after yourself, mentally, physically and spiritually.
It’s saying no to things that you really don’t want to do because you value your time.
It’s about getting to know every inch of your being and loving all of you because you are unique and there is no one else like you.
What is Release your Radiance and why did I do the course?
Release your Radiance is an 8-week programme led by self-love coach Sabi Kerr aimed at awakening your inner Goddess. I’ve been on my own self-love journey for a couple of years now but I knew I was only scratching the surface. All of the stuff above - I did hardly any of it a couple of years ago. I put up with bad behaviour from others and had very weak boundaries. I felt unworthy. I felt ashamed of my shadows and didn’t want to face parts of my being. I said yes to everything because I was more concerned with people pleasing rather than honouring what I wanted to do. I would often speak negatively to myself and want to change certain parts of my body.
Although I’ve come a long way and have finally learnt how to start putting myself first and feeling more comfortable in my own skin, I know I still have a long way to go. This is why I decided to join Sabi’s course. I didn’t think too much into it, I just had an inner knowing that this course was what I needed. Plus I loved Sabi’s energy. She embodies qualities I want to possess myself - confidence, a pure joy and love of life, and living life to the beat of her own drum. Who better to be guided by! And with the added bonus of being supported by a group of women all on a similar mission cheering each other on. I didn’t fully know what to expect when I signed up, but I had a feeling it would be expansive.
What did the course cover?
The course took place over 8 weeks, with a mixture of pre-recorded sessions, live group calls and homework consisting of self-love practices, journaling prompts and meditations. Each week covered a different topic, which started with doing the inner work around limiting beliefs, relationships and learning to listen to your heart. Self-love work always starts with looking inwards first. But that’s not to say we didn’t get to have fun with it too. After week 4 we started to really tap into our feminine fire, our creativity and our passions. When I started the course I was embarking on a new chapter in my life but was still full of self doubt. This course came at the perfect time, even though at the time of signing up I didn’t know the life changes that lay in store for me (I’m sure the universe knew though!)
Here’s a quick overview of the topics we covered each week:
Worthiness
Any self-love works starts with understanding that you are worthy. And this simply means knowing that you deserve respect, love and acceptance and don’t need to prove yourself to anyone. This also includes treating yourself with respect, love and acceptance. This is the basis for all self-love work. We started the course by setting intentions and starting to cultivate these feelings of worthiness.
Letting go of limiting beliefs
Most of us are plagued by limiting beliefs. They are stories we tell ourselves that end up restricting us in some way. For example, one of mine was ‘I can’t make money from doing something I love.’ I’ve grown up believing that if I’m going to be successful in life I need to do a job that pays well but doesn’t necessarily bring me a lot of joy. This belief massively restricted me from really going after what I wanted. During this week we worked on identifying what our limiting beliefs were, where they came from and how we can reframe them to something more empowering.
Healing your relationships
This is self-love work, so why focus on relationships and other people? The truth is our relationships are integral to our healing and self-love journey. Many of us will hold on to hurts from previous relationships, whether that’s romantic, parents or friends. We may have been treated badly and therefore felt not good enough or unworthy of love. Or perhaps it was us that did something to hurt someone else and we haven’t been able to forgive ourselves. This week we really delved into who and what we need to forgive, what we need to let go of and also become self-aware of the role we have played in relationships. Because self-love work is also just as much about owning our own shadows.
Listening to your heart and expressing your truth
Learning to really listen to our heart and body is difficult. We are so conditioned to let our minds run the show, but our minds are conditioned by external influences. This week we really focused on tapping into bodily sensations and listening to our intuition rather than our ego. It’s important to learn what your heart really desires, and be confident enough to express this without fear of judgement. The main question this week was ‘What do I really want?’ Not what society has told me to want.
Tapping into your feminine fire
Ah this week was fun! It’s all about tapping into our sexy, sensual nature through practices such as dance and mirror/camera work. As women we are told to suppress this side of us, that it’s not safe to be sexy, or it’s simply just attention seeking. There’s also the very real fear of being judged - by both men and women, but especially by other women. But women are sexual beings, and we should be allowed to express it. I think the main reason women will judge others is because they wish they could express themselves as freely too. So be their inspiration! Keeping any part of us hidden is detrimental to our wellbeing, including our sexuality. I also want to highlight here that me expressing my sexuality was very much for me. Giving myself permission to explore that side of me out of curiosity and love for myself. It was never for the approval from others.
Manifesting
Self-love plays a huge role in your ability to manifest. You become a magnet for what you embody and you need to believe you are worthy of all of your desires. After weeks of cultivating self-love, this week we could start to focus on our manifestations and what we really want to call in. And this includes already being in the energy of what you are calling in. As an example, I want to manifest a life where I have freedom to spend my days as I wish, full of joy and connection, so each day I am focusing on doing something that brings me joy and putting myself in new situations where I am building connections with others. I am already stepping into the energy and therefore that is what I will attract more of.
Getting creative
The more you step into self-love and radiance, the more you feel called to share with the world. You start to believe that what you have to share is important. This could be through any means you wish, there are no rules. Creativity brings so much joy, and everybody has the ability to be creative. So many people disengage from their creativity if it doesn’t make them money, but how about doing it for the pure joy it brings. This week we started to remember all the things we used to do for fun when we were younger, and all the things we would love to try. We then took ourselves on a creative date, which for me was to focus on starting my photography project. It felt amazing to carve time out to be creative. Isn’t this one of the best things about being human? To get to be creative, have fun and do things just for JOY and not purely for survival.
The path to passion
After 8 weeks of focusing on self-love you really start to believe that you are capable of anything, and now is the time to think about what your passions are and what your new path could look like. I believe living a life of purpose is the ultimate goal as a human being. I’m sure most people reading this will have asked themselves ‘Why am I here?’ What a gift it is to find your purpose in this life. This is a much easier question to answer when you’ve started to really learn to love yourself and listen to your heart. We all have magic in us, we’re all here for a reason, and once you’ve cultivated self-love you’ll really start to tap into what that is and believe it too.
What shifts did I see?
I know this course will be the gift that keeps on giving. Throughout the 8 weeks there were a couple of BIG shifts, and lots of small subtle ones. Most shifts will play out over time. We’ve been conditioned over our lifetimes to think and act a certain way, and it certainly won’t all change within 8 weeks. But that’s not to say I’m not already seeing the benefits. Some of my main ones are:
My creativity is flowing! I used to get stunted in my creativity through fear of judgement, the need to be perfect, afraid to share my voice etc. But through practicing self-love I feel confident sharing my work. It doesn’t need to be perfect, it just needs to be authentically me. And since I’ve taken all those pressures off, the creativity comes so much more freely.
I am so much more in touch with my sexuality. But it has nothing to do with my partner or sex. It's how I feel about myself and remembering that my sexuality is for me too and not about pleasing anyone else. It’s remembering the power I have as a woman. All of this was so liberating.
I’ve identified many limiting beliefs and they don’t have such a hold over me anymore. I’m already rewiring my brain to more positive, empowering thoughts.
I’m loosening my grip on life and learning to lean into whatever lies in store for me. We can’t control life, it’s a complete illusion that any of us have any control. But I trust myself to handle whatever is coming my way and that allows me to flow through life so much easier. Trusting myself has been a big one for me.
I feel so much more sure of my path. It’s not set in stone, but it doesn’t have to be. Like I said before, you can’t control life. But I know my passions, I know the kind of life I want to live and I know I want to help others. The rest is just minor details that will work themselves out.
I really enjoyed Sabi’s course. It helped me being guided through each of these topics by someone who embodies self-love and knows what the hell she is talking about. Even if you don’t enrol on the next course I would recommend following Sabi. She shows women there’s a way to be sexy, soft, playful, passionate, caring, strong. I know there’s more I’m going to gain from this course as time goes on, but I’m already loving how much is shifting for me. There’s no work like self-love work, trust me! If you want to know anything else about the course please feel free to ask me 🙂
If you want to read more about Sabi's work, visit her website here.