Love is actually all around.

Feb 14

Written By Kellie Fuller Strengths Coaching

It’s Valentine’s week, so of course, this month’s blog post will be about love! Each section will give you a resource to dig in further. Let’s get right to it.

Love and Self

Self-love and self-care are not the same. You can take care of yourself in many different ways, but it doesn’t equate to self-love. It’s related to self-esteem and self-compassion.

When you have a strong sense of self-love, you understand your value and treat yourself lovingly. Many studies suggest that we need self-love to take action, take chances, and take on new opportunities.

Self-love can boost your well-being, both mentally and physically. Yet, it is often something we neglect to focus on. Why is it so much…um…easier? beneficial? acceptable?...whatever the word you choose…to focus on others and the work we do instead of ourselves? The reality is that increased self-love leads to better relationships (and boundaries!) with the rest of the world.

Forbes Health recently posted a great article about the benefit of self-love and ways to cultivate it. Check it out…for you and nobody but YOU!

Love and Others

When I first decided on love as a theme, I promised myself I would finally read “The Five Love Languages.” I started it. I did not finish it yet. Not because I wasn’t enjoying the book. I just ran out of time. I know that my love language is words of affirmation and that it is the same whether I am giving or receiving love. With as much conviction, I know that words of affirmation is NOT my husband’s love language.

Relationships grow as we understand each other. Understanding each other develops a sense of closeness and allows us to have curiosity and grace for our similarities and differences. This is one of the reasons that I LOVE LOVE LOVE the CliftonStrengths assessment. (Loving an assessment tool that cannot love me back is not included in this blog!). We often think of CliftonStrengths in a work or professional sense. Just like Alanis Morrisette, I’m here to remind you it isn’t just a professional thang!

Romantic love: “My top three strengths are Activator, Maximizer, and Strategic. I always want to act on my ideas and can come up with a strategy quickly. My husband is Adaptive and Context. His decision-making is much more deliberative. Knowing all the above helped us to adjust to each other's decision-making processes and to respect each other's ways of approaching tasks. We both feel this has really strengthened our marriage.” - LP
Familial love: “Knowing my family's CliftonStrengths has brought us closer together. We can have conversations about our needs in a very open way. It's also given us a fun way to talk about how we operate and interpret each other by talking about strengths we wish were higher on our lists. It's given me a lot more new and helpful insight into these people who I've known and been close with my whole life.” - TW

How do you foster the different relationships you have in your life? Sign in to access and read your “Insight Guide Report,” and then use this worksheet to identify how you connect with others. Ask people how they connect with you.

Love and Work

While not finishing the book mentioned above, I have been digging into “Love + Work” by Marcus Buckingham. I am completing the six-part comprehensive learning series offered by Buckingham and Harvard Business Review. I’m not here to sell the book, but I do think it is a great, thought-provoking read. The class is self-paced. Give it a try!

“Love, the most powerful of human emotions, the source of all creativity, collaboration, insight, and excellence, has been systematically drained from our lives – our work, teams, and classrooms. It’s time we brought love back in. Love + Work shows you how.” - book excerpt.