My deepest lessons in self-love came during a particularly challenging period in my personal life. During a painful relationship transition, I found myself abandoning all the practices that had been supporting me. I was checking my phone constantly hoping for messages, ruminating about conversations for hours, skipping meals, and barely sleeping.

What transformed this pattern was creating what I now call my “self-love emergency protocol”—a simple list of non-negotiable practices that I committed to maintaining even when my heart felt broken. For me, these were: morning sunlight exposure (even just 5 minutes), a brief grounding practice with my feet on the earth, and setting boundaries around how often I would check my phone.

I placed reminders where I’d see them when emotionally distressed—a note on my phone that simply said “Breathe first,” an alarm that reminded me to eat regular meals, a post-it on my bathroom mirror that asked “What would you tell a friend in this situation?”

What surprised me was how these simple practices created small islands of calm in the emotional storm. They didn’t take away the pain, but they provided moments of presence that prevented me from being completely swept away. I learned that self-love isn’t about avoiding difficult emotions—it’s about creating a compassionate container to hold them while maintaining basic self-care.

These weren’t elaborate practices, but they created crucial moments of pause during one of my most challenging times. They reminded me that self-love isn’t something we practice only when it’s convenient—it’s most essential precisely when it feels hardest to maintain.