“I Am Worth Loving Too” Challenge

My friend Kevin from Voices of Glass has inspired his fellow bloggers with another Challenge, and while I usually choose to avoid the Challenge suggestions that float around the blogosphere, this one appealed to me.

Remember cassette tapes, and recording your own mix of favourites?  True love was about making a tape for your beloved.  Ahhhh!

But back to reality, Kevin suggests that it time to look at how we see and treat ourselves?  How do we treat ourselves  especially in our times of need?   Actually I completely agree with him.  After years of ignoring the whole idea of looking after myself, because I thought stupidly thought it was selfish and vain, I’m learning fast that actually I deserve some love and care from me too.  So here’s how it works (straight from Kevin’s blog):

“Get a pen and paper (or pull up a blank word file on your computer) and compile a lit of songs which remind you how loved you are and/or remind you that you are worth loving.

They should be songs that mean something to you and my advice is to aim for about 10-12 songs.

Once you have written your list or lists set about finding and obtaining those songs.

Once you have them all, burn yourself a CD or set up a playlist on your music player, that you can use any time you are feeling down or lacking in self-worth and need some encouragement.

And how about sharing the fact that you have taken up this challenge on your blog and sharing your list with others.  You can even share why certain songs mean so much to you.  Oh and feel free to link back here so that I can check out your songs too.”

Great idea.  I love music and while I used to participate, via voice and flute, now I just listen.  Music means a lot to me because it often expresses things that I can’t find the words to say.  While I love music I admit I’m not someone who has music on all the time as background.  It just becomes noise to me, and being ‘slightly challenged’ in the hearing department, it actually prevents me from hearing other things going on.  So when I have music on, it is to listen to.

I’ve made my playlist (see below).  I couldn’t quite decide when it came to narrowing it down, so I’ve exceeded Kevin’s suggested limit by going to 14.  But hey, rules were made to be broken. 😀

How have I chosen these songs?  Well, they’re not my favourites, although my current favourite is included (I’m not disclosing which it is, but feel free to take a guess).  For lots of different reasons, including the music, the words, the memories, the feel, the people the song reminds me of,  and my mood at the time I was putting it together…  these songs are my ‘feel good’ songs.  They remind me it’s actually okay to feel good, and head me in that direction.  Simply put, listening to them is a way to look after me.

If you read A Late Entry… Music (Passions Profile Challenge #3) you’ll know that music is one of the things I am passionate about.  I have a wide range of tastes, and this list doesn’t completely capture the diversity of my tastes.  As I’ve said before I love music from my country so  there are a couple of kiwi musicians in there on the list.  Have a listen.  I hope they leave you feeling good too.

The magic 14 are:

Louis Armstrong – What a wonderful world

Marc Cohn – Walking In Memphis

Van Morrison – These Are The Days

Celtic Woman – Pie Jesu

Tiki Taane – Over The Rainbow

Finn Brothers – Nothing Wrong With You

John Lennon – Woman

Eric Clapton – You Look Wonderful Tonight

Cher – You Haven’t Seen The Last Of Me By

Lou Reed – Perfect Day

Tiki Taane  – Always On My Mind

Joshua Kadison – Jessie

Pink Floyd – Wish You Were Here

Aaron Neville – Ave Maria

♦

“Music expresses that which cannot be said and on which it is impossible to be silent.”

― Victor Hugo

♦

“And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.” 

―    Friedrich Nietzsche

Related articles

• A Late Entry… Music (Passions Profile Challenge #3) (infinitesadnessorhope.wordpress.com)
• Launching The “I Am Worth Loving Too!” Challenge (voicesofglass.com)