Friends, shortly after I’d left my first spouse, I bought myself some flowers. I’d never done this before, had never even considered it. Flowers, I thought, were for other people. But once I’d bought myself some birds of paradise—I love those fiery flowers so much—I realized flowers are for all who love them. And that includes me.
This was the self-love that made that year the most transformative I’d known.
During these dark days, when the world around me seems to be falling apart, when my identity is attacked by people I’d thought were my friends, when my husband is attacked for being who he is, I do my very best to remember romance. Not just the books that I read, which whisk me off into the world of stories, but also the things I put around me, the places I go, the music I play, and perhaps most importantly, the things I say to myself. Looking in the mirror, (this is a technique I learned from Louise Hay) I tell my own reflection, “You’re wonderful, Brit. I love you so much. I love how you try. I love how authentic you are. I love how you’re growing.”
I do this because romance is for all of us who want it, whether or not we’re partnered, whether or not we’re romance readers. Romance isn’t a person, place or thing—or at least, it doesn’t have to be. Romance is inside us. Romance starts with us.
Romancey Pants 