Tradition & St. Valentine’s gifts

With Christmas, a distant memory, and valentines day coming up fast, the thought of presents, jewellery, what people expect as gifts, and what gifts mean to us individually comes up frequently.

Thru an amazingly complicated series of errors, my shopping cart on this website was not available for holiday shopping, even though I signed with a company to produce it (just specifically the SHOPPING CART) and when the company found out about the disappointment I had in the previous site, they said, “oh, let’s do it ALL again.” I was trying to scrimp money and still have a nice site, and every estimate that came in was MORE money, more expensive than the last, even though I had asked for the new appraisal to exist because I needed a less expensive site.

Much like someone who goes thru a messy divorce or the surprise passage of a close loved one, I now empathize with others who are on the path to “website autonomy”, clutch their hands and tell them. “Only someone who has gone thru this can understand how much it hurts”. It doesn’t help that now Vista Prints have template sites for $10.99 a month. Of course, my website is custom-made and one of a kind. Kind of doesn’t keep me warm at night though, and thus far I haven’t seen the difference in quality adding up to sales at the shopping cart. Of course, you never regret quality I am told. The correlation between quality work on a website and my handmade one of a kind jewellery and art that are infused with my love and energy is not missed on me. A template website is a correlation with sweatshop jewellery made overseas that falls apart after a month or two, even if made with real materials. I digress from the topic at hand.

What is the best gift, if any for Valentine’s day? A heart-shaped box of candy? A dozen or two red roses that you pay triple what you would pay for a few weeks earlier for very identical roses? A very pricey romantic dinner at a crowded restaurant with other stressed couples trying to wring all the passion and love out of the evening that we have been taught throughout our lives to expect from February 14th?

Having been on the receiving end of all the valentines’ gifts, I know how I feel without question. A card, just a card, from a serious life partner/spouse/significant other, falls short and is too little an effort, almost a “NON- effort. Flowers, dinner, chocolates, well, let’s face it, boys, shall we? It seems like the only woman being bought for is a candy inhaling flower sniffing lingerie wearing chick that doesn’t leave the house, “walking around in always ready lingerie” eating chocolates one at a time between her polished nails, lounging around, waiting for her man’s beck and call. Anyone who wants to post in with his or her reality is, I would LOVE to hear what your normal gifts you receive for Valentines Day, and perhaps what your IDEAL gift for Valentine’s gift is.

I could not write a complete post about Valentine’s gifting without mentioning that what women get men for Valentines is lame. Many times it is nothing or a slight pittance for what men give to them. That fact in and of it makes me feel that Valentines Day needs to be updated, to be modern. We as women no longer are possessions of men, and along with autonomy comes the ability to both give and receive.

Each year when Valentines Day rolls around, you have another shot at it. That is how tradition BECOMES tradition, to stop projection what you were raised to believe Valentine’s day was (the flowers, the dinner, the man driving and bringing chocolates), and with your true heart at the moment create a gift from love and your open heart. It can be a gifted tailor-made for your partners, like a snow skiing trip to Lake Tahoe, a gorgeous gemstone labradorite key ring or an amazing turquoise heart that I sell and make specifically to give as gifts to the men in our lives.

The point I am making that if you do not like or respect current traditions that are functioning in your life, quit projecting them into the future, and create an experience that you do enjoy. An experience or even that you will be proud to hand down as a tradition to your children. They will add their energy to it, achieving something that still has a part of you in it, but fits their individual integrity also. Can you see how that makes life more personal, individual and wonderful?

Another fun thing is to create a tradition for Valentines Day’s when you do not have a date/significant other to share the night with. Say a night out bowling with your girlfriends (I know for many of you this is a bad example), an afternoon in with your dogs stating 50 reasons you love yourself and writing them down, or writing down 50 ways you are going to model self-love. The world becomes a much more loving creative place when you stop having expectations from the past projected onto future events (which is currently what valentines day is for most people) and instead live from your heart and mind doing something that you really want to do, like staying home by the fire with your sweetie and giving each other foot massages. I do not know one man that would turn down a foot rub, and the new higher stiletto women’s shoes are causing the tootsies to scream and need attention too.

The point is: Enjoy. St valentines are about love, and love is a true dichotomy: it is all things and heals all things. And is the very definition of change.