As an active celebrator of holidays, unusual moments, and life in general, it seems counter-intuitive that I’ve never been a huge fan of Valentine’s Day. I’ve had a lot of long-term relationships, so it’s never been about being bitter that I was alone, but from the get-go, I decided that the way our society celebrates this holiday seems really biased and cliquey. It feels like it’s all about celebrating your life if you’re currently in a romantic relationship on one of the 365 days of the year, and excluding you if you happen to not be.

Boyfriends used to love that I didn’t want to celebrate February 14th, which I only took as a small percentage of a compliment because I knew that the main reason they were happy was because their past girlfriends had placed a lot of pressure on the holiday and they were relieved to not have to deal with that anymore.

In my early 20’s, I decided I wanted re-evaluate how I looked at Valentine’s Day. I decided I would start celebrating Valentine’s Day, including romantic relationships, but only if I was making sure I was celebrating love of all kinds. Love of my hobbies, my friends, my family, my pets, my postal workers, and definitely myself.

That said, being single this time of year can still suck the life out of you. Going into every store and being inundated by heart-shaped balloons, garlands, candy boxes, and stuffed animals can make you want to make sure you’re carrying a knife with you so you can slash through the helium-inflated Mylar before they slash the prices of the chocolate on February 15th.

I wanted to come up with a list of ways to have a Happy Valentine’s Day if you’re single (or not), or a list of ways to Survive Valentine’s Day… however you want to look at it. These are basically just some self-care ideas that you might want to take part in on the second week of February, or every day, or on the Autumn Equinox… whenever you want. 🙂

25 Ways To Survive Valentine's Day | Uncustomary

25 Ways To Survive Valentine’s Day

1. Celebrate being single (here’s 50 ways to celebrate being single)
2. Make your own list of reasons it’s awesome to be single
3. Buy yourself a Self-Care Kit (or make your own)
4. Eat a giant, delicious dessert
5. Ask one of the employees at Sephora to do your make-up
6. Bring a plant into your home (Bamboo, Jade, and Cacti are pretty easy to keep alive!)
7. Make plans to swap gifts with a friend (or maybe do an activity gift, like make each other a scavenger hunt)
8. Fill up an entire pad of Sticky Notes with reasons why you love yourself and then hang them up as an installation in your house
9. Wear a crown on your head (made of flowers, gemstones, tinsel, whatever you want)
10. Take yourself on a solo date (here’s 50 ideas of places to go and some tips of how to do it)
11. Wear two of your unpaired socks (they’re single, too)
12. Flip the script and get a man bouquets for Valentine’s day or other romantic gifts for him
13. Don’t wear a bra, take that shit off (or get fitted for one properly so it’s super comfortable)

25 Ways To Survive Valentine's Day | Uncustomary

14. Buy yourself a big hunk of raw Rose Quartz
15. Get some friends together to play True American
16. Read Succulent Wild Women by SARK
17. Splurge on something sexy, especially if it’s just for you (underwear, lingerie, sex toy, porn)
18. Do a random act of kindness for Random Acts Of Kindness Week: February 11th-17th (here’s 103 RAOK ideas)
19. Send texts to your favorite people with why you love them
20. Celebrate Galentine’s Day, Leslie Knope style
21. Watch non-romantic movies (challenge yourself right now to list five movies without a love plot line)
22. Try out a new perfume
23. Go to a drag show (or binge watch RuPaul)
24. Get a massage, or go sit in a massage chair
25. Create a zine, detailing all your ridiculous dating tales

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35 Things To Add To Your Self-Care Tool Kit!

 | Uncustomary Photos: Maura Housley