Sometimes when I am talking to someone I am sharing the coaching journey with, I mention self care and they tell me yes, they have had their nails done recently. Or maybe they say they can’t afford to do self care or can’t remember the last time they did.
Although my heart feels sad for what they have been missing out on, my soul quickly gets excited about what they have in front of them to explore.
Self care has become a bit of a buzzword, but I do feel it is absolutely key to the healing journey and to life in general; basically, self care is asking you to do the things that you enjoy and that are good for you!
As usual, with this series of ten thoughts I simply share ten thoughts(!) around a particular topic, these may be some theory, there also may be some of my experiences and journey in there, or I may share other stories that I have come across on my path.
1. Self care is not selfish. This is probably the comeback I hear most often when I am talking to someone about self care. They feel guilty for taking the time for themselves. I can understand this, and I share with them, that actually we are selfish not to. When we understand why self care is important and what it enables us to do differently, then it can become easier to bring it in to our lives on a regular basis.
2. The ultimate place to aim for is for it to just be part of the lifestyle we lead. The last thing we need it to be is another chore on the to do list, and as mentioned above it is about all the good stuff, the wholesome stuff that life has to offer. It can make us have a rethink about our priorities and where our time and focus is going…
3. It takes courage to heal. It takes courage to make changes in our lives. It takes courage to take different actions, however small. Courage requires energy. It may not be comfortable but continuing to make the same choices is easy; it is what we have known it is familiar. To choose something different, something more wholesome, is always the harder choice, takes more courage, more patience, more resilience. These all require energy. If we don’t have that in the tanks, if we haven’t been doing the self care to top up the tanks, it can make those changes much harder.
4. I remember one time I was working on healing a relationship. It was with someone that was not open to doing the work themselves, so it was coming from my side, and focusing on my stuff and healing that. It became really apparent to me the difference in working on it when the tanks were full. I had much more patience, more energy when this was the case.
5. Sometimes people will share how tired they are, and how no amount of sleep seems to make a difference. Sometimes that can be because our soul is tired. We have become disconnected from our true self and may be wondering what else life has to offer or just plain bored. Could you have a think as to what could be some ways of taking tiny steps?
6. Self care is not just about pretty nails, nor is it about necessarily going to the gym. We can take on society’s expectations as to what we feel we should be doing, but sometimes that adds an extra pressure or thing to add in to our day when actually it would be far more beneficial for us to head down the beach for a walk.
7. For a self care practice to be sustainable and regularly feature in our life, it needs to align with our values. It will be hard to stick to something if it is going against what is important to us. Sure you can do Pilates at home or learn a craft online, go fishing, but if you have values of community, belonging, friendship, then how about joining a group, taking someone with you, learning something together.
8. Feel this point needs reiterating in another way too. Self care does not need to be done on your own. Sometimes I am told it is hard to fit it in around kids and other responsibilities. How can it be tied in with them? Feeling frustrated and need to release something, crank up the tunes and have everyone dancing in the lounge, the kids don’t need to know exactly what is going on for you, they may just think you’re having fun. Kids want to be out in the garden, can you head out there and potter. Kids want to do some craft stuff, can you get yours out or a colouring book or share their paints?
9. Weeks can fly past, and sometimes the week ends and we can realise that no self care has happened. Or we have been busy over the weekend, but we haven’t actually checked in to our needs and done anything restorative for ourselves. As we get in to the routine of self care, I found it helped me to have a reminder on my phone at 3pm to ask myself what have I done for me today. If I have done something, then I get a happy memory for what I did, and if I haven’t managed to by that point, I still have plenty of time left to make it happen.
10. Schedule it in your diary, even if you don’t know what its going to be yet. Sure life happens and we need to be flexible, but having it pop up regularly on our calendar keeps it on the radar, and the more you do make it happen and experience the benefits, the more protective you may become over that time that you have scheduled!
If something here is resonating, if a part of you is going please listen to what is being said, please reread it and let it sink in.
If it is just ideas of what to do and what you want to bring in to your life, then why not download 100 self care ideas here.
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