What is Self-Care
2020-03-17 00:00:00 Natasha Griffin
Self-care is a term that has been thrown around in many different contexts lately. My interpretation of the word is: Something you can do to help utilize the time spent focusing on yourself, just as you would focus on a loved one. It is the space and time you carve out to take for yourself. To help you feel energized and ready to go back out into the world to help others.
Here is a list of ten things to try to do for yourself.
- Listen to your favorite podcast
- Focus on the positive parts of you
- Read a book you enjoy
- Spend time in nature
- Practice breathing and controlling your breath
- Take a bath
- Treat yourself to something new
- Maintain and practice your boundaries
- Practice self-love
- Practice compassion
It is important to understand that self-care looks different for everyone, Sometimes it can be a physical thing that we do to help ourselves unwind: get a massage or a new haircut.
Sometimes it is something we do to clear our mind or get out of our comfort zone to stretch ourselves mentally: try a new dance class, take the long way home to have time to sing in the car. This is time everyone needs to be present and spend time doing something for themselves. It can be as productive or unproductive as you need it to be.
Whatever you need to help energize and lift the emotional, mental and physical parts of yourselves. It is imperative that we take time for ourselves to recuperate from our busy schedules. We all need time to be selfish with our needs so we can take what we need to feel rejuvenated and ready to go back out into the hectic world. In our culture we see that our schedules are packed and we are told to push through always focusing on the future but it is important we carve out time for ourselves in the present.
This blog was written by Natasha Griffin, Trainee. Natasha is supervised by Danielle Fitch, LMFT #94672
Mental Health