Over the past 18 months or so I have been on a self healing journey. Part of this journey involved learning about self care and learning to love myself. I had no experience in self care prior to this and so I really had no idea where to start and how to make time for myself in my busy life.
This seems to be a common opportunity among many of us. I wanted to share with you the small things that I started with. Before I began I needed to FIND THE TIME I so desperately needed for myself. My first stop was at Micheal’s and my first purchase was a Happy Planner. Once I managed to figure out a good system for me I moved on to my next step.
I tend to lose my focus quite easily so I found if I wrote down a few things each day that were my priorities, then when I found myself wandering and lost in some other activity or just staring out the window, I could go back to my planner and REFOCUS!
I realized I needed to schedule myself into my daily to-do’s otherwise I was just always too busy to take a few minutes to sit down or even just breathe. The first thing I scheduled in was a bubble bath night. As soon as I got the kids to bed and settled (so I was sure they wouldn’t get out of bed and disturb me 300 times while I was in the bath) I would run the water, add the bubbles, grab a drink and a book or my phone to dive into my Facebook.
I’ve always had a fairly good night time skin care routine but I decided to spoil myself and get some Arbonne which I highly recommend. Check out the Energy Fizz Sticks as well, better than coffee 😉 Another important part of a good night-time routine would be moisturizing the feet. Our feet are extremely important and yet probably the most neglected.
Positive self talk. Gratitude. Boundaries. These are a few things that may also need to looked at. I have a really hard time with the positive self talk (always have) and I found that leaving myself little sticky notes throughout the house helped tons! I wrote little reminders to myself like: You are an amazing mom! You are enough! Set your limits, Stick to your limits, etc. Sounds silly, I know but you would be surprised how much it can help raise your vibrancy to read that every day. I had them in my medicine cabinet, inside the cupboard door with my coffee cup, by my bed and even in my car.
-Gratitude is my easiest out of these 3. Since it’s the easiest, its also the one I turn to in a pinch because I can think of 3-5 things I’m grateful for each and everyday. I write these down along with one thing I found through the day or week that I feel I need to work on (not in a negative way!) An example of this would be: Today I realized I need to work on ending phone conversations after a short time instead of being on the phone for 2 hours. This is a boundary goal.
-Boundaries are a new concept to me. Something I never had before. This is a hard one personally. Something I’m continuing to work on daily. Basically I had to gain some self-confidence first before attempting this area. It is definitely becoming easier as I gain my confidence with every new boundary made and respected.
Meditation may not be for you, I know I certainly didn’t “get it” and so every attempt was a failure. I never understood what I was supposed to be DOING while doing nothing! Someone finally explained very simply that you concentrate on your breath. Wait, what? Really? That’s it? And then I realized that it really wasn’t that easy. Since my thoughts jump around so quickly this “focusing on the breath” thing proved to be pretty difficult. I find it much easier with a free app called Calm. I use rain sounds or thunderstorm sounds for 2-5 minutes depending on how much time I have.
One last thing I’d like to mention is about compliments. Write down any compliments you receive and keep them all in the same place. Maybe write each one on a different piece of paper and stick them on a cork board. Or on a dry erase board. Make it pretty, make it creative, make it all about YOU! You deserve it.
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