What is Self-Care?
“Self-care is a broad term that encompasses just about anything you do to be good to yourself. In a nutshell, it’s about being as kind to yourself as you would be to others. It’s partly about knowing when your resources are running low, and stepping back to replenish them rather than letting them all drain away.” ~ The Law Of Attraction.
How can you take care of yourself?
Life can be overwhelming at times. I know that I need to love and take care of myself, every day and you should too; it doesn’t matter if you’re a parent, a student, or a person who works full or part-time. EVERYONE NEEDS LOVE, CARE AND ATTENTION and the person who needs it the most is yourself.
You should reward and treat yourself every now and then and that is where self-care or self-love routines come in. I highly recommend having a self-care routine to follow because
a) It will make you feel really good.
b) You will develop a connection with yourself.
What can you do?
For practicing self-love and care you have to detox your life. Remove all the negativity and negative people from your life. I went through my social media and did a cull of all negative people that I followed; now my feed is full of good friends and positive people. You don’t need that negativity in your life. All you need and deserve is love, care, and positivity. They’ll keep you going and moving forward.
Dedicate some time to yourself enjoy those moments and do it daily.
Have a self-care routine, both physical (body, hair & skin) and internal (heart, mind & soul), write it down in your journal, diary or even in your Notes (app on your phone). I personally set an alarm to remind myself; therefore I can have a routine and stick to it. It helps a lot.
Why is self-care so important?
When you have a mental illness, it’s difficult to care about anything – least of all ourselves. However, self-care is one of the key tools in our armoury for combating mental illness, so it’s important we make it a priority.
When I’m stressed, self-care is usually the first thing to go. I never use to do self-care I was too busy with events, guests, work, meetings and a lot of other things. To make room for all of this, I would skip lunch, I stopped going to the gym, and sometimes my social life would disappear entirely. When in fact doing the opposite and making time for self-care makes me less stressed.
Why do you need to take care of yourself?
Because 1. You deserve it. 2. You will appreciate yourself a lot more. 3. You will feel more productive afterwards. 4. You will feel better and be more relaxed. 5. It will enhance your self-esteem and improve your self-knowledge. 6. Why not?
Who doesn’t like to eat chocolate, take a long hot bath or binge watch Netflix every once in a while? Self-care is all about treating yourself after all that you do. It’s a way of bringing the positivity back into your body, mind, and soul.
Make sure to treat and reward yourself every now and then. Eventually, it will make a huge difference in your entire routine. Trust me!
Be your own best friend and show yourself a ton of love!
You are always focused on goals, meetings, deadlines and excessive expectations of people around you; that you rarely take care of yourself. It’s easy to neglect to take care of ourselves because when we’re busy and overwhelmed, even a small reprieve feels like a luxury. Taking time to eat lunch, exercise, and hang out with friends can feel like slacking. And it’s really not!
Self-care Tips to Try
Here are a few ways of how you can take care of yourself even on the busiest days, with very little time. These small steps will make a huge impact on your life and you’ll be more than happy that you did it.
1. Go to sleep when you are tired, you'll wake up feeling refreshed. Taking power naps also help.
2. Hydrate. Do you drink enough water? You should drink at least 2 liters of water every day. Get up in the morning and before doing anything drink a glass of water.
3. Put down your electronics for an hour each day. If you struggle to do it during the day then do it the hour before you go to bed.
4. Take a 10-minute break from what you’re doing and breathe. Follow your breath, stay with your breath. Notice how you feel after 10 minutes of doing this.
5. Go for a walk. Taking yourself out of your environment and moving your body can sometimes do wonders.