As we enter the era of the Power of Love, one of the most increasingly important calls for us is to relax, recharge, and rebalance ourselves and our lives.
We are moving away from the cultural conditioning that fostered and cultivated us to be disconnected, unaware, and on perpetual autopilot. This kept us out of alignment to our innermost needs, resonance, and in a disempowered state.
One of the main repercussions of a consciousness that bred the belief that our value and worth comes from our productivity and people-pleasing is the pervasive state of being guilt-ridden.
Have you ever noticed how often or when guilt comes up? Or the circumstances that bring it forth?
One of the biggest obstacles to our self-care is guilt. This is because it’s one of the main foundations of codependency. In essence, we have been trained and conditioned not to honor our needs in a healthy, balanced, and honest way. Or we associate it with being selfish, lazy, and unproductive.
Therefore, one of the most important steps when initiating or increasing our needed self-care is to be aware that guilt may very well arise. Sometimes the acknowledgment and understanding of why it shows up can be enough for it to transmute, dissolve, and release its clawed grip on us. Other times we may need to feel it and move it out of our system, acknowledge its presence, and command its dismissal, like an unwanted visitor.
Self-care is absolutely an act of self-love. This is why it is becoming imperative we create a lifestyle that promotes our well-being. One that consists of our own personal and individualized self-care routine. Because we are all unique in who we are, the tools, techniques, ways, and exercises that we may need can be vastly different for each of us. So, it’s helpful to keep comparison out of the equation when we are considering and cultivating our own customized practices of self-care.
They are our mental, emotional, physical, nutritional, environmental, spiritual, recreational, social and financial needs.
The more we know ourselves, the better able we will be to support ourselves with each of these pillars. We can self-support by considering what we need daily, weekly, monthly, and seasonally. Ideally, we want to create our own personal ‘self-care tool kit’ that will consist of our go-to methods, techniques, tools, exercises, places to go, etc., that we have at the ready without having to put too much thought into it. It’s also important to consider a specific time, stage, or phase we may be going through in our lives that requires specific needs for that period.
When we practice daily or more regular practices of self-care, we are in essence preventing being ‘made’ to self-care. Our natural state is one that consistently seeks homeostasis. A balancing of our ‘yin/yang’ essence. When we neglect ourselves in our yin essence, it can create a state of ‘exhausted yin’. This is when we become completely depleted, exhausted, sick or something goes out, like our back or we have a debilitating headache. This creates the setup that we must rest, recuperate, and recover to heal or replenish. Or we may be too prevalent in yin essence where we are apathetic, sluggish, or lethargic and need to activate more yang essence, such as getting the body moving more through action and exercise.
We can learn to manage the maintenance and healthy balance of our energies by being aware of what energizes us and fills ‘our cup’. Equally important is knowing when or how we are being drained. Be aware of how certain places, people, events, conversations vibes, music, shows, social media, etc., leave you feeling. Do you feel inspired or drained? The more aware we can become of the effects and impacts things have on us, we can either avoid them altogether or prepare ourselves more intentionally before being in those experiences/environments.
Depending on where we are on the spectrum, the implementation of a self-care routine may start with daily hygiene practices, like brushing teeth or showering regularly, eating and sleeping more consistently, and getting more fresh air or movement in. Or we may be going more into self-nurturing, where we are filling our cup to the top and then overflowing it. Where we are infusing ourselves with unconditional love, gentleness, care, warm kindness, and acceptance. We have more to offer others when we can be serving and generous from the overflow of our cup rather than a depleted or empty cup.
Sometimes self-care is having more boundaries and learning to say ‘no’. Being able to be comfortable and unaffected if others don’t understand us or our needs.
Some signs that we need to self-care are that we feel drained, frazzled, exhausted, negative, overly emotional, irritable, or angry.
We may feel more sensitive to sensory stimuli like noises or lights. We may have a desire to numb out. We may feel lonely or isolated. We don’t feel well and may have more aches and pains, difficulty with focus or concentration, insomnia, and overall lack of enthusiasm or ability to stay present. We may feel uninspired. We may see changes in our eating habits, wanting food (more or less), or having more cravings, especially for sugar.
When we don’t feel well, it is more difficult to make choices that support our overall health, vitality and well-being. So, ask ourselves – “What do we need to equalize more of our energy input and output? How can we stay more grounded and focused on the present moment and inspired in our lives? What would it look like to create a daily recipe for a delicious day?” Check-in often, asking what our bodies need, our personalities need and what does our soul need today. How can I take leadership over my emotions, thoughts, energies, day, and life? Confirm that we are allowed and worthy of loving ourselves because we are beautiful, vibrant beings here to shine our brightest radiance!!!
Examples of Yin: Moon. Dark. Cold. Rest. Stillness. Receptivity. Right brain activity. Introspective. Intuitive. Nurturing.
Examples of Yang: Sun. Heat. Activity. Expansive. Movement. Assertive. Thinking. Left brain activity. Logical. Initiator.
Examples of self-care practices to support the pillars:
Mental: Managing worry and going to worst-case scenarios. Being aware of whether our thoughts are creating a weed garden or a flower garden. Being aware of our beliefs and if they are serving our highest good or are limiting us and keeping us in unworthiness, doubt, or lack.
Emotional: Increasing positive emotions. Releasing suppressed emotions. Being aware if we are being ruled or making decisions predominantly from our emotions.
Physical: Creating a balanced exercise or movement regime. Getting the rest we need. Supporting our body with supplements, or healing modalities such as massage therapy, osteopathy or reflexology as some examples.
Nutritional: Eating foods that support our vitality and chi. Enjoying our food and honoring what truly resonates with us. Increasing our water intake.
Spiritual: Deepening our connection to something bigger than us, or nature. Connecting more to our Soul Self. Being aligned to our hearts. Find or have a reason for living. Creating practices to cultivate this such as meditation, stillness, journaling, or mindful exercises. Call upon our Spiritual team for guidance and support.
Environmental: Creating an environment that feels like our sanctuary. Or where we can fully relax, recharge, and rejuvenate.
Social: Embracing social support. Knowing when we need to be more social or intend to deepen our connections, finding deeper meaning in our relationships. Intend to or be in alignment with our like-minded tribe.
(Sometimes being social may mean we are out in a social situation yet not actually interacting with people, this may show up if we are highly empathic or are going through a deep healing or transformational process where we need social energy yet not the actual social engagement.)
Recreational: Knowing what fills our cup. That could be hiking, reading, skiing, golfing, singing, biking, painting, swimming, gardening, hanging out with our animals, etc.
Financial: Identifying and managing our stressors regarding our financials. Asking ourselves what money means to us and focusing on that rather than money itself. (Money may mean freedom to some, security to others.) Asking ourselves how we want to relate to money, abundance, and prosperity.
