We all hear about the importance of self-care but do you actually put it into practice?
You see quotes like “self-care isn’t selfish” all over social media but while we may agree with that in theory, many of us still don’t prioritise it. It might be because sub-consciously we don’t feel that we deserve to put ourselves first, but whatever the real reason, the most common excuse for not including self-care in your day is that we don’t have time. It’s common for me to hear that when I’m speaking to prospective clients.
I’ve been there myself. Back in the days when I really wasn’t looking after myself, I thought that I didn’t have time for self-care. Now I know that you can find time if you really want to.
There are 2 important stages to finding time for self-care.
Firstly, you need to accept that self-care is vital to your health and wellbeing.
You may have heard that “you can’t pour from an empty cup”. It’s absolutely true. It’s a bit like expecting your phone to work when its battery has run down. You wouldn’t hesitate to plug the phone in to recharge the battery. Yet with our own bodies we allow our energy to run down and expect ourselves to keep going when we’re practically running on empty. If we don’t practise self-care before our batteries run low it’ll take a lot more time to charge our energy up again. If we persistently run on empty, eventually we’ll burn out.
The next stage is to think about where in your day you have some free time or wasted time which you could use for self-care instead.
Obviously there are lots of different types of self-care, and some practices will take longer than others, but there’s no real reason you can’t fit one into every day.
Some ideas to consider are:
- If you use public transport to travel to work, you could meditate on your journey. No-one will know you’re doing it because plenty of people sit with their eyes closed.
- Instead of hitting the snooze button on the alarm clock, you could get up 10 or 15 minutes earlier to meditate, perhaps do some stretching, or set your intentions for the day.
- You can practise mindfulness while waiting in the supermarket queue, or at traffic lights.
- You could go for a walk for 20 minutes during your lunchtime instead of catching up on emails or scrolling through social media.
- You could spend 10 minutes in the evening writing in a gratitude journal instead of TV channel-hopping.
If you’re someone who has good intentions but you find the day running away with you, then schedule your self-care in your diary. Treat that appointment with yourself with the same importance that you do with other appointments, and don’t skip it.
We can all find time for self-care if we choose to, and our bodies and minds will thank us for it.
