Why do we need to ‘self-care?
People talk about self-care all the time, at least I know I certainly encourage everyone to have a self-care toolkit. What’s the importance of self-care, what is it and why do we need it? Is self-care being selfish?
What is self care and why is it so important for our health?
Let’s clear up one common misconception from the get-go: Self-care is not synonymous with self-indulgence or being selfish. Self-care means taking care of yourself so that you can be healthy, you can be well, you can do your job, you can help and care for others, and you can do all the things you need to and want to accomplish in a day.
If you think you’ve been hearing more about self-care now, you’re right. One indicator: According to Google Trends, the number of searches for “self-care” has more than doubled since 2015.
What Is Self-Care, and Why Is It Critical for Your Well-Being?
Several organizations and researchers take a health-oriented approach when defining self-care. The World Health Organization defines self-care as: “the ability of individuals, families, and communities to promote health, prevent disease, maintain health, and to cope with illness and disability with or without the support of a healthcare provider.
Self-care is not being selfish! Self-care is just that, taking care of the self. No one can make you happy, no one can fix you, no one can replace that negative voice in your head with a positive voice.
The only person you can make happy is you, the only person you can change is you, and the only person who can change that negative voice in your head to a positive encouraging one is you. That is self-care. Self-care is the journey of empowerment.
Now it’s important to remember that we may not have grown up with positive role models who were able to demonstrate or explain the importance and need for self-care in life. This does not mean we cannot learn about self-care today, take action today and start creating these tools that take care of our mental & physical to last a lifetime.
As you know we are all beautifully unique. We come from my own experiences, life events, interests and likes, self-expression, culture and religious practices, personalities these are all that I call our ‘Map of Reality.’ This makes us who we are today. We cannot deny or change our past, the good, the bad and real crappy cannot be changed, what we can do is create a positive mindset where we find our own way to move forward from the pain to happiness and success. Having a self-care toolkit helps us navigate through our own pain, sadness and trauma. Self-care will look and feel different because we are all different. Even in the same family, there are differences in the reactions to the family dynamics. Our self-care toolkit can also change as we grow and in discovering new tools and strategies that make us feel happy, confident, energized, and like who we are.
From the article: Achieving self-care in 11 wonderful ways.
Taking a break and adding self-care to your daily life helps in reducing the chance of physical and mental issues and gives you a stress-free life and a feeling of happiness and joy.
By giving yourself “me time,” positivity will surround you and you will have a clear mind.
Do we always use the same self-care tools?
No, everyone is different, some folks keep the same tools and never add new strategies (that’s okay) some folks add or remove different tools and self-care strategies, things change as we evolve in life.
Speaking from experience I’m adding to my tool kit all the time as I get out of my comfort zone and try new things, experience new adventures. One of the most important tools in my self-care is fitness. Something my father taught me as a young girl. We used to go running in the morning before school. Fitness for me today is more about my mental health which also benefits physical well-being. Gets rid of tension, stress and is a positive distraction.
I learned very early in life that fitness is part of good mental and physical health. Exercise also helps us deal with the stressors in life, releases those feel-good hormones, helps with depression and PTSD, and sleep.
Of course, fitness for me is different than anyone else’s interpretation of fitness. The idea is just to keep moving in any possible way that you can. Like I said before self-care will look and feel different for everyone. Be curious about what works for you, what can you add to it, and what is not working. This includes setting healthy boundaries in all relationships, work, home, friends, and intimate relationships.
Sometimes we have to change our pattern of thinking from negative to positive to create the self-care tools to feel and be happy. Sometimes we need professional help to navigate our own childhood or past trauma to find our way. That’s okay.
As a professional motivational speaker presenting to an audience can be mentally draining as well as incredibly satisfying and exciting. I love it! Each presentation of encouragement, education and empowerment for the audience, also requires a lot of emotional energy on my part. What I do after any of my presentations is reach into my self-care tool kit to help re-charge. It’s really important to share with others the lessons learned so that they don’t have to suffer. Sharing the tools and strategies I use, the idea is to help you be creative and think about what works for you in creating your own self-care ideas.
How do I start my self-care tool kit?
Make it fun, create a collage of all the things, activities you would like to have in your tool kit. Write a journal of ideas, put little sticky notes around the house, leave a note in your car with a positive message, think of all the movies and TV shows and make you laugh and feel good, the books and poems that energize your soul. My first tool was nail polish. Doing my nails each Thursday helped me get through 20 years of workplace violence and depression. It was not the only one but looking back it was the first. Over the years fitness has become my number one go-to, then watching funny movies or TV shows, Netflix comedies, baking, setting firm boundaries, hanging out with the positive folks ( which has been challenging under the Covid cloud), reading, writing my book on PTSD part two of Lake Agassi Murders, yoga and my list keeps growing.
If you think about it we are only as limited as our imagination and creating beautiful self-care tools and strategies to last a lifetime. This does not mean that we will not feel or suffer sadness, tragedy and loss merely that we will be resilient and bounce back to find happiness and success.
It’s never too late to create your own self-care tools and strategies that will last the rest of your life. Our children will mirror our patterns of behaviour let them mirror the positive creative ideas and taking care of themselves for good mental and physical health.
Empowerment comes from taking care of yourself. Self-care is about taking care of the self. The only person who can do that is you. Knowledge is power having your own self-care tool kit is part of the journey to empowerment.
