Self-care is more than just doing things for yourself; it is actively protecting your well-being and happiness. Practicing self-care brings many benefits to our lives and improves physical and emotional well-being. Self-care can foster resiliency as it is vital for building resiliency towards the everyday stressors we cannot eliminate. As a result, self-care helps us cope and manage the stress in our lives, which helps fight burnout and adds to life expectancy.
There are some different types of self-care: physical, social, mental, spiritual, and emotional self-care. Physical self-care is meeting your physical needs and refueling your body. This includes getting adequate sleep, eating a healthy diet, seeing your doctor regularly, and exercising. Socialization is the key to self-care because it’s easy to neglect your relationships when life gets busy. There is no perfect science to how many hours you should spend focused on your relationships, however, close connections are essential to our overall well-being. Mental self-care encompasses anything you do specifically to stimulate your mind. It is focused on understanding and building a loving relationship with your mind. Spiritual self-care includes activities to connect with nature and your soul. It helps you feel more grounded in your day-to-day life. Emotional self-care is our actions to connect with our emotions and healthily process them. When we engage in emotional self-care, we learn to give ourselves grace and develop healthy coping skills to increase happiness and well-being.
Since April 5th is National Self-care Day, let’s focus on our individual needs and be kind to ourselves. Practicing self-care is not always easy. Whether it is time we have to take away from something else or we are not good at giving ourselves space, you are worth taking care of. Creating a self-care plan may be helpful.
Develop a self-care plan. Assess areas of your life that could benefit from more attention/care. Reassess yourself and your life often, as your self-care plan should change when things change, too. Here is some help to get you started on your plan.
Assess your needs. List the different parts of your daily life, including work, school, relationships, and family.
Consider your stressors. Identify things that cause you stress and think of ways to address them.
Think of self-care strategies. These can include setting boundaries, building healthy social connections, or doing things that evoke happiness within you.
Plan for challenges. Where there is a plan, there are challenges. Remember to be realistic and add things you can do. Creating a plan for change doesn’t have to be perfect; it just has to work for you.
Schedule a time to focus on your needs. Self-care should be a priority; when you care for all aspects of yourself, you’ll be able to operate and function effectively.
Don’t forget to treat yourself! Do things that feel good for you. Put your phone on, do not disturb, decompress after a long day, eat your favorite food, or even buy yourself something.
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