Do You Practice Self Care?

“Give yourself the same care and attention that you give to others and watch yourself bloom.”

Check out the following scenarios. Do any of them sound familiar?

Sue has a young child, a spouse and a full time stressful job. She gets up at 5:00 a.m., goes to work, and continues to work at home until 1:00 a.m. She often skips meals and eats a lot of sugar instead. A friend told her she needed to take time for herself and she laughed and said she barely has time to take a shower. How in the world can she take time for herself?

Debra is sandwiched between her aging mother, who demands her attention daily, her daughters who are experiencing life transitions and care for her grandchildren, as well as trying to make time for her husband whose new job comes with its own stress.

John’s ninety year old mother with Alzheimer’s disease lives with him. He works from home and tries to be there for his mom, especially at night when the live in aide sleeps. It takes an emotional toll on him and disturbs his sleeps many nights during the week.

Sam recently received an email from an acquaintance asking if he could stay with Sam while he was visiting New York City. This was someone Sam was not very close to and he had the means to book a hotel. Sam did not feel comfortable having him stay, and did not know how to handle it. What would you do?

Why is it that even though we know it is important to take care of ourselves, we cannot find the time or energy to do it? Why do we always put others first and often put ourselves on the back burner? Why does it sometimes take a major wake up call to notice the toll that this lifestyle takes on us? The major problem is time–we are all busy with our very full lives and don’t have the time to pamper ourselves. With so much to do, self care sometimes feels like an indulgence or worse a selfish act. And it is especially important to take care of yourself when you have the responsibility of caring for someone else, whether it is children, parents or a sick spouse.

The first step to genuine self care is to recognize that self compassion is a crucial part of your emotional, psychological and physical well being. Self compassion is all about balance, not perfection. Ways to get balance are mindfulness practice, therapy and conversations with your friends, spouse and family to help you gain perspective.

Genuine self care involves recognizing and accepting your imperfections. It means making compromises and recognizing that no compromise is perfect. Torn between time with loved ones and time at work or time for yourself and time caring for a loved one? Self compassion involves managing the best you can without criticizing or punishing yourself for not doing things exactly as you would like to do them.

Here are important ideas with regard to the importance of self care:

1. Know your worth: Self care is important to maintain a healthy relationship with yourself. It is also important to remind yourself and others that you and your needs are important. This relates to my later discussion about learning to say no, a big problem of mine.

2. Healthy work-life balance: workaholism is not a virtue. Overwork with stress and exhaustion can lead to health problems like anxiety, depression, insomnia and heart disease. Take breaks for lunch, a walk and set professional boundaries so that you can stay motivated and healthy.

3. Stress management: Eat healthy, connect with friends, practice meditation which improves mood and boosts energy and confidence levels. The Open Heart Project offers free meditation on line.

4. Start living, stop existing: Life is a precious gift; don’t waste it. We all have responsibilities, but taking care of yourself is also your responsibility. Enjoy a bubble bath, read a book, make time for a new hobby or learn a language while you commute to work. Start a journal. This makes life more purposeful!

5. Better physical health: Eat healthy, get enough sleep, care about your hygiene and exercise regularly, laugh at least once a day and try to avoid emotional eating when you are stressed.

As you all know, I am retired. Being retired definitely gives you more time to practice self care. However, I still struggle with saying no to doing things I don’t want to do. I have always been a people pleaser and that is why I can’t say no to someone who needs my help, even to manipulative people who know this about me and use it against me.

In fact, when I was first divorced, I agreed to adopt a cat from my teacher’s aide (even though I do not like cats, and am somewhat allergic). Her mother in law had died leaving her with the cat and she did not want it. It turned out it was the cat from hell. When I chose to move in with my sister 5 years later, this woman had no problem saying “no backsies” to me when I explained I had no one to take the cat. Clearly, she did not suffer from the people pleaser affliction!

How do you say no and not feel bad about it? First we must understand why people feel bad turning someone down. Saying no may feel aggressive like you are rejecting the person. (and who wants to be an aggressor?) We feel like a bad person like we are letting someone down and we feel guilty. Or we worry that we won’t be liked and will be perceived as uncaring and unhelpful. So we go the path of least potential conflict and say yes.

If we do say no, we say it ineffectively with excuses, such as “I would like to help but I am so busy now. This gives the other person the opportunity to respond, “since you’re busy this week what about next week”.

Here is how to effectively say no:

1. Say it. Don’t beat around the bush, offer weak excuses or hem and haw. Don’t delay or stall. Don’t feel compelled to give explanations. The less said the better.

2. Be assertive and courteous. “I’m sorry I can’t right now but I will let you know when and if I can“. This approach is polite and puts you in charge by changing the dynamic. “I appreciate your asking for help, but I am stretched too thin now to devote time and be of quality help to you” also works.

3. Understand people’s tactics. Many people use manipulation techniques whether knowingly or not.

4. Set boundaries. Take time to understand your role in relationships with people.

5. Be firm. If someone can’t accept your no, the person is not a true friend or doesn’t respect you.

6. Be selfish. Put your needs first. This is the most difficult for me–I need to work on it! Take advice from Warren Buffet who said, “the difference between successful people and very successful people is that very successful people say no to almost everything”.

Don’t forget to use sunscreen daily as part of your self care routine. I recently discovered my new favorite from Josie Maran. It’s a physical sunscreen (not chemical) called Protect and Perfect with SPF 47. I use it instead of foundation daily and it kind of matches all skin tones and evens out your skin. Love it! Be good to yourself! XO Penny

“Our soul is like a soft and gentle flower; it needs to be nurtured, cared for, tended to with sufficient sunlight, fresh air and freedom to bloom into its most precious and beautiful form”. Miya Ymanoachi