The Importance of Self-Care

Hi everyone, and welcome to this month's blog post!  Today I want to have a chat about the importance of self-care.  In these uncertain times where we’ve been living through a pandemic, where income can be uncertain and unstable for some, especially when earning a living from your creativity, it’s really important to take time for yourself and look after your mental health.  

If we are living in a constant state of stress, our bodies are flooded with hormones such as adrenaline, noradrenaline and cortisol.  This triggers the ‘fight or flight’ response, which is fine if it’s occasional and helps us to deal with  singular stressful situations.  But when it’s constant, this is unhealthy and starts to cause all sorts of issues, such as increased blood pressure, muscle tension, increased risk of diabetes and mood disorders.

So what can we do if we feel like we’re spiraling out of control?  If you are in a position to do so, getting some counseling is very helpful (and finding the right counselor to gel with is very important).  In addition, there are also things we can do for ourselves.  Do something that you enjoy to help you get back some feeling of control, such as having a cup of tea and reading a book.  Do some yoga or mindfulness meditation. Don’t berate yourself for “not feeling like your supposed to”, cut yourself some slack and be kind to yourself.  

Someone recently gave me a wonderful analogy of the turmoil I was experiencing. I was on a mountain path and it was raining hard. The path was slippery, but I didn’t slide back down the mountain; I stepped to the side of the path and took shelter, waiting for the storm to pass.  That was incredibly helpful to me in coping with what I was feeling; that the turmoil would pass and it was ok for me to seek shelter, I didn’t have to be out in the storm.  I was then obsessed for several days about creating a graphic to represent this analogy; I wanted something visual to remind me that it’s ok to step to one side and wait out the storm.  I eventually found some free-to-use vector graphics of the different elements and created my own picture, which I have attached to the top of this post.   If you’re a visual person like me, a graphic of some sort may be helpful to remind you to relax.  

If you are finding that everything feels overwhelming; it is helpful to set yourself small daily goals. Just set a maximum of three, that don’t have too many steps to them; this also helps you to regain some control and feel as though you have achieved something.  

Another discussion I have had recently was with a health professional who advised me to stop being so hard on myself for not “exercising” (which appears to be intrinsically linked with “diet”) and focus more on movement.  Rather than battling myself to get on the treadmill and walk for half an hour, my son and I have been playing tennis on our Nintendo Wii.  Whilst we’re not getting as hot and sweaty as we would playing real tennis, we are moving, which is important for general (and also mental) health.  It’s a lot more fun and doesn’t feel like a chore, which is half the battle.
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Anyway, that’s it for now, I hope you found some of these tips useful.  If this resonated with you at all, let me know.   Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next month.  Bye for now!