We can easily fall into the pattern of putting others first and forgetting about ourselves in the process. This pattern begins to wear us down slowly but surely. It is necessary to put ourselves first sometimes and that’s what we’re going to talk about today. We’ll talk about the importance of self-care, developing a self-care routine, and some examples of self-care. I’ll also talk about my self-care routine. So here we go!
Why Self-Care is Important to Your Mental Health
Let’s start by answering the question what is self-care. Self care is showing love to yourself and setting time aside for yourself to relax, to be creative, to enjoy the moment, and to make yourself happy. Self care is different for each person, but necessary for everybody. By taking time out for ourselves, it helps us feel re-energized and revitalized. Lately, if you’ve been feeling worn down, setting time aside for yourself can work wonders.
The benefits of self care are vast and include increased self-esteem, increased self-confidence, increased patience, increased positivity, decreased anxiety, decreased fatigue, and more. One of the first steps to taking care of our mental health is with self-care. As I said before, self-care is different for everybody, whether it’s sitting and reading a book with a cup of tea or going out for a morning job. No matter what self-care act you prefer, you’ll see benefits right away.
Not only will you see benefits for yourself, you may find that those around you are benefited as well. Being positive and in a good mood can spread so easily just as being negative and being in a bad mood can spread so easily. By taking care of ourselves we increase the good in our lives and it spreads out around us. It can even improve relationships. For example, if spending time with someone is feeling more like an obligation than a choice, take some time out for yourself and see if your perception changes after some self care.
Developing a Self-Care Routine
One of the biggest issues with developing a self-care routine is that you may feel selfish taking time out for yourself. Parents may feel uncomfortable putting themselves first even for an hour when they have children to care for, for example. The sentiment is understandable, but simply not realistic. It is not selfish to take any time out for yourself. In fact, I would view it as responsible because the better you take care of yourself, the better you’re able to take care of others. By avoiding self care, a parent may feel worn down and not present when spending time with their children. However, take an evening for yourself and you may find that you feel more present and energized when you’re spending time with your children.
So now that we discussed the wonders of self-care, let’s talk about developing a self-care routine. This is going to be different for everyone, but I find that I require self-care a little bit each day. Even just 10 to 30 minutes can make a huge difference for me so I try to set time aside. While it’s good to set aside some time everyday for self-care, it’s not a hard and fast rule. You may find that it’s better to have an entire day to yourself or an evening to yourself spread out. It’s really up to you what you feel most comfortable with and what helps you to feel more energized.
Examples of Self-Care
There may be times when we can’t even think about what we want to do because we’ve been so busy thinking about what others want from us or need from us. So I compiled this list for you to peruse over and pick out which things you’d like to do. Set some time aside to do them and see the positive benefits that come from taking care of yourself.
- Spending some time exercising – this isn’t always for everyone because sometimes exercise can feel like an obligation. Remember that this is self-care, so if anything feels like an obligation to you, skip it and move on to something that sounds like fun.
- Meditating
- Tapping into your spirituality
- Take a walk outside
- Take a long shower or bath
- Pick your favorite movie or two and set some time aside to watch it
- Read a book
- Do something to satisfy your creative side such as painting, writing, crafting, anything.
- Learn something new – have you been wanting to learn a new instrument or a new language or website programming or what have you? Maybe now’s the time to try it.
- Enjoy a hobby – two things I love doing is cooking and baking. I like putting time aside on the weekends to bake whatever comes to mind and it’s satisfying and stress relieving. Perhaps for you it’s going to be fishing, knitting, hiking, or whatever else.
- Practice mindfulness
- Reward yourself with a treat now and again
- If you’re an introvert, spend a day or an evening by yourself to re-energize
- If you’re an extrovert, spend the day with someone or some people who lift your spirits when you hang out with them
- Go somewhere new. Has there been a restaurant you wanted to try or museum that you haven’t visited yet? Set it up to go and enjoy it!
- Plan a spa day for yourself whether an actual spa or at home
My Self Care Routine
The beauty of self-care is that once you get into the habit of it, it’s really easy to fit it into your life whenever you need it. I had to start focusing on self-care whenever I first became sick and ever since then I’ve been hooked. I try not to let anything get in the way of self care. It took me awhile to accept that I wasn’t selfish for taking care of myself. Now I have absolutely no problem setting that boundary and telling people I can’t go somewhere because it’s “me time”. I’m kidding I don’t actually say “me time”.
The things I do for self-care vary from day-to-day and it’s just depending on what I need. I do yoga almost everyday and when I feel like the yoga routine that I do is getting a little stale or feeling a little like an obligation, that’s when I’ll switch it up with a new yoga routine which is always fun.
Another thing that I love doing is going exploring in the woods. We have a lot of woods in our city and it’s a lot of fun to go exploring in them. There’s definitely something exciting about going into a new place that’s untamed and beautiful. Along the same lines, I really love going for walks and going to the park. My spiritual beliefs are very earth-centric so just being around nature is usually enough to help re-energize me a bit.
One thing that I absolutely have to do or else I feel like I go crazy is let out my creativity. Of course this blog helps a lot since I’m creating content often. I also enjoy writing fiction, drawing comics, painting, designing and making clothes, creating music, and almost anything that involves creating something.
I already mentioned that I do enjoy cooking and baking but I find it especially fun to do with Jacob. It’s such a fun way to connect with each other so long as you can compromise and accept mistakes. If you’re a perfectionist in the kitchen, I would not recommend cooking with someone else. We are not perfectionists, but we’ve been fairly close to arguments thanks to the kitchen. However, it’s still an awesome place to be with each other.
I do daily meditations and practice mindfulness constantly. By helping myself remain present I have better control over my anxiety which is such a gift.
Pretty much every night I play video games. At the moment, I’m in the middle of Hollow Knight and Jacob and I are in the middle of Luigi’s Mansion 3. I find video games really relax me, energize me, and even inspire me with the story, art, music, etc.
There may be more, but that’s my general self-care routine. The yoga and meditation I try to do daily although I slack on the yoga during the weekend. Who am I kidding? I slack on both during the weekend. I also like to read everyday and play video games everyday and these are the self-care routines that I prefer. Some of these I do when I really need to set out time for myself and others I do whenever I feel like I need or want them.
Without self-care I would not be the person I am today. I don’t believe I’d be nearly as positive, grounded, confident, or relaxed as I am now. So I’m a huge believer in self-care. Try it out and let me know what you do and how it goes! Do you have a self care routine? I’d love to hear about it!