Self-care is often viewed through a vanity lens. As if it’s all about having bubble baths and putting on face masks, yet this is not entirely correct; self-care is something we should all make time for, and while bubble baths and face masks may be apart of some people’s self-care routines, it doesn’t represent what self-care is really about.
In this post, I am going to talk about ‘why self-care is important’ and how we can make room for it in our busy lives. I also want to talk about why this is a topic that I want to share more about in the future.
What Is Self-Care?
Self-care can be many things and mean many things to different people.
Though it is generally defined as prioritising one’s needs or health. Often, through a holistic approach to health and well-being. However, it can also include seeking help from health care professionals if necessary.
Why is Self-Care Important?
Self-care is important because it helps us regulate and slow down.
In a modern society, we are on the go all the time, and even when we are not busy, we are bombarded with a lot of information through our phones, television, the internet, etc. Our brains and bodies need a break from all that, which is why making sure you are taking care of what you need is important.
What are the benefits of Self-care?
There are many benefits that we can get from self-care, some of these include reducing stress, increasing our well-being and sense of accomplishment, as well as improving our health and relationships.
How can we make Self-care a Priority?
There are many different areas of our lives where we can start to prioritise self-care, but what are they? And how do we not get overwhelmed by adding more into our very busy lives?
What are the key areas of self-care:
The main areas of self-care are:
- Emotional (Processing emotions. This can be through journaling, meditation or talking to someone.)
- Mental (Positive mental stimulation. Through hobbies or learning new skills, etc.)
- Physical (healthy physical practices. Eating healthy, moving regularly, getting enough sleep, etc.)
- Social (healthy social interactions. Interacting with people whom you enjoy being around, as well as building boundaries for relationships that are more difficult.)
- Spiritual (spiritual or religious needs. Through meditation or practising of a chosen faith.)
- Work or Education (boundary and/ or goal setting)
- Financial (financial well-being goals)
As suggested by Online Social Work
Seeing the list above may be overwhelming, but it doesn’t have to be. We can learn to make self-care a priority by focusing on one area at a time and gradually working toward adding more self-care in other areas later.
For example, you might want to look at setting boundaries in key areas of your life first. This could be around work or school, or maybe you are spending a little bit too much time on your phone or other devices and would like to use them less, and instead focus on a relaxing hobby or being more present in the moment.
This can be done by making sure you set clear office hours. By this, I mean setting a ‘Work time’ where you focus on work and ‘Closed time’ where you focus on your home life and self-care priorities.
I know this is easier said than done, especially if you feel like your boss doesn’t adhere to the same rules, but where you can set these kinds of boundaries, it can be really beneficial.
You can do the same thing for phone, productivity or other device use. Set clear boundaries on when you can use certain devices and apps and when they are off limits.
Want to know more? Here are some suggestions for further reading.
🖥️ Quick Reads 🖥️
For more information on the different areas we talked about above, here are some quick but helpful articles for you to read.
- 7 Types of Self-Care and Why You Should Practice Them – Online Social Work (This article talks about self-care in the context of social workers, but I felt that the advice also works for most people.)
- Seven Types of Self-Care Activities for Coping With Stress – Psychology Today
- 20 Ways To Practice Self-Care – Joanna Rahier
- 12 relaxation ideas to reduce stress and anxiety – Calm
📖 Book Recommendations 📖
If you would like to go more in-depth, here are a few books that focus on different areas of self-care.
- Be Happy – 35 Powerful methods for Personal Growth & Wellbeing, The Universe Listens to Brave, The Art of Self-kindness & Setting Boundaries by Dr Rebecca Ray (This author primarily publishes books around self-care, which include a range of topics like personal growth, habit setting and boundaries. Her books are worth taking a look at. Depending on where you’re at and what your experiences are will determine which book is for you. The books mentioned are just a few of the books she has published.)
- Feel Good Productivity by Ali Abdaal (If you want to stop working harder and start enjoying your work and life, this book is worth a read. It gives some great tips on making life enjoyable and to release yourself of any guilt when you’re feeling like you’re not doing enough.)
- The Success Myth by Emma Gannon (This book is similar to ‘Feel-good Productivity’ in that it dispels any myths of how we should be working or striving toward goals in different areas of our lives, and helps us understand that our goals are what we want them to be. Highly recommend reading.)
Prioritising Self-Care in my Life and Content
I, like most people, have forgotten to make self-care a priority in the past, pushing through hard times because I needed to feel like I was doing something instead of just surviving, but I almost always ended up burning myself out.
In the last couple of years, I have tried really hard to make it a priority and let myself rest when that’s what my body needs and be more productive when I felt like I could. Even if that was weeks or months in between. (This is because I live with disabilities and a chronic health condition, which makes it hard to function sometimes.)
This year in particular has felt like it has been necessary to step back and let myself be, especially because my family is going through some challenging times (I’m not quite ready to talk about it yet and not sure when I will, but it’s been a lot. It’s one of those things you never expect to happen in your family, but sometimes it does, and it’s sudden and unexpected.) So I have made sure to do things to help myself relax and work through some very difficult emotions, instead of forcing myself to continue writing or creating when my brain has been fuzzy.
I had good intentions to keep writing after my previous posts. This was going to be that post, actually, and it has taken me 5 + months to sit down and write it. My brain has had a very difficult time, and I had to work on myself before I could talk about self-care with others.
But it’s these exact reasons why I want to make my content more self-care focused because it’s important, but it also doesn’t need to be intimidating.
I want to share a range of things to help inspire others on their self-care journey. And though I am not a professional in this field, I feel that by sharing a few of the things I like to do for self-care, it might help others on their self-care journey. *
This includes articles on topics like mindfulness and journaling, as well as helpful product reviews. I also want to share focus and relaxation videos (Focus timers, relaxing music playlists, art for self-care, journal with me, productivity and focus sprints, read with me, etc.)
I also want to share some of my favourite cozy hobbies, which help me relax and that you might like to try as well.
Self-care doesn’t need to be hard; it can be as small as taking time to have a cup of tea and turn off notifications while you’re drinking it, before bringing yourself back to reality.
So I hope you will join me on this journey, and we can work on making self-care a priority together.
Erin.
* I will include links, like in this article, to places where more information on the topics I’m talking about can be found. Usually from places that have more knowledge than me.
Things to Remember
- It’s okay to focus on yourself sometimes. You can’t be there for others if you’re not there for yourself, so give yourself permission to take a step back and focus on you.
- It’s okay to set boundaries that allow time for a home and work life balance; you can’t be on all the time.
References :
Reference 1 – 7 Types of Self-Care and Why You Should Practice Them – Online Social Work
Other References
Image Credits:
Image 3 – Graphic created in Adobe Express using Adobe assets and book covers from some of the authors mentioned.
Book Covers sourced from Be Happy – Amazon, The Universe Listens to Brave – Pan Macmillan Australia , The Art of Self-Kindness – Pan Macmillan Australia , Setting Boundaries – Pan Macmillan Australia , Feel Good Productivity – Ali Abdaal’s Website & The Success Myth – Penguin Australia.
Disclaimer – This post is not sponsored and doesn’t contain any affiliate links; any links included are for reference only in case you are interested in checking out a mentioned link or purchasing a reviewed product. Check out my full Disclaimers here, including AI use on my blog.
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