Think of self-care. What do you envision? Probably petal filled bubble baths and luxurious spa days with ambient music permeating our senses. While these activities are soothing, I challenge you to go beyond the basics and explore a more holistic approach.
True self-care involves mind healthy holistic practices. These practices take our self-care practice to the next level for our emotional, mental, and physical wellbeing. Let’s face it, life isn’t what it used to be. We are more stressed, overwhelmed and overloaded than ever! Modern stressors have agitated our ability to function at high levels. We are more digitally overloaded than ever. Each day, many of us are confronted with a plethora of notifications, emails. Excessive social media usage can contribute to an “always on” lifestyle that causes mental duress and the reduction of attention span.
The Five Dimensions of Self Care, if adopted can help foster long-term personal growth.
1. Emotional Self-Care
This aspect of self-care centers around self-compassion and mindfulness. It’s being cognizant enough to self-reflect; forgive, accept and love ourselves regardless of our missteps. Journaling, therapy and self-reflection exercises are effective tools to attain optimal emotional self-care. Carve out time everyday, just five to ten minutes to record your thoughts and the day you’ve experienced. The time needed could be found in unmonitored television time or social media scrolling time. This excessive use has led to emotional decline. Emotional self-care activities put you back on track and prioritize you over mindless mental time wasters.
2. Mental/Intellectual Self-Care
This layer of self-care is all about challenging the mind and our intellectual prowess. Remember when we were presented complicated formulas and theories as children how quickly we could’ve grasped those topics? Senescence is an inevitability of life. Today, there are many activities and applications that can be utilized to derail cognitive decline. Staying on top of our mental game is pivotal. Engaging the mind with activities that challenge and inspire is the desired road map to becoming mentally and intellectually aware. Reading has never been easier. We have libraries; both physical and online as well as various forms of books. Not having time isn’t a plausible excuse when a book can be read to you using the audio book version. There’s always an option! Puzzles and taking up a new skill are excellent ways of reducing stress and building mental agility. There is an endless availability of FREE apps and affordable online courses that anyone of the 21st century can discover.
3. Physical Self-Care
The first thing that comes to mind when we think physical self-care is probably the gym. Physical self-care goes beyond fitness. It centers around nutrition, proper sleep hygiene and restorative practices. Yoga, which dates back 5000 years, is an aspect of physical self-care that can positively affect our mental well being. Good House Keeping credits yoga as the catalyst for stress and inflammation reduction, a sharper mind and better breathing practices. Hiking is another example of engaging in physical self-care while engaging in nature and the world around us. Going to the doctor for regular check-ups and doing blood work should be routine physical self-care. Many conditions and illnesses could be caught before the onset of dire situations. Self-care is knowing and that means touching all areas of such self-care. Now more than ever, we need to be current with our health. Don’t wait for a diagnosis. Prevention starts with the implementation of good practices.
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4. Spiritual Self-Care
Inner peace and connection to self contribute to a heightened sense of being. When we align our actions with values, finding purpose becomes a reality. Meditation, prayer and spending time in nature are all activities that aids spiritual self awareness. Take three to five minutes out of your morning to sit peacefully, clear your mind and set your intentions for the day. I started walking over ten years ago and that has been the one constant in my spiritual growth. It has become habit and an excellent path to peaceful interaction with nature. It calms the mind and sets the tone for the day.
5. Vocational/Social Self-Care
A large aspect of life is interactions and relationships. If we are to have long term bonds, we must consider nurturing these relationships as well as establishing boundaries. Respect is a must in all relationships. Whether spousal or familial, how we treat people is a telltale of longevity or lack of it. On the other hand, having boundaries at work can be the game changer in our career. Knowing when to say yes or no will be reflected in our work load and the dignity we keep at the end of the day. If you are a yes man/woman, then you’ll be on the receiving end of endless projects and saying no will become the current work-life conundrum. We teach people how to treat us and that becomes engrained in the fabric of those relationships. Trust your gut. Your intuition most likely won’t lead you astray. Service to others must be the highest form of giving back. Serving our communities by volunteering is a path to attaining meaning. When we give service without expecting anything in return, the universe recognizes quietly and you are paid back tenfold by way of blessings.
May you go beyond the bubble baths and attain the richest form of self-care.
C.T.A (Call To Action) : What small step will you take today to begin exploring these five dimensions of self-care?
