Quote Anon

Apparently in parts of Asia, you pay your doctor until you get sick. When you are ill it’s considered they aren’t doing their job well and you stop paying until you’re better…that makes sense to me. It’s the doctors financial incentive to keep you healthy.

Most of us know why we aren’t healthy. Whether we stayed up too late and lack sleep, our diet is out of balance and the local take away service knows your first name…or perhaps the only exercise your body has seen was in Year 9 at secondary school.

That said, looking after your health in the circumstances that you are in, with the time and finances and time you have is a wonderful start.

Self care for me, is a little deeper. Making time to prioritise myself, listening to what I need at any given moment and leaning in, rather than ‘I’ll do that tomorrow’. The balance of self when done correctly isn’t selfish, it actually means those around you, those closest to you, thrive from you being a better version of yourself. Last night I was exhausted…I went to bed at 6:30pm. I woke at around 5am, with nearly 11 hours of sleep under my belt, I was like an upgraded me! Even if it did mean my family went to bed after me.

The other crazy thing about self care is it often has little cost attached to it, of course a spa day at an exclusive resorts can be fabulous, but taking time to look after your skin, to paint your nails, wearing clothes that fit you well and make you feel awesome can serve you on a daily basis.

My favourite self care tip is talking kindly to yourself. Totally free and easy to begin right now – no excuses, except in reality many of us struggle with ‘thinking’ kindly about our own looks, actions and dreams. We allow our negative bias to stop the power of what we could do and often want to do. Within seconds we feed our minds negative thoughts and halt any potential progress or growth mindset before we’ve even realised it. To alter this you need ninja responses – when you think a negative thought, you instantly need to say ‘I see you naughty negative, and I raise you three positives’ then drown the single negative thought (my bum looks big) with three positives (the dress looks lovely on me, my eyes are sparkly, my eye brows are on point) or you can reframe the initial thought ‘ my bum looks big in this dress and it makes the outfit pop, I look wonderful and curvy’….

Self care begins with the simple step of allowing yourself to be happy. Next to allow happy thoughts, happy dreams and the self belief that you can achieve them. Despite evaluating self care in 3 lines – it takes most people a life time to do, sadly most don’t even try.

I double dare you this week to show yourself DAILY self care – book something to look forward to, create five minutes each day to do something you enjoy ‘just because ’ and if you are feeling truly rebellious, stop the negative ninja moments and watch your life and those around you become totally awesome in under a week. *side note: if you miss a negative ninja moment, allow it. Don’t fuel yourself with more ‘ I can’t even do that right’ negative fuel.

Have a wonderful week and make time for you…off to do a midweek face mask my lovely friend gave me.