In case you can't figure it out from reading, self-care is a common buzzword used in mental health to remind both clients and clinicians to take a step back and take care of themselves. The concept is that if you can't take care of yourself, you can't effectively take care of anything or anyone else, or that your ability to do what needs doing will be so compromised that it will end up causing you even MORE stress. And it is a thing that everyone can benefit from.
Self-care takes many forms. It can be indulging in a guilty pleasure. It can be spending quality time with people you love. It can be getting into your hobbies or interests. It can be exercise, meditating, relaxation, a spa day, shooting the shit with good-humored folks, playing Cards Against Humanity, organising your life, reflecting, switching off your brain and refusing to think about work or your problems... any list of things. In fact, most of you already exercise good self-care without even knowing that this is what it is. And this is what I want to talk about. It's one thing to distract yourself when you're feeling shitty - it's another to take active measures to building your capacity deal with shit before shit actually happens. It is a preventative measure and for a lot of us, we go through things like work and life-shit so that we can engage in proper self-care.
As with anything, there is a way to take care of yourself "properly" and a way to do it "not so properly." Knowing and reminding yourself to make specific time for self-care is so important to keep yourselves going, because when things are going shitty, you at least have the capacity to handle it. Good self-care involves a mix of things that involve other people AND things that you can do on your own. It involves grand plans to travel somewhere for a vacation and it can also involve blocking out some time to bake your favourite cake.
Some of you may know the Diet Coke metaphor:
Self-care not only keeps your Diet Coke levels low, but also makes your bottle bigger, giving more room shit to go down without spilling out of the bottle.
The tricky thing with self-care is that it often is the first thing to be compromised when shit is going bad. When your bottle is already full, you're focused on keeping a flurry of mentos away from it rather than finding ways to reduce your Diet Coke levels or to make your bottle bigger. Sometimes, it is useful to remember that self-care is more important than the things you are doing in the moment to respond to stress. It keeps you motivated, it keeps you centred, and what works is different for everyone.
So, in true "Forum Mom" form, I encourage everyone to take a step back and think about the following:
- what do you do that you know is a form of self-care?
- are there any forms of self-care you want to learn to do but don't know where to start learning?
- how much time do you currently allot to just taking care of yourself?
- what forms of self-care have worked for you that you think may work for others?
- how can you take better care of yourself (physically/emotionally/spiritually/etc)?
- what do you already do that you didn't previously realise was a form of self-care?
Whether you're in school, at work, moving (or buying a) house, getting married, or just moving from one day to the next - everyone can benefit from good self-care.
For my part, my biggest ones are:
- Taking some time out of my day to reflect on where I am and finding a way to be happy and secure in it
- Playing volleyball (though currently, I am unable to do this because KNEE SURGERY)
- QT with my significant other
- Playing video games purely for the enjoyment of them
- Switching off my work phone when I get home from work (seems small, but it is oh so big)
- When it rains, switch off everything that makes a noise in the house, lie on couch/bed and listen to the rain
Self-care takes many forms. It can be indulging in a guilty pleasure. It can be spending quality time with people you love. It can be getting into your hobbies or interests. It can be exercise, meditating, relaxation, a spa day, shooting the shit with good-humored folks, playing Cards Against Humanity, organising your life, reflecting, switching off your brain and refusing to think about work or your problems... any list of things. In fact, most of you already exercise good self-care without even knowing that this is what it is. And this is what I want to talk about. It's one thing to distract yourself when you're feeling shitty - it's another to take active measures to building your capacity deal with shit before shit actually happens. It is a preventative measure and for a lot of us, we go through things like work and life-shit so that we can engage in proper self-care.
As with anything, there is a way to take care of yourself "properly" and a way to do it "not so properly." Knowing and reminding yourself to make specific time for self-care is so important to keep yourselves going, because when things are going shitty, you at least have the capacity to handle it. Good self-care involves a mix of things that involve other people AND things that you can do on your own. It involves grand plans to travel somewhere for a vacation and it can also involve blocking out some time to bake your favourite cake.
Some of you may know the Diet Coke metaphor:
Spoiler:
"do you know what happens when you put mentos into a bottle of Diet Coke?" or "have you seen Wreck-It Ralph?"
*briefly explain explosion that happens if they answer no to both questions*
"so, every little thing that pisses you off, it goes into this Diet Coke bottle. every stressor, every negative thought, it adds a bit of Diet Coke to your bottle. so it gets very full, because it doesn't really get emptied."
"then a mentos comes along. no one thinks anything of a mentos - it's small, white, round, very *shrug* no big deal. this is someone not saying good morning to you. this is someone looking at you in a way that you think is weird. this is something like not being able to find your hairbrush. something small. and, normally, you'd cope just fine with it. it wouldn't usually bother you."
"but then it hits that bottle of Diet Coke. and it explodes. and it's messy. it's gooey and sticky and smells kind of weird and your mom gets pissed off for staining the furniture and then you get strangers like me coming into your house trying help clean it up. it's all very awkward and awful and even after it's cleaned up, things still feel sticky."
"so what we want to do is help you find ways to drain out that Diet Coke from time to time. so that your bottle not so full. so that when a mentos comes along, it may fizz up, but it stays in the bottle and it doesn't explode. the bottle's still intact and there's no mess. how does that sound?"
*briefly explain explosion that happens if they answer no to both questions*
"so, every little thing that pisses you off, it goes into this Diet Coke bottle. every stressor, every negative thought, it adds a bit of Diet Coke to your bottle. so it gets very full, because it doesn't really get emptied."
"then a mentos comes along. no one thinks anything of a mentos - it's small, white, round, very *shrug* no big deal. this is someone not saying good morning to you. this is someone looking at you in a way that you think is weird. this is something like not being able to find your hairbrush. something small. and, normally, you'd cope just fine with it. it wouldn't usually bother you."
"but then it hits that bottle of Diet Coke. and it explodes. and it's messy. it's gooey and sticky and smells kind of weird and your mom gets pissed off for staining the furniture and then you get strangers like me coming into your house trying help clean it up. it's all very awkward and awful and even after it's cleaned up, things still feel sticky."
"so what we want to do is help you find ways to drain out that Diet Coke from time to time. so that your bottle not so full. so that when a mentos comes along, it may fizz up, but it stays in the bottle and it doesn't explode. the bottle's still intact and there's no mess. how does that sound?"
Self-care not only keeps your Diet Coke levels low, but also makes your bottle bigger, giving more room shit to go down without spilling out of the bottle.
The tricky thing with self-care is that it often is the first thing to be compromised when shit is going bad. When your bottle is already full, you're focused on keeping a flurry of mentos away from it rather than finding ways to reduce your Diet Coke levels or to make your bottle bigger. Sometimes, it is useful to remember that self-care is more important than the things you are doing in the moment to respond to stress. It keeps you motivated, it keeps you centred, and what works is different for everyone.
So, in true "Forum Mom" form, I encourage everyone to take a step back and think about the following:
- what do you do that you know is a form of self-care?
- are there any forms of self-care you want to learn to do but don't know where to start learning?
- how much time do you currently allot to just taking care of yourself?
- what forms of self-care have worked for you that you think may work for others?
- how can you take better care of yourself (physically/emotionally/spiritually/etc)?
- what do you already do that you didn't previously realise was a form of self-care?
Whether you're in school, at work, moving (or buying a) house, getting married, or just moving from one day to the next - everyone can benefit from good self-care.
For my part, my biggest ones are:
- Taking some time out of my day to reflect on where I am and finding a way to be happy and secure in it
- Playing volleyball (though currently, I am unable to do this because KNEE SURGERY)
- QT with my significant other
- Playing video games purely for the enjoyment of them
- Switching off my work phone when I get home from work (seems small, but it is oh so big)
- When it rains, switch off everything that makes a noise in the house, lie on couch/bed and listen to the rain