Major life events, long holidays and sickness are all triggers to let us lose ways from our self-care routine.
I had a long stretch of time in the past few weeks where I neglected myself completely to take care of my family and sort things out on the personal front. Result? My skin finally tells my age. I am constantly exhausted and my lack of self-love is reflecting on the roles I play daily in my life. Coming back to my self-care rituals seemed daunting until I decided to take baby steps. For the past 3 to 4 days I have been incorporating the below-mentioned steps without fail and I can not verbalize how much better I feel already.
You could print this image and put it along with your daily planner as a checklist and stay on track every day. These are small simple steps that when done consistently every single day would make a world of difference.
The thing about Self Care and Self love is that the concept makes some of us feel as if we have to take huge chunks of time out of our daily routine to do a lot of extensive things so that we are doing Self Care the right way. In reality, it is all about small consistent things we do for ourselves that makes us feel cared for and important. After brushing my teeth, the first thing I do in the morning is to drink warm water. I aim to drink close to 500 ml of warm water as I believe in living according to the Ayurvedic principles and Ayurveda strongly recommends the intake of warm water in the morning and never ice cold water. The reason for this is not to mess with the Agni in us which is also called the digestive fire.
Since we have been asleep for more than 6 to 7 hours we wake up dehydrated and drinking tea or coffee before hydrating ourselves first is unhealthy. After drinking my morning water I do a simple 2 to 3 minutes stretch based on how my body is feeling. I have read that it increases blood circulation and makes your body flexible. For me personally stretching relieves my stress and gets me ready to tackle the day.
I keep a notepad on my nightstand where I jot down the 5 things I am grateful for and it always happens to be small things like my pillow, clean drinking water, toothbrush, and toothpaste and there are days when my gratitude list is deeper and longer. I also write down 3 things that I have to get done that day no matter what.
Eating a healthy filling breakfast and wearing SPF are other things that set me for the day and makes me feel like I matter and I am cared for. I also look at the mirror and say some affirmations based on the theme of the day or my general mood.
The whole point of this simple effective gadget free morning routine is it helps you connect with yourself and fills you up so that throughout the day you can do your duties and attend to important matters without feeling empty.
A simple meditation added to this is an additional boost for your morning self-care.
Gratitude
I have heard many people say that this whole gratitude journal is a new age time waste and I genuinely feel sorry for them. Gratitude is the right attitude forward. If you start counting your blessings you are reprogramming your mind to see the positive things in life and that makes you a happier person who in turn attracts, even more, happiness and positivity.
Meditation
I have never had the level of commitment to meditate daily and hence, I still do not go into the zone of zero thoughts, however, as I am restarting my meditation practice I am more forgiving of myself and I am so much more kind to myself. That truly has made a huge difference. Meditation for me is sitting in silence, breathing deeply and letting my thoughts come and go without feeling bad about my not so good thoughts. It is my moment of stillness. It fills me up and heals me though I end up crying after certain sessions.
I am slowly establishing a simple night routine and that will be posted here soon as well.
Tell me all about your self-care routine my friends.
More articles to inspire you in your self-growth journey
A journey to Self Love and Acceptance
Stay blessed!
It’s definitely easy to forget to take care of ourselves when we have so much going on around us. I fall victim to this as well. But I love your tips and I try to do similar things every day. Like starting my day off with a nice glass of water. Even the small steps help so much!
I agree Lisa small consistent steps are the key 🙂
I so need meditation in my life. Going to start with it from tomorrow itself
That is amazing Sonali 🙂
When person is busy she/he forget about their health thank you for this tips will start it from tomorrow
So glad it motivated you 🙂