Tag Archives: self-care

Continuing To Work On Myself (or More Reflective Challenges)

Posted on June 1, 2018 | 2 comments

I have to admit that the beginning of a month is pretty exciting for me. I used to hate it because that is when so many of my bills are due (and then my bank accounts look so low), but now I look forward to it because of my monthly challenges! It has been tough to pick challenges sometimes, but I do enjoy them and I feel like they have made me a much better person since I started doing them.

Last month my challenge was to do daily intentions/affirmations. I wasn’t exactly sure what to call them when I started the challenge and I still don’t know exactly what to call them now. But every morning I would write something down to set the tone for the day. Sometimes it was a reminder that I was going to get through something tough. Sometimes it was just saying that I will get over my cold soon. And there were other times where it was just a reminder that it was ok to feel what I was feeling or it was ok to do nothing.

Almost every single morning I remembered to write something down either before work or before my workout. There were only a few days that I forgot but it was always done within the first few hours of my day. And it really did help put me into a better mindset with a goal in mind. It was something to focus on from the start of my day as opposed to my gratitude list which is a reflection of how my day went. And it really was a positive change in my month even with how tough things were for me.

And considering how tough the last month was for me both mentally and physically, I’ve decided that my challenge for June is to work on getting back to my normal self. I’ve already started to work on this, but I really want to have a month of refocusing and reconnecting. I still feel a bit out of sorts with a few things and I want to take the time to work on fixing them. I just want to get into a better and more positive mindset and the best way to do that is to work on me.

I know this is another abstract challenge to have, but I think that because I’ve felt disconnected that it’s exactly what I need. I need to just have a month to work on figuring out what I want and what I need. It’s not something that is really measurable but it’s exactly what I need to do right now. I’ve been knocked down a bit lately and my self-esteem took a hit. I want to work on fixing that and seeing what things I can do to make sure that it doesn’t happen again or if it does I can come back quickly from it.

But I’ve got a big list of things that I want to work on that are a bit more concrete. I need to work on food and meal planning (even if I’m not eating breakfast). I want to do more cooking and that fits into the meal planning too. I have worked on cleaning my house but it’s also led me to realize how much more cleaning I need to do. I want to do an inventory of the clothes that I have right now. I totally forgot about a pair of yoga pants that I got last year and almost ordered another pair thinking I didn’t have one already. I don’t want to make that mistake even though I could always return clothes (I just know myself enough to know that I probably won’t). And there are some projects in my house that I’ve been meaning to do that I just need to get done.

All of my monthly challenges have been things to make me a better person, but I think this one is the most personal one I’ve done so far. It’s also the first one where I don’t necessarily have action steps for everything I want to do. I have my list of things that are more concrete, but for the mental things I really don’t know what I will do or what it will take to get me back to being me. But I am excited to see what happens and what new things about myself I learn as I work on this. I know that whatever ends up happening that it will be a positive change for me and that when I’m writing about this again in a month I will have only good things to share.

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Finally It Feels Like Things Are Normal (or A Week Of Various Self-Care)

Posted on May 25, 2018 | 1 comment

I feel like I’ve been writing about being sick for months now! But I have been sick for almost a month now which is a pretty long time. I have a feeling it may take another month before I’m totally back to normal, but I am noticing a little bit of progress every day. I’m having fewer coughing fits each day (but still having a bunch) and I have less congestion in general. I am still a bit shocked about how hard I went down with this cold and how long it has taken me to even feel this much better.

I did take some time to be lazy and do nothing since that’s what you really need to do to get better. But I get so antsy and restless and felt like I needed to do more. I worked hard at ignoring that feeling and just lying low and the past 10 days or so were when I was really getting back to full force and just trying to make my life as normal as possible again.

I did some fun things like getting my hair done. Just feeling refreshed physically can do wonders mentally as well. I’ve also been practicing other beauty self-care things like using the nicer products that I have or using sheet masks to make my face look better. It can feel so special and luxurious to do beauty things at home that you don’t do on a daily basis. While I have my everyday body lotion, I’ve also got a nicer one that I rarely use. So when I do use something other my my normal products it feels like a real treat for myself. It’s the little things like that which help make things feel fancier even if they are still cheap things. I’ve been wanting to get a pedicure too, but that keeps getting put off so eventually I’ll be doing that too. I just don’t want to spend the money on a pedicure yet because I like to save them for when I have a good reason to get one.

I have gone out for fun things like the Lena Hall show. Even though while I was at the show I was dealing with several coughing fits and my nose was running the entire time, I still had an amazing time and that show was just incredible! It was a form of self-care by getting me out of my house and doing something. Sometimes you just need an excuse to get out to get yourself together and then you force yourself to feel better. I also had a date this week. The guy I met was nice, but not the guy for me. He was in LA because he’s in town for work (he may be moving here for his job) and we just had a pleasant night out. I could see him and I being friends if he moves here, but there was nothing romantic between us and neither of us felt chemistry. But again, it was just nice to get out and have some time outside of my house.

And I did some cooking which helped me feel extra productive. I know how important it is for my physical health (as well as my financial health) to be cooking at home as often as I can. And knowing that I can make an amazing meal and not need to spend all day cooking and cleaning is a nice confidence boost and another way self-care can just make me feel less sick. And now I have a ton of new recipes that I want to try so I’m going to work on some meal planning stuff so I can make sure I try things more often. Plus, if I feel like I’m getting sick again, I have better ways to make soup at home instead of having to rely on canned soup (which is nice, but not the most nutritious option).

I’m sorry that so many of my posts lately have been about me being sick. It really did dominate my life for so long and I’ve been working hard lately to turn that around. I’m working on adding things back into my calendar instead of making sure I have more time at home to relax and work on getting better. I need to move on with my normal life again and I think I’m finally getting to that. It’s nice to feel like even if I didn’t do a ton of stuff this week as far as big events that I still was getting out and doing things for myself. Even if those things are little things to help me take care of myself, I’m doing what I can to just be back to regular life again. This cold took over my life for far too long and I’m done with letting that happen.

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Using Podcasts To Better Myself (or Continuing To Be A Podcast Addict)

Posted on February 22, 2018 | 3 comments

I wrote a long time ago about how much I love podcasts. I’ve been listening to podcasts for so many years that I can’t remember when I started. But because I don’t really listen to music, podcasts are my entertainment in my car (and while I’m blogging!). I just looked at my podcast app and I’m currently subscribed to 55 podcasts! There are some of them that don’t have new episodes or rarely have new episodes, but many of them are weekly and I have to work to stay caught up.

I listen to a lot of podcasts about the entertainment industry and about eating disorders/food. Those are great educational podcasts for me and it’s an easy way for me to stay informed. And there are lots of fun interview style podcasts I listen to as pure entertainment and those are great for when I’m just looking for a distraction. Every podcast I listen to is important to me for one reason or another, but I wanted to highlight 3 (technically 4) podcasts that are really changing my life right now.

The first one is one of the newer ones I’ve been listening to. It’s called Forever35.

I found this podcast because one of the hosts is on another podcast I listen to. Since I like what she has to say, I figured I’d listen to her on a second podcast and I am so glad that I did! This podcast is really about self-care. A lot of it is physical self-care like face serums, face masks, and other beauty things. And because self-care and allowing myself to be a bit more selfish was something I’ve been working on recently, this podcast came into my life at the perfect time!

While I’ve always tried to have a regular skin care routine, I’ve been making adjustments to it lately so it feels a bit more luxurious. I’m still doing things cheaply (thankfully Trader Joes has some amazing skin care products!) but it’s nice to add something that feels special into something you do every day. My new routine is still very new, but I do think I see a difference in my skin. It may just be that my skin is feeling pampered and I’m finally taking time to myself so I can work on it, but that still is a result! And I’m so glad that I felt encouraged by this podcast and the amazing Facebook group for fans of the podcast to work on taking care of myself.

The next podcast that has been helping me better myself is Unladylike.

This is another podcast I found out through another podcasts. The hosts of Unladylike used to host Stuff Mom Never Told You and I listened to them on that show. So when they created a new podcast I followed them there (I still listen to the other podcast with the new hosts) and I love this one! This podcast is about feminism and issues that women are concerned about. Topics have included the history of women and bikes, yoga and what is a yoga body, and abortion rights. I’m a feminist and have always been one, but I have been more and more involved in issues lately and I’m glad I’ve found a podcast that is adding to my education about the issues that I may not have thought about before.

And the final podcast is actually more of a podcast network. It’s Crooked Media and the podcasts that I listen to in that network are Pod Save America and Lovett or Leave It.

I learned about Crooked Media from a friend of a friend I met at a party. I think at that time they only had Pod Save America but now there are 8 podcasts in their network (I think that number is correct, but they are always adding more). I’ll admit that I wasn’t the most involved person in politics in the past. Even though as a teenager I was on the city council for the city I grew up in on the youth committee and I’ve always voted, I was only aware of the most superficial issues. I know where I stand on gun control, abortion rights, healthcare, and other issues that I’m connected to and which politicians agree and disagree with me. But when Trump was elected, I knew that I needed to make a change.

The hosts of these podcasts use to work for the Obama administration so they are extremely knowledgable about political issues. But they are in their 30’s so they can relate to how those in my generation are experiencing things. They also know how to make politics more interesting and less like they are lecturing you. Each week they discuss the current issues in politics (although when an episode is released there may already be a new issue as that is the trend in the current administration) and while they are Democrats they are not afraid to call out Democrats when they are wrong.

Lovett or Leave It is a game show style political podcast where guests and audience members play games related to current events. The games are fun, but I still learn a lot from them. And because I listen to Pod Save America along with other political podcasts, I’m so excited when I am able to figure out the answers when I am listening to the episode. It proves how much information I’ve been picking up from listening to podcasts and how much more educated I am about issues that affect me and others.

If anyone is interested in more podcast recommendations on what I’m listening to that is educational, fun, or just entertaining; please let me know. I’m such a podcast junkie that I just want to share podcasts with everyone because I love them so much!

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Figuring Out Some Self-Care (or Working On My Physical And Mental Health)

Posted on January 19, 2018 | Comments Off on Figuring Out Some Self-Care (or Working On My Physical And Mental Health)

I’ve been a bit too stressed out lately. A lot of it had to do with just being overwhelmed and trying to schedule myself, but that didn’t explain all of it. Reflecting back on it, I think that it’s possible that my panic and anxiety disorder came back. It wasn’t enough for me to feel like I needed to take medication or call my new therapist, but it was something I was aware of.

Like with so many other things in my life, being aware is a huge step for me and I consider that to be a win. But of course I wanted to make the stressed out feelings go away and not just be aware of it. Part of what I’ve been working on is related to my monthly challenge this month. I’m being a bit selfish and turning down invitations to things I don’t want to go to. I’m not committing myself to things that aren’t what I want to do socially and I’m not going insane when there is an event I want to go to but it doesn’t fit into my schedule. I’ve had to miss some fun things like birthday parties and baby showers because of work, but I’m not feeling guilty that I have to work because my friends understand.

Being selfish is a bit of self-care and I never really thought of that before. I think it has been a big step in my mental health although it isn’t fixing everything. But giving time to myself does allow me to think through the stress I’m feeling and figuring out what is causing it and what I can do to make it a bit better. And I know I’ve said this probably a million times, but I am also working on time management to work on my stress. I hate when I get to the end of the day and I still have so much to get done. I’m trying to work on doing stuff throughout the day and not just after work or after my workout.

But this time, I’m also working on my physical self-care too. I love to look at different beauty products, but I’m not always someone who uses them. But I decided to get a set of sheet masks from Amazon (they were pretty cheap) so I could work on my skin care. They are nice, but I look pretty creepy when I’m using them!

I’ve only used one so far so I don’t see a huge difference in my skin, but I think the mental break I get when I use those masks help too. It is time that I have to be still and relax, which I probably don’t do enough. I also found a nice new body cream at CVS on sale that I got that feels a lot more luxurious than my normal body lotion. Sometimes, it’s the little things like those that make a big difference.

I’ve been working a lot of doing these self-care things this week and I really have noticed my stress levels go down. I still need it to go down a bit more before I feel totally like myself, but I’m glad it’s getting better. I didn’t need to turn to medication (which I’d rather not use since it will make my Vyvanse less effective) and I’m not waiting it out and suffering. I’m taking action and figuring out what works. Or at least what works for me right now. I know that things will change all the time and what is working now might not work later this year. But at least I was productive in figuring out what I needed to do.

I know that this self-care is a positive step, but I still am working on how to stop the stress from getting to this level. I want to be able to stop it before it gets this bad and I start feeling overwhelmed. But as I’ve learned I have to look at the baby steps I take and not get frustrated. I can’t be expected to figure out everything right away so I need to appreciate that I figured out one small step toward figuring it all out. And hopefully next time, I’ll figure out the next small step.

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