Making Yourself A Priority
The term self-care is WAY over-used. It always seems too trite--get a massage, take a bubble bath, eat fancy chocolates. Those are cursory examples of self-care. A big part of reducing anxiety is knowing your values, knowing your priorities, and living your life based on those priorities. Earlier this year, I started changing my self-talk, "you need to engage in more self-care." Which, for me, means massages, bubble baths, and fancy chocolates to "you need to make yourself more of a priority."
Making myself more of a priority means:
actively engaging in mindfulness techniques
adding more yoga to my life
actively participating in what I wanted to do in my life.
Looking at myself, mind, body, and spirit.
Recently, I realized that I had been ignoring the body part of body, mind, and spirit. To put myself first, I needed to take a hard look at how I was treating my body. What food was I feeding myself? How was I eating? When was I eating? How was I moving my body? etc.
Last year, I had a few health issues that took me away from my regular workout routine and left me feeling pretty much old and defeated. I realized I couldn't make myself a priority unless I made my body a priority. My body has always been a touchy subject. I wasn't an overweight child; I wasn't even an overweight 20-year-old, but I never loved and appreciated my body. It wasn't until my 30s that weight became an issue. But since then, I have yo-yoed and dieted, worked out like a crazy person, and restricted way too much. By the time I hit 40, I was 80 lbs overweight and tired of the whole weight game, so I decided at 40, enough was enough. I was done thinking about food and diets. I was tired of shaming myself into eating the 'right' foods and weighing the 'right amount. I would eat whatever I wanted whenever I wanted and try to bring as much mindfulness to it as possible. And I did just that; I ate when I was hungry and ate whatever I wanted. I didn't gain any weight----I didn't lose any weight either, I maintained. But slowly, over time, the mindfulness peace faded away, and I just ended up ignoring my body. I knew I had been ignoring my body, and I also knew I didn't want to go back to the place of shame and ridicule about my body.
Then one day, I was procrastinating writing and randomly googling things, and I came across this article about Oprah's weight struggles, and I realized I am out of balance. I have lost touch with myself as a priority. I loved what Oprah says, "I am not hungry for food. I am hungry for balance." And so that has what I have started doing, asking myself what I am hungry for. Sometimes it is actual hunger, but most of the time, it is balance, a break, a hug, or a chance to let go and step back. Self-care has become a place where I notice my body, notice how I feel in my body, notice how food cravings come up, notice how certain foods make me feel.
Weight, diets, bodies are such dirty words in our society. The truth is carrying extra weight is bad for my health. The truth is food can't make me feel a certain way. The year of eating whatever I want hasn't made me feel more peaceful---it has been WAY easier--but not more peaceful. What has been more peaceful? When I started putting myself, my health, and my body as a top priority again.
Your struggle may not be weight, but I ask you:
Where are you not putting yourself as a priority? At work? At home? In your body?
What are you HUNGRY for?