When the phrase “self care” makes you cringe
New ways to think about taking care of yourself without feeling guilty
I see the phrase self care all over the place these days.
Maybe it's because I’m in the health coaching business of coping with stress and feeling better in your mind and body.
Maybe it's the Baader-Meinhof phenomenon that happens when you want to buy a gray minivan, and then suddenly all you see on the road are gray minivans!
(I make myself laugh because I actually drive a gray minivan and no one is actually fantasizing about buying one. But you get the point.)
Or maybe it's because self care is really that gosh darn dang important!
I totally forgot to take care of myself, physically and mentally, during the years when my babies were young. I wasn’t sleeping well, exercising or relaxing.
I was one of those people who thought that selflessness and busy-ness made me a “good mom.”
A lot of nurses and other caretakers I know also feel that they should constantly give to everyone around them, without also thinking about their own health.
Young girls and women receive the message that their worth is in giving to and nurturing others. Nurses receive honors and accolades for being “selfless” in delivering care to their patients.
But if we stop to think about it, what does selfless actually mean?
If you look up selflessness in the dictionary you will find it to mean “having little or no concern for oneself; motivated by no concern for oneself but for others, unselfish.”
Unselfish.
No wonder the nurses and moms I work with feel “guilty” when they take time for self care. They think, “self care inherently focuses on the self, but I’m not supposed to do that, because then I am selfish.” The ultimate no-no quality in a caregiver.
As I hope and wait for society to change the narrative it gives to young girls, we can start by recognizing our own thoughts about feeling guilty or selfish when taking care of ourselves. As we begin to change how we think about caring for ourselves, our friends and daughters will notice and learn from us, too.
If we change the phrase self care to something with less moral judgment, I believe caregivers can start letting go of the guilt when they spend some time relaxing. We can begin encouraging each other and make self-care a normal, accepted part of daily life. No element of our worth involved.
Because let's face it, when you don’t spend time in self-care activities (ie: time spent activating the parasympathetic nervous system) your body begins to accumulate stress, and that’s when physical and mental illness can take hold.
Self care without the guilt
So how can we begin to think differently about self care to release the thought, “I should be doing something else?”
1. Identify why self care is important to you
What are you trying to achieve by spending more time on your health? Think about how you want to feel in your mind and body, and why you want to feel that way.
Do you want to walk into work without feeling anxious? Do you want to be able to relax in your bed at night and easily drift off to sleep? Do you want improved digestion and less painful bloating? Do you want to feel more in control of your emotions and stop yelling at your kids when you’re overwhelmed? Or maybe you’d love to age gracefully and be able to walk until your last days.
Take a few moments to dig a little deeper into why you really want to start focusing on your health.
2. Release the feeling of guilt for taking care of yourself
If you start to feel guilty for going for a walk or reading a book when the house is a mess just notice the feeling. Do not try to push it away. Allow it to come along with you, kind of like a jacket. Eventually it will fall off if you don’t resist.
Notice the thoughts you associate with feeling guilty. For me, guilt-creating thoughts include, “I really should be doing something else. I don’t have time for this when I need to cook dinner, help with homework, and get ready for work.”
Sometimes sneaky thoughts will creep in that you don’t even realize are making you feel guilty. You have the choice to continue believing these thoughts, or notice when these thoughts come in your brain and let them go without actually believing the thoughts.
Over time with repeated practice, your body and brain will have habituated to looking forward to your relaxing time without any negative feelings attached.
3. Read through the list below of alternative phrases to self care.
These phrases are not stale or overused on the internet.
Pay attention to how you feel in your gut, or even in your chest, as you read through this list.
Is there a certain phrase that pops out? If you feel a little punch to your gut, take that as an invitation to begin using that phrase for the next few weeks to see if it changes your attitude toward caring for yourself:
Looking after myself
Balancing my nervous system
Self-love
Relaxation
Being my own advocate (this one is for the nurses!)
Calming/regulating my nervous system
Time for healing
Health-seeking
Health-awareness
My own well-being
Mental health
Emotional health
Time for joy
Fun
Stress reduction
My own thriving
Inner health (wow, this one got me)
The list goes on, and includes more than I imagined when originally thinking about this topic.
What else would you add to the list?
Which phrase caught your attention?
Write it down and commit to creating 10 minutes of “inner health” time each day. Put it on your calendar. No backing out. It’s a date!
4. Remember that two things can be true
I believe one of the most selfless things we can do is be selfish in the way we approach our physical and mental health.
You can selflessly take care of others and selfishly take care of yourself. Because when you are rested, nourished, and coping well with stress…oh man! Everyone around you will notice and benefit from how you are feeling.
This is how you will begin to feel better in your mind and body.
