Self-care at home: How to nurture yourself

Self-care is basic to our well-being and our health. It helps us gain energy and gives us strength to undertake our day to day. If we feel good, it reflects in our state of mind and our motivation.

So taking care of our body, mind and soul should be among our top priorities. Let us see then proposals for your self-care at home.

Excuses for not spending more time on your self-care

Do you think you do not have time to take care of yourself? Do you feel guilty when you put yourself first? Do you think you do not deserve to take care of and pamper yourself? Or you may think it is a waste of time; it does not matter. Perhaps you think you have more important things to do.

The importance of self-care

Sometimes we forget that we are the most important person in our life. If we are well, the people around us notice it and benefit from it. Mood and emotions are transmitted and spread. What do you prefer to spread? Sadness, anxiety, stress, anger …? Or rather joy, energy, motivation, the desire to take on the world?

Therefore, taking care of our health and well-being is not selfish. Self-care means giving importance to ourselves and our needs. And that also benefits others.

Pay attention to yourself

In the morning, when you wake up, take a moment to notice how you feel. Pay attention to your body and your mind. What do you notice and feel? What do you need? In other words, what care do your body, mind and soul seek today? Which activities give you energy?

Throughout the day you can repeat this action by closing your eyes and taking a deep breath. This way you learn to connect with yourself and with your intuition.

Basic self-care

The first thing in order to feel good in our own skin is to take care of our body. Good hygiene, diet, physical activity and rest are basic for this.

Take care of your hygiene

• Shower every day.
• Brush your teeth at least twice a day.
• Wash your hands often.
• Get dressed.
• Hydrate your skin.

Take care of your diet

• Hydrate yourself well by drinking at least 1.5 litres of water a day. If you always have a bottle within reach, this is easier.
• Try to include a lot of fruit and vegetables in your diet. That way you satiate yourself with a lower caloric intake in addition to procuring necessary vitamins and minerals.
• Avoid junk food, industrial pastries, and processed food products. Their studied combination of fats, salt and sugar makes them irresistible. But they contain a lot of calories.

Move

Our body atrophies if we do not move. We also lose muscle mass quickly. Nowadays there are many articles and videos on the internet that teach you exercises of all kinds. So:

• Do cardiovascular exercises (aerobics, zumba, running on a treadmill or on site, dancing, HIIT training, body combat …)
• Train your muscles (push-ups, press-ups, sit-ups, weight-lifting etc.)
• Stretch your body to prevent and release tension. In this way you stay flexible and prevent muscular contractions.

Rest and relax

Recovering from the efforts of the day is essential to our physical and mental well-being. Therefore getting enough hours of sleep is not only important but necessary. Taking breaks throughout the day and relaxing also helps to regain strength.

Self-care for your mind

After reviewing basic personal care, let us see how to care for and nurture our minds.

• Create good habits and give structure to your day.
• Keep your house tidy and, thus, free yourself from a mental burden.
• Create a cozy atmosphere with decorative elements that cheer you up and feed your senses. Pictures, travel memories and plants brighten our home. Candles, aromatic oils or incense nourish our sense of smell.
• Limit the time in front of various screens, that is, television, smartphone, tablet or computer.
• Relieve the stress you may be suffering and reduce the stressors.
• Choose well what you feed your mind, that is, the contents you consume. How does what you read, listen to or watch serve you? Do you learn something? Does it inspire, motivate you or is it fun? Or do you just consume it out of boredom?
• Learn something new. Be it a topic, a skill, a recipe, a hobby, the spectrum is broad. Like our body, our mind atrophies if we do not exercise it.
• Share your knowledge. Teach someone something that you are good at.
• Have fun and entertain yourself with hobbies, crafts and board games.

Emotional self-care

Our emotional world also needs us to take care of it. So:

• Talk to your family and friends.
• Laugh and smile
• Listen to music. Create a list of songs that you love and that make you feel good.
• Express your emotions with artistic activities such as painting, singing, dancing or whatever you like.
• Write what you feel and think in a journal, in the form of a poem or story.
• Massage your hands, feet, arms, shoulders and neck when you feel tension. Or let somebody give you a massage if you are lucky enough to have someone at home who knows.

“Let us always meet each other with smile, for the smile is the beginning of love.” #MotherTheresa #SelfCare #EmotionalWellbeing Click To Tweet

Self-care for your soul

Nurturing our soul means caring for our spiritual world. That means connecting with ourselves, with our environment or with something higher. This point is very personal since some proposals depend on your beliefs.

• Connect with the present moment through breathing or meditation. Become aware of the sensations of your body and of what surrounds you.
• Look out the window and enjoy the views: sunrise, sunset, trees, grass. Take time to breathe in the air, notice the temperature, the wind or the sun on your face.
• Practice your belief, for example, by praying or reading sacred texts.
• Take care of the plants in your home. This is also a way of being in contact with nature.
• Help others.
• Take time to reflect on what is important in your life, your purpose, your aspirations.
• Feel grateful for all the good you have and that happens to you.

If you work at home

In addition to the above, if you work at home, I would like to give you some additional recommendations. It is easy for the boundaries between work and free time to blur. So try to establish working hours.

Then take short breaks every hour or at least every two hours. Get up from your chair to stretch your legs and rest your eyes. You can take the opportunity to do some stretches to loosen the muscles of your neck, back, arms and legs. You can even do a few short exercises.

If you find it difficult to stop for lunch and take breaks, I suggest that you reserve slots in your agenda as if they were meetings.

A final note

To take care of our well-being, self-knowledge is important. Extroverts relax and regain their energy from relating with other people. On the other hand, introverts charge their batteries and rest better with some alone time. Most of us are somewhere between the two extremes. So listen to your intuition and your state of mind to know how to best take care of yourself at a certain moment.

Do you attach importance to your self-care?

Taking care of yourself is one of your priorities? Do you take care of yourself in every way or are there aspects that you tend to neglect? How can you improve your self-care?

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