Managing the Holidays and Self-Care

The Holidays are Here! For some this is the best time of the year. For others this time of year only brings stress, anxiety and the feeling of not “measuring up” or “not doing enough for others”. In pursuit of trying to please everyone around us, often we get lost in the shuffle. Now when I say we, I mean each and every one of us. This sense of losing one self in pursuit of doing it all can be very difficult and bring on unnecessary depression, anxiety and feelings of guilt or not measuring up. The idea of taking care of oneself, or taking time for self-care seems selfish, impossible, and even just crazy. The irony is, when a person takes the time to take care of themselves, they are a much better at giving to others what they need.

In this blog post I wanted to spark some conversation around this topic. Self-care is a hot topic out there, especially in the world of mental health. Here are some common misconceptions about self-care. It’s selfish; the idea of taking care of yourself takes time away from others, it brings on guilty feelings that you’re not doing enough or spending enough time caring for others. When a person spends so much time caring for others, they get exhausted and begin resenting those around them or resenting “all the things” they are doing. Sometimes this resentment actually is subconscious and it shows up as an irritable, frustrated, short tempered individual. Taking time to take care of your self will refresh you, recharge you so to speak and in turn you are able to be more fully present for the ones around you. This looks like more patience, being able to be calm, especially when there are tight schedules, things to do and places to go. You will be able to enjoy the different roles of partner, parent, son or daughter, sibling, employee or boss.

Another barrier that people try to put in place is that self-care takes so much “time”. No one ever laid out rules that say if you don’t spend a certain amount of time on self-care, then it doesn’t count. Truly- self-care can be even just a few moments of deep breathing to help ground yourself to continue with the moment or stressful time your in. It can be simple, like sitting in your favorite chair and just being present, just enjoying your surroundings, just allowing yourself the grace “not to be doing anything at all”. If you find yourself with little time or money to invest in the concept of self-care, then find the moments, the 5 minutes, the 10 minutes of doing something that YOU like to do. Allow yourself the grace or self-compassion to “not get it all done”, to not get all things on your to do list done. Life will truly be ok and life moves on even if your to do list is not done for a day or even a few days if needed.

What are Your thoughts on this topic?