Are You Doing Self-Care Well Enough?

I have a mastermind group that meets monthly, and prior to our meetings, we all fill out and share a reflection form that includes an inventory on our self-care. “I have been doing self-care by . . .” This week, I blanked. Had I been doing self-care? Other than the monthly half-day retreat I attended at the beginning of January, I couldn’t come up with a single thing.

My friend and fellow mastermind member, Beth, promptly sent over a graphic of the 5 Stages of Burnout (this woman wastes no time in calling it as she sees it, and she’s never afraid to get after me, but then, she’s a coach’s wife).

“What stage are you in?” she asked me.

At first glance, I said flippantly, “Oh, probably Stage 3.” Later, upon taking a closer look at the stages, I amended my self-assessment to a more reasonable Stage 2. Still, when we’ve crossed over into anything beyond Stage 1, it’s good to take a look at what’s going on.

Here’s the thing: I am always in danger of burnout. Always. And I’m not alone. Most modern women are always in danger of burnout. In the pursuit of having it all–or having it forced upon us–our lives are a veritable juggling act. This means we must be extra diligent when it comes to self-care, to wellness.

I spent the next couple of days after our mastermind meeting thinking about current my self-care habits. When had I gotten off the rails? It was a few days before it dawned on me that the digression had begun last winter when my husband was deployed for four months. We live far from family, and while my village of friends and fellow homeschoolers hopped on board and provided backup when they could, I still had to make a lot of modifications to my habits. I gave up, for example, early Saturday mornings out of the house to write, and then I never returned to that part of my routine when E got home from overseas.

In the summer, I focused on my health for a while. I joined Noom and lost 30 pounds. But then fall came along with all its busyness, and I began to slide in my diligence. I pinned my self-care hopes on a week at the beach in October, then ended up working off and on while we were there in order to hit a deadline at my job and came home to the boatload of stuff that had piled up while I was “out of the office.” (Wo)man cannot live by biannual vacations alone–especially when we return from paradise to find the responsibilities we set aside for a week have doubled in our absence. Vacations come with a price.

In August, for my birthday, my mom sent me a gift card for a spa day. Do you think I got right on that? Nope.

I was forced to conclude that the only self-care habit I’ve kept up consistently for the past year is my monthly half-day retreat. And while those retreats are key to my wellness, they’re not the only key. They can only be part of my self-care package.

In thinking over all of this for the past few days, here’s what I’ve come to: self-care has to be diverse, and it has to be regular. A physical and spiritual retreat once a month is not enough. So what does good self-care look like? These are my self-care buckets:

• Spiritual self-care. For me, this looks like my monthly spiritual retreat but also daily time spent reading Scripture and other good spiritual books, prayer, listening to worship music, Communion, and simply making space to think about spiritual things and ponder spiritual questions.
• Physical self-care. This is something of a no-brainer, but it’s multifaceted, so it’s easy for me to get off-track. Eating well (lots of fruits and vegetables, whole grains, and little to no sugar), daily exercise (I really need to do more yoga), getting outside, and getting enough rest.
• Mental self-care. For me, this constitutes as alone time. I need brain space. Introvert space. Kid-free space. It doesn’t have to be complicated: a solo browse in the bookstore, an hour on the couch with a novel, a walk around the block, an episode of a show or a movie on my own. Even getting out of the house and working from a local cafe on a weekday morning will do it for me.
• Creative self-care. I am a maker. I have a deep-seated need to create. This is satisfied by writing, yes, but also by sewing, knitting, cooking, and even, apparently, making dollhouses. Creative output fills me up.

In order to keep all of these buckets filled on a regular basis, I have to be strategic with my time. This means the things that have to get done must be handled justly but also kept in their rightful places so they don’t obstruct my ability to engage in the self-care I need. Just as in a well-organized home, a well-managed life has “a place for everything, and everything in its place.” And if I consistently fail to make space for self-care, I have a harder time dealing with everything else, right down to tucking people in at bedtime. I have less patience and a shorter fuse; things feel heavier and more burdensome. The person who cuts me off in traffic or parks at an obscene angle to my car is a bigger jerk.

In addition to looking at my time management, I also had to take an honest look at what deters me from good self-care. The number-one culprit? The lie that self-care is selfish.

Appropriately, the retreat leader this month reminded us that Jesus himself practiced good self-care, and we can look to him as our example. He retreated, both alone and with his inner circle. He rested. He feasted. He created. He worshipped. He spent a lot of time outdoors. Self-care is not selfish. Self-care done right is Christlike because it enables us to be more Christlike. It fills us up so we can pour ourselves out for others, whether those others are our family, our friends, or the people we work for or serve.

Realizing I couldn’t put it off any longer, I sat down this week and made a list of the self-care things I need to schedule or put back in place. I booked that spa day. I scheduled a writing retreat. I registered for a homeschooling convention I’ll attend alone. These are things to look forward to. But I also attended to the big rocks that impact my wellness on a more regular basis. I talked to my husband about returning to my Saturday morning writing habit (thus, this post, being composed on a Saturday morning at my local Panera Bread). I looked at the latest course offerings in my online yoga membership (she’s got a new line of classes on combating overwhelm) and blocked out time for those. I laid out my must-dos for the weekend so I can have a true Sabbath on Sunday. First the plan, then the follow-through, one step at a time. And when I inevitably go off the rails again, I’ll have to circle back, reflect and reevaluate, just like I did this week.

What about you? What are you doing to care for yourself right now? Are you off the rails like I was? If so, can you see your way forward to getting back on track?

Image by Shahariar Lenin from Pixabay