Explore some of the less common categories of self-care, which include learning to make the hard choices that are good for you.
It's to our benefit to practice self-care habits beyond eating well, exercising, and getting enough rest. A broader view of self-care includes self-soothing, self-discipline, and a self-compassionate attitude.
Let’s face it: Self-care routines are difficult to establish and maintain. This is true even if we’re fortunate enough to have access to the resources needed, such as wholesome food and time to exercise, as well as the luxury of routinely getting eight hours of sleep.Most of us have been reminded many times to practice self-care for the sake of our own physical and mental health or general well-being. We have been advised to eat a healthyIt’s not difficult to see how these actions would improve general well-being; you might even consider them to beparts of a balanced lifestyle. That doesn’t make them easy to do, considering the many factors that might interfere with our efforts toward improved self-care. Most of us have days or even weeks when it’s very challenging to keep up these basic self-care habits. For example, if your resources are limited in terms of time or money, you might find it nearly impossible to routinely eat healthy foods or get in the recommended minimum of 30 minutes of exercise each day.of emotional and physical well-being. These wouldn’t completely replace the healthy habits noted already, but they might “sub in” on certain days as needed. On other days, these added skills can enhance the overall well-being derived from the self-nurturant skills., self-soothing is a skill learned from parents. Parents who themselves grew up with caregivers who helped them identify their emotions are naturally likely to do the same for their children. In my clinical experience, it’s uncommon to learn self-soothing during childhood. Past generations of parents were generally unaware of the importance of this aspect ofIn many instances, other, more urgent needs simply had to take priority over teaching emotional awareness and self-soothing skills. Providing food, shelter, clothing, and health care were necessary priorities and left no time or energy for efforts toward emotional Self-soothing can be learned at any age, and it can take many different forms. The process involves identifying what you’re feeling and then looking at your options for what might help you feel better. Self-soothing is different for each individual, depending on what helps them to feel calmer or less angry, sad, or worried., or compulsive gambling, have a strong potential to cause more harm in the longer term. Being prepared with your own list of healthy self-soothing strategies helps to lessen the risk of becoming stuck in these harmful habits.It may be obvious to many that self-discipline is a form of self-care. You know that you feel better and function better when you’re doing the right things for yourself and avoiding the wrong things. But for anyone who grew up with childhood emotional neglect, this awareness isn’t instinctive. If you were never required to maintain good habits, such as saving money or doing menial tasks, you may have never learned that you’re capable of these types of self-discipline.Self-discipline is defined by Dr. Jonice Webb as “making yourself do things you don’t want to do and stopping yourself from doing things you shouldn’t do.” This concept was beautifully summed up by one of my colleagues as “making the hard choices that are good for you.” Many of my past clients have labelled themselves lazy, or as procrastinators, when actually they simply hadn’t learned the benefits of self-discipline. My suggestion for learning to practice self-discipline is to choose just one thing you’d like to start doing each day, and make it a top priority. Or, you might choose one thing you’d like to stop doing, and replace that bad habit with a better one, one small step at a time.What does a lack of self-compassion look like? Judging yourself harshly, blaming yourself for mistakes, insulting yourself , and disliking yourself are all signs of a lack of self-compassion. Expecting perfection of yourself can also be a sign of lacking self-compassion. Just as the other forms of self-care can be learned, that is also true of self-compassion. It can be the most challenging self-care skill because it requires genuine self-love, not in theLearning self-compassion is a complex, multistep process that takes time and continuous effort. Rather than try to simplify it to fit the context of this post, my intention is to follow up with a second post on that specific topic.Self-care is much more than eating well, exercising, and getting enough rest. A broader set of self-care skills includes knowing how to soothe yourself, practicing self-discipline, and being compassionate toward yourself. Although many people are not taught these skills during childhood, for various reasons, they can be learned at any age.Life never gets easier. Fortunately, psychology is keeping up, uncovering new ways to maintain mental and physical health, and positivity and confidence, through manageable daily habits like these. How many are you ready to try?Self Tests are all about you. Are you outgoing or introverted? Are you a narcissist? Does perfectionism hold you back? Find out the answers to these questions and more with Psychology Today.
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