Tag: relationship with self

3 Pillars of Transformative Self-Care

~ The Healing Modalities ~ 3 Comments

Relate to Self.

We’ve heard the term “self-care” being thrown about somewhat recklessly lately. It could mean anything from taking a bubble bath, getting a massage, going out in nature, or drinking a frothy, sugar-filled drink. 

Yes, those are all things we can do to take care of ourselves – unless we’re cutting down on sugar, then maybe pass on the frothy, sugar-filled drink! 

The way I view self-care is in a transformative way. And there are three pillars of transformative self-care:

  1. 1. How we think about ourselves
  2. 2. How we speak about and to ourselves
  3. 3. How we treat ourselves 

All this adds up to how we relate to ourselves – our relationship with our Self. 

How we think about ourselves will determine how we speak about and to ourselves. If we mainly think thoughts that reflect poorly on ourselves, we will likely speak poorly about and to ourselves. This shows up in self-denigrating language spoken out loud to others, like “I’m so lame, you’ll never guess what I did yesterday!” Or to ourselves, “I can’t believe I messed that up again! Why am I so stupid?!” 

How we think about ourselves also impacts how we treat ourselves. If we don’t think we’re deserving of care, we will likely not take caring actions towards ourselves, even if we know what to do to take care of ourselves. This shows up in how we blow ourselves off by not doing what we say we want to do. For example, we scroll on social media when we have plans to take a walk instead. Or we eat three cookies when we said we’d only have one. We don’t take our commitments to ourselves seriously. We flake on ourselves. We self-sabotage. 

And then we wonder why our relationship with ourselves can feel so frustrating. Why we never do what we say we’ll do. Why we end up feeling disappointed with ourselves. Why we feel discouraged about our goals. Why we keep making decisions out of alignment with ourselves.

We can start to build ourselves back up, to transform how we care for ourselves. We had a strong sense of ourselves when we were little kids. Over the years, most of us got that knocked out of us unintentionally by certain adults, society, peers, our culture, the media. 

We can think about ourselves intentionally and with kindness and care. Start treating ourselves like our 5-year-old self who is just starting to learn more about the world and other people. What would we say to that 5-year-old when she (or he or they) makes a mistake? Or when she is excited about something she’s doing? Or when she is sad because something didn’t go her way? 

This is one way to engage in transformative self-care: by becoming aware of our relationship with ourselves and to start nurturing it even more.

Your turn: What do you want to think about yourself on purpose, with kindness and care? Here’s a clue: What would you love to hear someone else tell you about yourself? What if you tell that to yourself and you believe it? How can you practice believing it even more?

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Work with me: Want to see how self-care is transformative and can help you create the results you want in your life? I can show you how. I offer first-time seekers a complimentary 60-minute exploratory session. Sign up here.

What’s on your mind? It can be powerful to learn from each other and our common struggles when it comes to our practice of self-care–or just being a human being. If you have something you’re struggling with and would like some perspective, share it here. Your issue may be chosen and addressed in the next post–it’ll be totally anonymous.

Your thoughts about you

~ The Healing Modalities ~ Leave a comment

Room for kindness.

I’d like to remind us that our longest relationship is the one we have with ourselves. 

What if that relationship were loving, supportive, and kind? What if we knew that we’d always have our own back no matter what?

What would our lives look like then?

To see the difference, we have to look at what our lives look like now, with what we’re currently thinking about ourselves and telling ourselves about ourselves.

What this might look like are thoughts that judge, criticize, or put ourselves down.

In the below examples, it might sound like we’re saying these things to other people, but we’d rarely tell people we care about some of the things we’re so used to telling ourselves:

  • I can’t believe you did that again–so stupid!
  • You don’t know what you’re doing, as usual.
  • Why is this so hard for you?
  • You don’t deserve to have that.
  • This shows you’re not good enough to be chosen.
  • You’re not going to do it anyway, so just don’t even try.
  • Who do you think you are?
  • You’ll never get there.

It’s not surprising then, when we don’t do what we say we want to do for ourselves with this judge always beating us up or berating us along the way. 

Sometimes we’re so used to hearing this judge that we don’t know it’s there or even saying mean things to us. We just take it as “normal.”

When we become more aware of what we’re telling ourselves and how we’re thinking about ourselves, we can start changing the story and narrative. 

We can start being more supportive and kind to ourselves.

We can start believing in what’s possible for us. We can start believing new things about ourselves. We can start believing in ourselves. 

Your turn: Are you open to becoming aware of the thoughts you’re currently thinking about yourself? What is the narrative you’re telling yourself? Why are you choosing to think those thoughts or hold those beliefs about yourself? How can you incorporate more kindness and compassion in your thoughts about you? How would this change your relationship with yourself?

Feeling challenged by replacing your current thoughts with new, more supportive, and empowering thoughts? Sign up for an exploratory session here.

Subscribe if you want to receive this content directly in your inbox.

Work with me: Want to see how self-care is transformative and can help you create a more meaningful life in which you start committing to yourself and show up the way you want? I can show you how. I offer first-time seekers a complimentary 45-minute exploratory session. Sign up here.