Archive for October, 2008

Dare to Care – Mental Self-Care

Friday, October 31st, 2008

So now you’ve heard me on my soapbox about self-care for several weeks, and last week I shared insights for how to care for yourself in my Coffee with a Coach #2 – Dare to Care About You.  But I’m not done with this topic!  It’s too important – I’ve just got to say a few more things on it before I move on to other issues.  (By the way – there’s lots of interesting stuff coming in the next two months!  I have new ideas, new things to share with you, and well…you’ll just have to wait and see!  Make sure you’re on the email list to be the first to know about these exciting upcoming things!)

This week, I’m excited to introduce a new way to take care of yourself.  I’ve had many requests from clients and non-clients alike for a recording to help with relaxation, taking a mental time-out, and utilizing some of the coaching tools.  I’m delighted to announce that I have taken your requests seriously and created a short 15-minute recording called A Moment of Self-Care.  It’s designed to help you have some structure to your mental self-care, but in a short, effective way.  (Hey, I’m realistic – I know you’re all still busy!)

This recording is not a traditional relaxation recording.  It’s really like hiring me to coach you for 15 minutes, whenever you’d like! I use all of my favorite self-coaching, self-care techniques in a short 15 minutes, which I think is pretty cool!  A Moment of Self-Care is an mp3 file that you can use on your iPod, burn to a CD, or listen to in any convenient way, wherever you need it most.  It is designed to be used daily, if you like, or it can serve as a teaching tool to help you learn the techniques and then use them in your life on your own.  It’s available on the PRODUCTS page of my website for $9.95.

Now, on to more about self-care!

Here’s another of my favorite hints I’d like to share with you: it’s easier to take care of yourself, to treat yourself with kindness and compassion, if you slow down.

We’re in a heck of a rush in our culture, dashing from this to that to the weekend right on to Monday morning.  I’ve even found myself rushing to yoga class, hurrying to squeeze in meditation, and zipping toward the next thing on my list, even if it’s watching a movie!

So how do you slow down, when you’ve got a zillion things to do?  Well, a good first step is to decide which of those zillion you choose not to do, as I’ve mentioned before.  However, slowing down does not have to mean cutting out a bunch of your activities.  Slowing down can be slowing your mind down, putting on the mental brakes, and allowing yourself to do one thing at a time, with your attention fully on it.

I’ve noticed that by doing this, I can play with time.  When I slow down my attention, take moments to breathe, moments to pay attention to what I’m engaged in, and really be here, I do not feel rushed.  I might be doing several things in a row, but if I do them all with my mind fully present, they do not feel rushed.  I do not feel overwhelmed.  Time does not seem scarce.

When my mind is focused on the present, not on the future or the past, time is at its most elastic.  The day feels more expansive, and I do feel as though I have all the time in the world.  Time and I do not feel like opponents.  Time seems to be waiting for me, expanding to let me do what I need to do.

Breathing helps me reach this state of mindfulness, this relaxed attention on where I am now.  Everything feels less urgent, I’m much more likely to be kind to myself, to listen to my body’s messages, and to see what’s going on in my thoughts.  I’m able to be present with myself and with what I’m doing, and I become the team of me and my body rather than the dysfunctional family of me and my body.  Plus, I enjoy what I’m doing SO much more, even if it’s not my favorite way to pass the time.  I don’t love book-keeping, but doing it mindfully makes it less onerous, allows me to finish more quickly, and keeps me from feeling grouchy.  Much to my husband’s delight.

The more I talk about this to you, the more I think about how great it is.  Really, you must try it!  I’m having a blast, right now, writing, mindfully in the moment.  In the past, I might have looked at the clock and worried about whether I’d finish in time, think about what was coming next, and generally not settle into the moment.  Now, I’m HERE, with you, right now – nowhere else.  I feel relaxed, peaceful, comfortable, and in-sync with my essential self.

So, as you read this, take a deep breath.  Allow your eyes to slow down and take in each word, your mind to collect its attention on just this sentence.  Everything else will still be there when you choose to think about it.  Take another deep breath.  Pause.  Just be for a moment, right now.  Ahhhhh.  This is a fantastic way to take care of yourself, anytime, anywhere, whenever you need it.  Enjoy!

And don’t forget to talk to me!  Come check out my Top 25 Self-Care Favorites and share yours!  (It can be your top 5, 10, 15, whatever!)

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Posted in Adrenal Fatigue, Chronic Pain, Interstitial Cystitis, Life Coaching, Martha Beck, Mind Body Healing, Vulvar Pain, Vulvar Vestibulitis Syndrome, Vulvodynia, Vulvodynia Support | No Comments »

Coffee with a Coach # 2 Dare to Care About You

Friday, October 24th, 2008

It’s been so fun to hear what everyone is doing to take care of themselves!  Thanks for writing comments, everyone who wrote, and keep it up.  I think this is a very important discussion.  This week, I am giving you another installment of Coffee with a Coach.  Listen in as I talk with fellow Certified Martha Beck Coach Debbie Hurson about the importance of taking care of yourself, ways to do more of it, and how we as life coaches take care of ourselves.  As usual, feel free to comment on the post and email me or Debbie!  If there’s one thing we coaches have in common, it’s a love of communication.  We LOVE emails.  We love hearing from you!

To hear the recording, click the link below.  To download the file to your computer, right click (control click for mac users) and select “save link as.”

Coffee with a Coach #2: Dare to Care About You

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Posted in Adrenal Fatigue, Chronic Pain, Interstitial Cystitis, Life Coaching, Martha Beck, Mind Body Healing, Vulvar Pain, Vulvar Vestibulitis Syndrome, Vulvodynia, Vulvodynia Support | No Comments »

Dare to Care – A Revolt from the Tryanny of To-Do's

Wednesday, October 15th, 2008

Let’s talk about our to-do lists.  I’m going to use my powers of clairvoyance to see your to-do list…hang on, I’m accessing them now…I’m seeing a list that’s miles long, maybe even more than one list, with more items on it than you can actually do in a day…  Either I’m brilliant or I’m just looking at my own list, right in front of me.

When I started the conversation about taking care of ourselves last week, (Dare to Care – About You), I was excited that many of you responded and commented.  The conversation has officially started!  I’d love to hear from more of you.  A common theme seemed to be present last week – putting yucky “have-to’s” before nice, self care moments.  Yes, there are always things that “need to get done.”  The important word in that sentence is: ALWAYS.  So, if you think you’re going to get the work out of the way before you take care of yourself, you are sadly mistaken.  I hate to break it to you, but…

It’s never all done.  It’s never even done at all.  Just to hammer the point home, I’ll say it again: It’s NEVER done.

There will always and forever be things that “need to get done.”  Or “have to get done.”  Are you wondering why I’m putting those phrases in quotes?  It’s because it’s all perception.  You are perceiving that these things need to get done, but the truth is that many of them can be bought, bartered, or bagged, as Martha Beck likes to say.  I’m a huge fan of bagging them, myself!  In any to-do list, there’s something that can wait, can be eliminated totally, or can be done some other way.

Before you argue with me over that and tell me why each and every thing on your list HAS to get done, let me just stop you.  I don’t mean to be rude, but it’s for your own good!  Even if every item on your list HAS to get done because otherwise, the world will stop revolving, I KNOW that there’s something you can at least put off for another day.  I know there’s ONE tiny thing that you can strike from the list right now and replace with a self-care moment.

For example,  I bagged laundry last weekend.  I looked at the full baskets of dirty laundry, and I decided they could wait.  I picked up a good book and read, instead.  Did I feel guilty? No.  Did I think one more thought about the laundry? No.  (It’s taken me a while to get to that place, though, so don’t be hard on yourself at first.)  I LOVED my book.  And then, on Monday, I came home from my lovely self-care yoga class and discovered that my husband had done the laundry after work, unbidden.  This is truly a miraculous moment!  More evidence, I think, that taking care of myself is the right choice.

For those of you who are literally unable to do much right now, who have had to sideline your to-do lists in favor of survival, think for a moment of the power of your body.  I’m almost 100% sure that you were probably not doing much, if any, self-care prior to your physical collapse.  Hmmmmm….interesting, isn’t it, how now you simply can’t live that way?  The wisdom of the body is worth listening to – rather than beating yourself up over what you’re NOT doing.  Your body has made you stop the madness, and is actively trying to teach you how to rest and be kind to yourself.  Smart body!

It’s high time we supported each other in good, effective self-care moments (more on that in the upcoming weeks) before our bodies collapse and we have dreams of extended vacations involving nothing more exciting than our beds.  That’s why I’m promoting this discussion and asking you to participate.  I am of the opinion that many of the health forums on the web, while supportive, focus on negativity quite a bit.  I’ve pondered starting my own forum, but I’m not sure it’s the right move.  For now, I would like to experiment with my blog as a place where you can come to talk about taking care of yourself, learn more about how to do so, and share with others who are trying to learn the art of self-care and self-compassion.

Isn’t it nice to hear about others who are slowing down a bit, taking things off the to-do list, and treating themselves with kindness?  Doesn’t it help you allow yourself to do a little more here and there, for you, with less guilt?  And if you’re ill, doesn’t it help you to allow your body the rest and recovery it needs rather than feeling like you’re “less than” just because your body is healing?

Let’s support each other!  I’m here to support you, so please see this blog a bit like a forum now – that is my intention.  Come to talk to others, come to get a little coaching, come to support and be supported.  Write!  Write!  I want to hear from you!

So this week’s questions are (but don’t confine yourself to these only!): What are you feeling guilty about?  What are you doing this week to care for yourself?

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Posted in Adrenal Fatigue, Chronic Pain, Interstitial Cystitis, Life Coaching, Martha Beck, Mind Body Healing, Vulvar Pain, Vulvar Vestibulitis Syndrome, Vulvodynia, Vulvodynia Support | 6 Comments »

Dare to Care – About You

Wednesday, October 8th, 2008

Since I recently re-evaluated my lifestyle and came to the conclusion I was once again pushing myself too hard, I wanted to open a discussion on this topic with all of you.  I’d love to hear your comments about this post, because my vision for this blog is to make it more and more interactive.  This can become a place where there’s a sense of community, of healing, and of a collective sigh of relief in the midst of the craziness of regular life.  Which brings me to my topic…

How are you living your life?  Are you too busy?  Are you overbooked?  Are you getting enough sleep?  Are you always tired?

I want to know what’s going on with you personally, so that we can all have a discussion about this for the next month or so.  I’ve got a bee in my bonnet regarding this topic, because I think our culture supports the message that doing, doing, doing is somehow GOOD.  We’re overbooked, tired, and not taking care of ourselves, but it doesn’t have to stay that way.

I spend a lot of time giving my clients permission to do things like rest, say no to requests for their time/effort, and dial down the intensity of their lives.  I am glad to be a role model for this way of living- one that values being, resting, and listening to my Essential Self (don’t worry, I’ll be talking at great length about the Essential Self in a few weeks, so you’ll have some more tools to really tap into this intuitive inner self).  As a coach, I choose to be authentic, living what I preach.  It keeps me honest, and I like it.  I like living my life at a pace that feels good to me.  I like not letting our culture dictate my lifestyle.  I like going against the flow, the madness, and letting myself live with room to breathe in every single day.

My Social Self – the part of my psyche that wants me to fit in within my culture – gives me messages daily about how much work I should do, why I should not rest, why I need to be busier, etc.  For me, just knowing that I have a Social Self (want to know more about your Social Self? Read Following Your Own North Star by Martha Beck) helps me to make choices that directly oppose its opinion.  Sure, my Social Self thinks I should work constantly and tell everyone how busy I am.  Then she feels really awesome, like she’s successful and everyone will approve of her.  My Essential Self, on the other hand, would really prefer to go do absolutely nothing on a Friday afternoon, take naps, and go meander among the fall leaves before the snow comes.  She doesn’t give a hoot what anyone thinks of this plan.

So, guess what?  My Essential Self wins.  I’m starting a crusade, right now.  If you want to join me, I’d love it.  Let’s take a journey toward saying no to our Social Selves and yes to our Essential Selves, more and more and more.  I’ll promise to listen to my Essential Self, tell you all about it, and be the constant role model of an un-busy, sometimes even un-productive (gasp!), life, if you’ll share a little bit about your endeavors to do the same.

It’s time to take care of ourselves in a new and different way.  It’s time to give ourselves the gift of less rather than more.  What can you subtract from your day, today, to give yourself some do-nothing minutes?  Do it, and then give yourself permission to truly do NOTHING, for five minutes, guilt-free.  Then, go crazy and give yourself five minutes (or more!) to do something totally silly that you really love.  Anything at all.

If you want great health, taking care of yourself is not optional.  I would even venture to say that illness is the teacher who forces you to learn this lesson.  I plan to expound on this topic some more in the following weeks, because I meet so many women each week who don’t value themselves unless they’re working themselves into the ground.  I beg to differ.  You are all valuable, worthwhile human beings, even when you’re lying on the couch, imitating a vegetable.

I refuse to say I’m busy.  I’m done with that way of living.  I am not busy.  I work, I play, I rest, I do nothing, I breathe, I spend time with friends and family.  I live.  I take care of myself.  I am worth it.

Talk to me, ladies.  Tell me how you’re living your life.  If you’re taking the time to care for yourself, how are you doing it?  If you aren’t, why not?  Let’s chat!

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Posted in Adrenal Fatigue, Chronic Pain, Interstitial Cystitis, Life Coaching, Martha Beck, Mind Body Healing, Vulvar Pain, Vulvar Vestibulitis Syndrome, Vulvodynia, Vulvodynia Support | 16 Comments »