Self Care When You Feel Like Crap

When we feel like 'crap', it can be hard to practice mindfulness and take care of our emotions, mind, and body. I came on to share a few simple techniques that help me on days when I don't feel that great and am a human with my foibles and imperfections and all. Join me!

Transcript

Hello and welcome.

I figured I'd come on for a moment and share a little of my experience today.

As an embodiment coach and meditation facilitator,

Somatic educator,

I think one of the important aspects of what I do is share my own experience and be transparent with my humanness so that it's more accessible to all of you.

And so that you know that learning and healing and personal growth is accessible and not just for people who have put in thousands of hours or are way far away from where you are.

So I want to get a dental appointment today,

Which I don't love,

The dentist,

First of all.

And it was for deep cleaning and I got anesthesia.

And I have recently been dealing with like some headaches,

Which I haven't been perfectly taken care of.

And so I knew I might get a headache from today,

From today's appointment because it's,

You know,

Stress on the head.

And of course I wake up and there's a snowstorm because I live in the mountains in Colorado.

So then I also had to deal with the stress of driving in a snowstorm over the pass to get to my dental appointment.

And just driving in a snowstorm can give me a headache because it's like literally dangerous to drive in a snowstorm.

But this has been rescheduled twice since last summer,

So I had to show up.

Anyways,

I got there okay.

But a semi-truck almost crashed on the way,

So I had a little scare,

But I have an awesome car so that was great.

And then I got the dental appointment,

Listened,

I was listening to a book on tape,

Doing all my somatic practices,

Deep breathing,

Got through it,

Decided to sit at a coffee shop,

Snowstorm gets worse.

So I'm like,

Oh crap,

Okay,

I got to drive back.

Driving back in a snowstorm over the pass,

Started getting a more severe headache.

So what do I do?

What do you do when you have to deal with life,

When stress comes at you,

When,

You know,

The practices you've been doing might not be perfectly working in the moment you're dealing with the stress.

So I'm dealing with headache,

Migraine-ish pain,

I'm dealing with the pain of the dental work,

It was deep,

Deep cleaning,

You know,

With anesthesia.

And I had inflamed gums or whatever,

So it took a while.

And one of my favorite questions to ask that really,

Really helps is how can I take care of myself while I'm going through this?

How can I take care of my human?

How can I take care of my body?

And it's not an abstract question because you can even ask your body,

Like as if you're in conversation with it,

How can I take care of your body while you're going through this?

Is there anything I'm missing?

Is there anything I need to do?

And my body immediately started giving me responses.

When you get home,

Go take a really nice bath with a lot of epsom salt.

Let your coaching client know later today.

It's probably better if you reschedule because you really need to focus on self-care.

This was unexpected as far as the migraine and the snowstorm.

Client was totally fine to reschedule.

What else?

Noticing the pain.

Can you take any supplements for inflammation?

What type of food can you eat to feel nourished tonight?

When you see your body as an ally instead of an enemy,

I could have gotten into a lot of stress and been like,

Shit,

I'm getting a migraine.

Now what?

Now I have to drive through this winter snow.

I'm so afraid.

This is so stressful.

And I could have really been focusing on the issues,

The discomfort,

The pain,

Kind of the suffering of my human self going through today.

Instead from practice.

So this is not my default,

But it comes from practice.

It's becoming my default to immediately say,

This is OK.

I'm allowed to be human.

I'm allowed to feel what I'm feeling.

I'm allowed to have the experiences,

The sensations,

The pain,

The tension.

And I can also invite in the ability to tune in to my body as a friend,

To ask it.

Let's be collaborative in this.

Let's take care of each other.

What do you need to take better care of me?

What can I do for you so that you can reduce the inflammation sooner,

So that I can get good rest tonight,

So that I can have a really good rest of the day,

So that you can show me how to not have the pain or the headache go into tomorrow.

Right.

Hopefully these are some helpful tips for you.

I see that we have a guest waiting,

So I will let you come up in one moment.

The one more thing I wanted to say was.

When you're dealing with stress like that,

You also get to ask questions like,

What else is possible?

And it's an open ended question.

I like asking what else is possible?

Show me.

Because you're kind of asking your intuition.

You're asking your like if you believe in guides or Holy Spirit or non local consciousness,

Whatever you believe.

You're kind of asking life and essentially your brain to access the creative problem solving part of your frontal lobe so that you can start seeing more of what's possible and more of the possibilities and potential of where you want to head.

Rather than focusing on the contraction and the suffering and the tension of where you currently find yourself or are trying to move away from.

So hopefully that makes sense.

And I think my settings are set to having whoever comes up to have about three minutes.

So you're free to comment or ask a question.

Welcome.

Welcome,

Misty.

You have the floor.

Do you have a question?

Have you have a question?

So it looks like Misty might be,

Maybe you're able to.

Let me give you another moment.

Oh,

Good.

Oh,

Good.

Okay.

Okay.

Well,

If you can make a making yourself.

And then come back on.

Okay.

If anyone else wants to ask a question,

You can.

So that was a weird tech,

Probably a tech issue.

Anyways,

I wanted to get on quick today and just share that because I have not had the best day as far as how I feel physically or even what,

You know,

Life shows up.

Like,

I'm glad that I was able to go get a teeth cleaning.

But yeah,

When we're feeling crappy,

Either physically or mentally,

We tend to focus on that.

We tend to focus on why am I here again?

Why is this happening?

How can I get out of this?

And we move sometimes we tend to focus on that and it almost moves us more into stress.

If we can invite ourselves to acknowledge one,

I'm allowed to be I'm allowed to feel crappy,

First of all,

So that we don't put pressure on ourselves to suddenly have to change how we feel.

Because that can be an invalidating experience.

So the first thing is I'm allowed to feel crappy.

This is my any emotion I feel any thought I have any stress I'm going through is okay because I'm a human.

And is there anything I can invite in invite into my experience to self soothe to bring an aspect of relief so that I have the opportunity and the accessibility to move in a direction of feeling better if I choose to without invalidating where I am.

And that has been a really key piece in just my own personal healing,

But how I've approached working with my embodiment clients,

Because a lot of times we feel like we should feel different or should move away from how we're feeling.

And that's okay,

But then we don't actually allow ourselves to process the feelings or we become afraid of the feelings we become afraid of the narratives that we have defaulted to when we validate from a place of self compassion from a place of grace from a place of holding space for ourselves.

It allows us to move through it.

And then invite in the shift.

So as I finish,

Because I'm about to go take a bath and take care of myself.

What you can leave with are these types of questions,

How this is,

I'm allowed to feel this this is okay.

I give myself permission to be human in this moment.

What else is possible show me body.

Is there anything you need from me right now that I can help you with that I can support you with.

What need,

Can I meet for myself in this moment.

And you can even get more specific what emotional need can I meet for myself in this moment.

What physical need,

Can I meet my for myself in this moment because for example first thing my body's like water,

It's almost always water.

What need do I have water.

Oh yeah,

Okay drink water.

Then it's nourishing foods then it's bath,

Then it's be gentle with yourself today,

It's okay if this feels shitty,

It's okay if you feel tension in your head.

Remember,

Be open to the supplements that help with inflammation,

Turmeric,

Ginger.

Remember the fire cider.

Don't you don't have to stress too much about this,

Build come into moments of meditative trust in your body that it's brilliant that it's always wanting to be your ally and coming into support of health and balance.

And of course sometimes what need can I meet right now,

It can be,

I want to call a friend,

I want to call my partner,

I want to call a trusted person in my life.

You know,

Because sometimes the co regulation the community aspect is exactly what you need.

That moment and if it's available.

That's what we go for.

Hopefully these are some ideas that help.

I would just wanted to share my experience as I was going through not feeling my best today.

So you could know that,

You know,

Especially on social media,

Marketing and all that we always try to put our best self forward but we're also allowed to be human through this whole process we're allowed to show up as humans which means imperfect.

Which means exactly who we are in any given moment.

Have a wonderful rest of your day,

Evening,

Wherever you are in the world.

And take care.

Reviews

Just what i need it to hear today. Can you please share what supplements are helping you with inflammation? Thank you 🙏💕

Excellent topic and I think you covered it very well. In the last year I have started talking to my body and I get so excited when she answers me. I still find it hard to remember to ask my body when the pain is very severe but we are working on it and that makes me feel good. Thanks so much Lydia I always come away from your sessions with alot of food for thought. 🙏🙏❤🤗

Thank you

"What else is possible (in this moment)?...Show me!" This is a new extremely valuable tool that I'll be adding to my toolbox. Especially needed during those moments I find myself in a D-Hole (depression hole). Sometimes gratitude can morph into guilt & shame thinking, "Yeah, but I don't deserve all of these things I'm grateful for" & other lies created from a depressed state of mind.
So, "What else is possible, show me!" Is so freeing from guilt that says I SHOULD be figuring these things/my problems out all by myself. Plus it softens the isolation aspect. It makes the "Universe has your back" concept more relatable.
Sorry you had audio difficulties but think it provided great takeaways anyway!
Thanks

Lovely points to remember Lydia, when I'm having a stressful day.. xo