Self-Care Is Not Selfish: Build Resilience During Coronavirus

In these anxious times, we can feel overwhelmed by stressors. Self-care helps us avoid burn-out, so that we can be our best selves in our relationships and in our work. Attend to your self-care with this brief resilience lesson and meditation, and emerge into your life with a sense of replenishment and renewal.

Transcript

Welcome back to another resilience building session in anxious times.

Today's resilience building meditation is on the topic of how self-care is not selfish.

This is actually one of the most common misperceptions I hear that somehow taking time to nourish ourselves is selfish,

That we should somehow,

And there's the self-judgment coming in,

That we should be able to give to everyone else in our lives and attend to ourselves last.

This is especially true among fellow moms,

And I know I felt that way too.

And one of the most powerful lessons in resilience is that the more stressors that are present in our lives,

The more supports we weave in,

The more supports we need to weave in,

In order to sustain ourselves and even to have the chance to thrive.

If we have a lot of stressors in our lives,

As we all do,

Especially in this time,

We are feeling the effects of a lot of stress and overwhelm on our system.

If we don't take the time to nourish ourselves,

To engage in some self-care that helps us to become more present in our bodies and just a little more kind to ourselves,

We can quickly drive ourselves into burnout.

So that's why self-care is not selfish,

Because if we burn ourselves out,

If we are in stress and anxious mind too much of the time,

It's a chronic stress response that's actually very unhealthy,

That erodes our health in a lot of ways,

Physical,

Mental,

Emotional.

And when our health is eroded in those ways,

When we start to suffer the effects of burnout from chronic and continual stress,

Then we cannot be as fully present,

We cannot show up in our lives with our best selves,

Our most true selves.

And you may know this,

I know I see it in myself when I am in anxious mind,

I am not fully present.

And I often make more mistakes or I'm more preoccupied,

I'm not able to give to the situation at hand in the same open-hearted way that I could if I am able to be more present.

So self-care can take the form of many different things.

We can think about weaving in these resilience supports,

Again,

One of the most powerful lessons of resilience.

The more stressors are weighing down on you,

The more supports to weave in.

So today's meditation will focus on self-care.

And self-care can take the form of walking,

Of playing with a dog.

Just take a moment and reflect on your most important self-care supports.

What really helps to replenish your energy,

Renew your source of energy?

Let's take a moment to kind of reflect.

And ask yourself,

Am I doing enough of that in my life right now?

Can I weave that more in more intentionally so that I can replenish my energy,

So that I can renew my source?

Let's go ahead and find our comfortable position for today.

One that will allow you to feel supported and grounded.

And I'm going to ring a bell.

So as I ring the bell,

Just let your eyes close.

And as the sound of the bell fades,

Allowing your awareness to attune to sounds that are happening in your environment.

We'll also letting the swirl of sounds happen around you without needing to do anything about them.

We're just listening.

We're taking a few minutes for ourselves to nourish ourselves so that we can return to our lives more replenished,

More renewed.

Allowing your awareness to be drawn into the feeling of the breath that's happening in this moment.

Maybe letting yourself attune to the sound of the breath.

Just feeling yourself as this living,

Breathing being.

Noticing yourself sitting in this chair or lying down on the floor or your bed.

Wherever you are,

Notice how the chair,

The floor,

The ground beneath you is supporting you.

Perhaps even allowing yourself to feel held by the support underneath you.

To let yourself relax a little more fully.

And one really helpful way of allowing yourself to relax and arrive more fully into the present moment is through the breath.

The breath that helps to bridge,

Build a bridge between our minds and our body.

It is that bridge coming down out of anxious thoughts,

Riding the wave of the breath into the body.

You might allow yourself to just feel the breath in your chest or even in your belly.

Just inviting a few deeper breaths so that you can arrive more fully in this moment in your body.

Notice any agitation that may be present.

When we have agitated minds,

When we are restless in our minds and anxious,

We often can feel that agitation in our bodies.

Which is one of the reasons it can be so difficult to stay present in our bodies.

So by deepening our breath,

We are inviting our nervous system to return to a non-stressed state.

So on the exhale,

You might just invite a softening of any of the spots where you really notice that you are carrying tension in your body.

Or that you tend to carry tension,

Sort of your hot spots.

And allowing the breath to move through your forehead.

On the exhale,

Softening the forehead,

The lines.

Softening space around your eyes.

Relaxing your jaw.

Exhaling.

Exhaling your breath in the neck and letting the neck be a little more loose.

Soft.

Let the head hang a little more loosely.

Letting go of tension in your shoulders.

Even seeing if you can let go of a little tension in your heart.

Letting the breath move through your heart and just softening a little bit on the exhale.

Taking care of yourself.

Being kind to yourself in this moment by taking care of your body.

Taking care of your heart.

You might practice bringing a slight smile to your lips.

Almost as if you're smiling from the inside of your mouth.

See if you can just tune into the energy of that smile.

If it brings up anything in your mind or even more in your body.

Noticing the energy of a smile.

However slight.

And seeing if you can bring the energy of that smile moving down the waves of the breath into your body and into your heart.

So that you might almost imagine that your heart is smiling from the inside out.

Just noticing what that feels like.

And if it's hard to feel the energy of a smile in your heart,

You might try thinking about some activity that brings you joy.

Or some person in your life with whom you feel very loved,

Very seen,

Valued.

Even a pet.

Some activity or some relationship where you feel that you can be your true self.

Notice what you feel like when you call that to mind.

Notice if you feel anything in your heart.

Just breathing with whatever shows up.

You might invite yourself to bring your hand to your heart.

Just feeling the energy of that connection.

The energy of that compassion.

Gentle laying of hand on heart.

Just feeling the warmth and the connection.

Just allowing your breath to return to a natural rhythm.

Allowing your hand to rest back on the lap or your knees or by your side.

Maybe thank yourself for taking just 10 minutes to do an activity which can be so nourishing of your body,

Your mind,

Your heart.

So that you can give more freely to others from a full heart.

From a renewed resource.

And this really is the ultimate renewable resource.

This breath in which we can constantly renew ourselves or continually renew ourselves.

One breath at a time.

And be kind to yourself.

Even small moments of self care are so essential.

Whatever that may mean for you.

One of the most wonderful quotes I've heard about meditation is Three breaths a day.

Three conscious body centered breaths a day.

Is a good day.

Can you try to bring your awareness into your breath,

Into your body three times today?

Give yourself a self care day by trying that.

As the sound of the bell fades,

Fluttering open your eyes and just taking a moment to feel this renewed energy through the feeling of your breath.

As you notice color,

Shape,

Ground yourself in something that you see.

And see if you can take this renewed,

Re-centered energy with you as you rejoin the day,

The swirl around you.

I'll look forward to connecting with you next week for another resilience building session.

Be well.

Reviews

Very nourishing.

Thought provoking, encouraging, helpful! Thank you!

Thank you so much for this teaching/ guided meditation/ advice. I will certainly share it!
🙏✨❤️

Lovely experience. Very calming and soothing voice. I love the quote at the end too! Thank you and many Blessings! 🕊🌻🦋

Thank you so much. The weight of our unmanageable world can feel relentless at times. This meditation helped me to give myself permission to stand down from all the worry and come back to a relaxed awareness of a solid and calm inner life.

Calming and very useful meditation.👍

Important message, great pacing. Thank you! 🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻

Thanks so much for showing me how to focus on some self care. And the idea of 3 focused breaths each day will stick with me.

Today was a very challenging day, more than I really could handle on my own. Listening to this was exactly what I needed. Your voice was that of a good friend. Definitely time for some self care.

I fucken saw indigo light wave through my mind as she was talking.

WONDERFUL Reminder and Practice❣️🙏🏻💕

Thank you do much!

Thank you so much!

Thank you for this beautiful self-care meditation. I am aware of my breath more than ever before although I still forget to take care of me first.
Blessings of gratitude, abundance and self care🙏

Very good! Loved the voice pitch! Namaste 🙏🏽

Very helpful. Thank you ❤️

What a beauty🍀❤️