What are some good self-care ideas?
Self-care and self-love are the strong foundation of self-growth. It depends on the individual to find where they need to care more.
Expensive or high-budget self-care doesn’t need for everyone.
Even though you have good self-care practices in your daily routine.
Updating it and finding more choices helps you to choose the one which you need for your better self.
Some essential parts of self-care practices which everyone follows or popular ones can’t be effective for you. Because sometimes you will find it more difficult to practice it daily.
For example, If you are a person who enjoys talking, then positive self-talk works great for you. You don’t need to listen to positive affirmations all day.
The more you dig into yourself and know yourself more.
You will sort out which self-care ideas you can add to your daily routine.
Self-care ideas examples: Evergreen ones
Physical self-care
- Healthy diet
- Enough exercise
Emotional self-care
- Doing your favorite hobby
- Meditation
Mental self-care
- Being kind to yourself
- Expressing gratitude
How does self-care increase self-love?
"Your priority is YOU!"
Do you like to update your self-care practices? Great!
The only person who knows you completely is you. Then knowing the self-care practice that needs for you is more important.
No one can make you happy until you do.
Women usually love a caring partner. Why expect from a partner or loved ones?
When we can care for ourselves best and love ourselves even more.
So just be happy so people will wish to be around you!
The vibe you create outside always depends on how to treat yourself.
Imagine when your work is pending (which is more important to you) then you will show frustration with your family.
Prioritize your work and care for yourself. In that way, you feel more loved and show more love and care towards others too.
How can I improve my self-care routine?
Think self-care is an essential part of your day. How you feel today is more important. The one thing that you do for yourself makes your day fulfilled.
Approach every day as a new day-“New page to fill in”. How you care about yourself on that day is more important.
- You might feel exhausted sometimes and think of skipping self-care practice.
- You find no time for yourself. Then during bedtime, you can relax and meditate for 5 minutes.
- Or you can write 3 things grateful for that day.
This practice of ending your day even though the day is over. It makes your mind feel relaxed and peaceful.
And the next day you will be waiting to start your day with a fresh mind.
Self-care need not concentrate on looking good. Good thoughts and feelings are also important.
Heard of mental self-care, physical self-care, and emotional self-care. These are the 3 golden rules of self-care.
What should I do every day to take care of myself?
If you got this question in your head. Kudos to your self-growth thinking. You know that 3 things are more important.
Bring your awareness to yourself.
Find where you are feeling low- Tired mentally, emotionally, or physically?
Even if you don’t feel low. Which part you will to grow yourself more?
Ask these questions yourself every day. You will dive into any self-care practices and find yourself feeling better.
There are 7 pillars of self-care. So many self-care practices. But all you can simplify is by focusing on 3 Basic self-care rules.
Why balance self-care is important?
Some Days you have a perfect exercise routine and a productive day. But felt something is missing. Then you missed taking care of your mental health.
Focus on where you need care.
Physical self-care
1. Slow Bath
Play some music. Lit up your favorite candle.
Allow yourself to take every moment to slow. Touch and feel every part of the body.
Your rush bath doesn’t notice that wound mark or mole of yours.
It need not be something other than a fancy bathtub in the Maldives or Thailand.
Just in your bathroom -your extreme private space. Do enjoy yourself.
2. Naked sleep
Heard about Naked sleep?
Then you can relate this to self-care practice. Your body needs to breathe out from that dress you wear all day.
Are you thinking of changing into a nightdress?
Even though it’s cozy and comfortable. It doesn’t allow your complete skin to breathe.
- Will it be comfortable? No, but after some time, you can relax…
- Do I have to do it completely naked? Yes, Try it lonely in your bedroom when no one is around.
You can also try it with your partner. It builds a strong relationship.
Why do I have to do it?
- Improves the quality of sleep
- All your skin breathes- Healthy skin
- Prevents weight gain
- Reduces stress
Still, counting the benefits? Jump into the bed naked today. It’s the total body self-care you can do with zero effort. Wake up with a reinvigorated body.
3. Follow a pampered sleep routine
If you find no time in the day. Then the best time to follow a self-care routine is at night.
As a nightly ritual I do follow,
- Brushing-Oil pulling
- Face wash-Skincare
- Fill my water bottle
- Foot care
- Write 3 gratitude statements for the day
- Play some music or affirmation with my speaker.
- Sometimes I use cucumber slices for eyes. It feels like it is needed for my eyes. All the heat in my eyes vapors. It also helps me keep my eyes away from the phone.
We always scroll our phones when we lie in bed as if like relaxation. To escape from this practice use cucumber slices.
Ditch that Bra
Feeling heavy. Take that bra out! BREATHE, Oh my god it’s a heavenly feeling.
- Wearing a bra at night should be avoided. Don’t treat it as an enemy because you need to wear it in the daytime.
- It protects from sagging- Sagging causes back pain. Keeping your breasts in shape is not for beauty, it’s also for health.
Whatever gives your body relaxation DO IT! Expect screen-time.
4. Move your body around
Settling into cozy and comfy clothes is so easy. You can rest your body when it is needed.
Suppose you wish to do something else but find yourself lazy in bed. Say 3 2 1 get up!
Find an activity that you look forward to, If you don’t enjoy the exercise you’re doing, you’re less likely to stick with it.
It can be going for a walk in the park, taking a yoga class, or playing tennis.
An easy way to make working out more interesting is by working out with a friend. Having a buddy to chat with while you’re sweating it out can make the time fly by.
Plus, you can motivate and push each other to reach your fitness goals.
Finally, listening to music or watching TV while you work out can also help make the time go by more quickly and make working out more enjoyable.
5. Do DIY skincare products for you
Grind some orange peel powder or make some aloe vera gel. Does it sound like work?
Really no. It’s more of being natural. Your skin deserves it.
Start with some basic powder grind.
- Green gram powder: Can be used as a face mask, bath powder, and scrubber.
- Dry it and powder it. Does not need preservatives.
Begin with knowing your skin type.
If you are involved then from bath powder to sunscreen you can make yourself.
Extremely satisfying when you do everything by yourself naturally.
6. Sun gazing + Gratitude
It’s perfect when you do it in the early morning( Before 9 am). You will feel more alive and blessed.
Expressing your gratefulness in nature is the best. 15 mins of sun gazing in the morning time is best for vitamin D.
Writing or counting the number of gratefulness is a great combo for perfect self-care.
You can try sun grazing with meditation or yoga. The wish is all yours. Combing two ideas can save a lot of time.
Mental self-care
1. Practice accepting all parts of you
Keep on trusting yourself.
On your bad days, your thoughts are more negative. Every failure every bad situation comes to your mind.
You have not been the best version of yourself. But it’s ok to feel inferior, anxious, and negative. Every human goes through this self-doubt phase.
When self-doubt question arises you have to strongly give reassurance to yourself.
Keep on trusting yourself. It’s okay to feel not productive or stick to that routine every day.
The woman with mood swings, less caring, and fuzzy is you. But remember you are also the happiest woman, excited and caring for everyone around you and active.
The days with a straight line of positivity are not how life teaches us. It’s like sea waves bring us up and pull us totally down. So be kind to yourself even on your bad days.
2. Take a hobby
- Gardening
- Listening to music
- Painting
- Reading
- Journaling
Whatever habit you might have. Even if you have a childish hobby never leave it when you become an adult (If even now you find it so happy doing it).
Why do I suggest spending time on hobbies?
You know that it improves our mental health. Actually, the good part is when you sometimes feel low (even though it’s normal) you think of doing something to get rid of that zone.
But your mind suggests 10+ ideas to do or sometimes blank.
When again makes us confused to making decisions- Decision fatigue is called. To be simple always have an activity( a hobby) whenever your mood goes down.
Jump to that activity and do it. You feel better. Don’t get stuck up with ideas in your free time. With the same activities create numerous ideas.
3. Focus on positivity
The more you are conscious about your thoughts more positive you can become. Initial days you will find it difficult.
Keep on noticing your thoughts.
- So practice noticing how you feel.
- Sometimes deep down something will be keeping you worried.
- Instead of avoiding it find it-Write it and take steps to solve it.
When you look into that problem with a positive approach then things start taking
In my experience, If I keep on avoiding my insecurities. I can’t cut it down completely. So instead of Ignoring it. I started acknowledging my insecurities.
Find reasons for my insecurities. Keep on asking questions and journaling them. I could completely kill it. But it takes time.
Don’t accept that as your character or something you are born with.
If it doesn’t takes you up kill it down-No victim of negative belief.
Why and when your negative feeling arises. This approach towards changing your negative thoughts to positive ones helps in the long run.
Then automatically you can focus more on good things.
Even though your attention is towards that negative thought write gratitude for others’ positive things you got.
4. Learn to say no
Kids do it so easily, As adults we struggle a lot with saying no to close ones. Always occupied or busy makes you feel overwhelmed and stressed.
Wish to relax in bed after a long week, say no to your party friends.
It’s actually a practice we have to build step by step. It is NO for everything then you find yourself guilty.
But ask yourself if you want to say yes or no to the thing.
Remember the way everyone has fun is not the same for you. Do say No to things when you truly don’t want them.
5. Plan your healthy week
We all want to be healthy-Eating the right nutritious food keeps us mentally healthy.
But going with the flow doesn’t work for sticking to a healthy diet.
Buy your veggies and fruits for a week.
Make sure you choose seasonal and balanced food items.
Do a weekly chart from Monday to Saturday. Discuss with your family.
What about Sunday? Do have some of your favorite home cooks if possible or else treat yourself to a good restaurant.
Eating healthy 6 days a week is possible when you have cheat days often.
Do be hard on yourself and forget your plan.
6. Practice mindfulness
Always feeling rushed? Felt lost in thoughts?
You are not alone. Am into this phase for a long that even I don’t know about it. But when I find myself busy but not productive enough.
I started noticing my activities. When I brought my awareness to myself, I always had a never-ending do-to list, wishing to do more things and consume more on the internet.
We will have certain important things when we set a goal in our life. When we complete it with satisfaction after days we can see ourselves improve.
Do bring your awareness to what to consume every day- food and social media.
Check what eats your time and cut down if it doesn’t come to the top 3 tasks for the day.
Practicing mindfulness is only possible when you stop consuming unnecessarily. Take it slow but accomplish all priority tasks.
This way I can find myself thinking about a few important things in my life or expressing gratitude. I am living in the moment and keep on practicing it.
Emotional self-care
1. Declutter
Do you often feel overwhelmed? Or struck? Then you are not been aware and organized.
Letting go of things, data, and apps that don’t serve you!
Staying aware of what you consume and buy is more important in this digital world.
When you can’t find your favorite dress in that cupboard. Losing all the energy finds that makes you feel stressed.
Declutter the one which won’t serve you hereafter. Keep it minimum. Organize things often.
These simple formula both online as well as offline gives you peace.
- Organize your photos-The road best traveled, Family is forever, Our best day-whatever you name your album let it be, delete that unwanted forwarded WhatsApp message.
- Uninstall the app that you don’t use.
Exclusive tip: If you can’t uninstall the default apps then hide it/remove them from your home screen. So many apps should not be given a place on your phone.
We might not even notice these small things can also make us feel better. If you remove almost everything and follow essentialism in your phone. You will be more aware and focused on using your phone.
Small practices of decluttering around you help your subconscious mind to notice what you really what in your life and ideas pop out.
Now you can get the point of how Emotional self-care is attained through decluttering.
2. Ask for help
Sometimes we wish everything must be done by ourselves. Asking for help from your family even if it’s tiny work can help you drop a piece of work from your mind. That creates relaxation.
Actually, we can prioritize our work and get some free time.
- For example, if you have 30 small to-do lists in a day and another day only 3 most significant tasks.
- Your scattered thinking of finishing that 30 tiny tasks also feels like a burden.
- But even if you finish 3 deep work tasks you feel more satisfied and you will have plenty of time to do things.
Surely from that 30 tiny tasks- some tasks can be asked for help even though it’s 2 minutes.
Your family also doesn’t want you to do all on your own and feel stressed.
Understanding this splits the task into-Only you can do. Anyone can do it. Then ask for help when needed.
3. Talk with a Supportive friend
Speak it out-the one who care for you without any judgement.
Sharing your progress or troubles gets your mind cleared out. Humans are social animals. We need support and acceptance. So often calling your friend helps you with emotional self-care.
Remember: Don’t call any random friend. The one who won’t judge you or make you feel negative.
4. Stop consuming
Maybe you will find it easier to scroll your phone. It feels like rest. You are doing it even when you are extremely tired. It’s all because of the Instant gratification you get from it. It makes to feel like you have done something.
In the long run, it doesn’t help you to focus. So consuming less will help in attaining mental peace.
Do practice screen-free week and spend time with nature and humans-The real humans.
Related: SCREEN_FREE activities for adults
5. Sit with your thoughts
You will have a reason for your thoughts. Find it. Positive built it. Negative overcome it.
Feel it-Change it.
From that important news to a bad incident your thoughts randomly rounds.
Sitting with your random thoughts feels like a movie. You could go from emotional, to funny, and hypothetical situations too.
Feeling anxious and stressed? Then sit and notice what kind of thoughts you are in.
Self-forgiveness: Giving a solution for that thought, letting go of that, or forgiving that thing will help you change the vibe of the thought.
The key importance to self-care is forgiving all your mistakes and keep improving from them.
Do practice this and it helps in overcoming your negative thoughts.
Write down your thoughts before doing this and after getting insights. If you are not aware and keep on feeling the same pattern again and again you can’t fit into your dream lifestyle.
Change your thought pattern with new positive thoughts.
6. Laugh
Be in situations where you can laugh out loud. Enjoying movies with friends, playing with a child. Do something that makes your stomach hurts.
I do watch standup comedy or play with my neighbor’s kid. Kids are so innocent and naughty.
Come out of the room and do enjoy some fun things.
It doesn’t happen with the flow. Sometimes we have to create situations to laugh and enjoy.
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