Our discussion on self-care was prompted by a lack of care for myself that I needed to admit to and work on. We had such a great discussion and I heard from a lot of you (through email and through your comments) that you were making it a priority to care for yourselves. For those of you that missed our discussion, I encourage you to read our entire discussion and to start taking some steps towards caring for yourself.
I wanted to share with you the improvements that I have made towards these goals:
1. I am managing my time much better. Now that Blogger has finally added the feature where you can publish into the future (doesn’t that sound cool the way I worded that?), I am actually able to do the majority of my work on the weekend and I just schedule my entries to publish during the week. I have started devoting my time on Sunday afternoon towards getting my posts ready to go from Monday through Thursday so I can concentrate on family time throughout my week. The computer is ruling my life a lot less and I have less on my shoulders in the mornings to worry about.
2. I am working out regularly. I almost hate to admit it, for fear that I will get off track, but my working out is going really well. I am still going to the gym and am indulging in that in the evenings on occasion, instead of my trips to Goodwill. I am also running in my neighborhood (to help save on gas) and we are planning to invest in a treadmill so that my husband, who is a runner, can also enjoy working out in the winter and training for his runs in the spring & summer. Whether I will continue at the gym, I am unsure, especially if we invest in a treadmill for our home.
I never thought I would be the type of person that would work out regularly, but I really am proud that I am. Some of the positive side effects that happened because I am exercising regularly are that I have more energy during the day, my mood is much better after I have had those nice endorphins releasing into my system, and my troubles with insomnia are almost gone. I am sleeping so hard that we now have a new problem on occasion…snoring! In all seriousness though, I am feeling so much better about myself for adding this to my life.
3. I am making time for hobbies now. My new knitting hobby has been the best form of self-care yet because it has calmed me down a lot in the evening hours. I have found that I am more creative than I give myself credit for and I am trying to focus this creativity into benefiting my children too. We are spending more time crafting and enjoying time together now that I don’t feel so busy all of the time. Our evenings are spent in our backyard indulging in conversation and fun summertime activities.
4. I am also continuing to reduce the clutter in our house and am trying to be more purposeful about the things we bring into our lives. One commitment that I made to myself (which has been extremely hard) is to not go to garage sales this summer. I know, HARD! I haven’t brought as much in and I am finding that I can be more inventive with what we already own. Best of all, I have a little less to clean and a little more room to entertain in. When things come in, things go out- sounds simple enough, but I am still learning.
5. I am trying to do more for others by donating my time and talents to some great causes. The more that I am doing for others, the more I feel better about myself. It isn’t anything extravagant that I am doing, but they are little things that have made me feel better about how I can help other people. I am still working on this so I am looking for opportunities to give back to others in our community.
Basically, I am feeling a lot more balanced than I was before. I am trying to talk less about how busy I am and more about how fulfilled I feel from the great things I have added to my life. I am saying no to more and missing out on some things, but I am concentrating on building our family unit up and strengthening the important ties that need strengthening.
How is your self-care going? What are you doing lately that you feel really proud of?
Yeah Amy!!!! That all sounds really great!!
My form of self care right now is dealing with our finances to attack and pay off our debt. That has been a HUGE stress for me over the last 5 years and we are finally in a place to make some major headway. I don’t like looking at the numbers and working on a budget but I know it is worth taking care of for myself and my family.
I’m also working on going to bed earlier and getting more rest. Getting up earlier to walk is my next “thing” to work on. Thanks for sharing your life with us!
Lisa
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Way to go!!!
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Good for you, Amy! I need to get back on the workout routine, but for now I’m satisfied knowing I’m not working around the clock (one of the dangers of being a work-at-home mom….)
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Sounds like you’re making great progress, Amy! I am glad you are continuing to discuss this great topic.
I am working on:
1) getting to bed earlier – this is going pretty well for me. I have started getting up earlier on nights I get to bed at my target time. I am a morning person and love spending some alone time seting my goals for the day before my daughter gets up.
2)limiting my internet time – this is going pretty well too. I had never used google reader before, and it has been a huge timesave for me. I subscribed to the feeds I want to look at and it helps keep me from “wandering” aimlessly.
3) increasing my workout frequency – thanks to the recommendations from your great audience I have 4 DVDs I’ve been using to work out at nights, and I continue to take a class at the Y on Saturday. I am definitely getting back in shape, enjoying the workouts and feeling more energized throughout the day.
4) I am still struggling a little with (but working on) setting and keeping appointments for myself. Right now I am focusing now on finding a hairdresser I like near my work so I can go during lunch. I have defintely let this slip and would like to get back into the habit of something other than the poneytail!
Take care,
Steph
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That’s great, Amy! Those are really great accomplishments. I’m working towards making sure I eat enough healthy foods during the day. It’s easy for me to make sure kids eat healthy, and then ignore taking care of myself. But I’m changing that.
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It’s funny you posted this today- I just wrote on my blog about an incredible book I read a couple years ago called “Take Your Time: Finding Balance in a Hurried World”. It’s a quick read and I’d highly recommend it. It honestly changed the way I live.
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I’m inspired! I really like reading what you have been working on because it makes me feel like I could actually do it too. I really need to get more exercise and I just don’t have any idea how to fit it in. I’m not a gym person and I don’t like running. I really like yoga, but it is expensive! I like bike riding, but don’t get to do it enough. I’m inspired by your insomnia fix because I have a horrible time sleeping!
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YAYNESS!
I so feel ya on this one. I have declared some days NO blog days wherein I don’t even touch the PC. This by far has made me more productive on the things that realy matter / are a higher priority.
So I applaud you and totally get it Amy!
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You know, what’s ironic. I handle public relations for an upstart Web site called The Take Care Project (www.takecareproject.com) that’s mission is to get moms to take time for themselves EVERY day, and I often find that I’m not following my client’s advice.
I take on too many projects, do too much for other people, stay up too late and generally feel frazzled — which doesn’t benefit me or my family.
But I’ve been deliberately trying to rectify that. Just passed on another client to a colleague to free up my time. And last night, instead of staying up to do laundry, I laid down when my son did and fell asleep at like 9:30. That’s unheard of for me. But it made for a much better day today.
I need to do more of that.
I hope your readers will visit the Take Care Project and read some of the articles we’ll be posting there over the next couple of weeks. (Web site is under construction at the moment, but it’s going to be up and running any day now.) We’d also love to see articles from moms who are taking time and taking care of themselves.
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Thanks for this post, Amy. I enjoyed reading your progress especially because I think we have some similar tendencies. =)
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