hello swedish potatoes
welcome back before taking self-care
seriously
this was what my day-to-day look like a
fried potato
who was perpetually stressed lethargic
and
uninspired constantly being this close
to losing it
and forever rushing from point a to
point b
i used to think i had to do every single
self-care task
every single day from exercising to
meditating to reading to journaling to
taking a bubble bath to lighting a
candle to calling my mom
or else i'm a failure and my mental
health
will be wrecked what i've learned over
the years is the importance of creating
a self-care toolkit for myself
making and choosing at least one to two
acts of self-care to practice daily
has done wonders for my mental and
emotional
health now that i've learned to take
better care of myself
it looks a lot more like this
fulfilled energized and ready
to take on the world these days the
phrase self-care gets thrown around
all the time but what does it really
mean why is it important
and how can we truly put it in practice
as we previously mentioned in our time
versus energy management video
it's helpful to have a repertoire of
self-care habits you can proactively
implement
before the going gets rough or fall back
on
when you're a blink away from burning
out today
let's deep dive into how to create a
personalized self-care toolkit
to help us be our best and most
authentic selves
for those who are just tuning in we're
on week four of the how to unpotential
your 2021 challenge but don't worry you
don't need to do these weeks in order
all the previous videos are linked down
below though if you are interested we
also created a digital worksheet that
accompanies every video as well as a
community on vibely where we can chat
dream big dreams together and keep each
other accountable with all that being
said
as always let's start with why
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self-care is essential to all of us
because it helps prevent burnout reduce
stress and allows us to refocus on what
is
true and important it's ironic that
we're on this never-ending quest to be
more productive but what we often don't
appreciate is that slowing down
and caring for ourselves first can be
the missing piece to helping us get
there
it can help us focus on what matters
most so that we can make time
every present with ourselves and our
loved ones it also helps us cultivate
more compassion
love and kindness for again ourselves
and others the best thing about
self-care we don't need to spend a dime
to get all of its juicy benefits and it
can also take
less than 10 minutes a day all that to
say to all my partially or fully far
potatoes out there whether now or in the
future
we need to inhale to exhale and slow
down to speed up
so now that we know it's important how
do we figure out what type of self-care
is right for us
our energy very much like us ups and
flows with peaks and valleys throughout
the day
as much as we've convinced ourselves
that we have consistent energy levels
throughout the day
it actually looks a lot more like this
as always the best use of our time is to
spend it on what we have control over
our energy instead of what we don't our
time
this is important because if we're able
to spend most of our time doing things
to energize us and know
how and when to take care of ourselves
we'll all go places
far far away from being a fried oily
greasy and perpetually stressed potato
so how do we understand what triggers
our dips in energy
we'll share two quick exercises to help
identify activities that give us
energy and drains our energy the first
is keeping track of your energy levels
throughout the day
drawing energy graphs will help you
visualize your energy and tangibly see
where you have a dip in energy if you
guys want a more detailed breakdown and
explanation how to do this i'll time
stamp a video down below as well as up
here in the corner
the second is james clear's habit
scorecard write out every single thing
you do from the moment you wake up to
the moment you go to sleep at the end of
the night go through every single task
and give it a plus sign if it gives you
energy
an equal sign if it was neutral and a
minus sign if it drained your energy
do this for a few days and you'll notice
patterns specific activities that give
you energy
as well as activities that drain your
energy make note of the ones that give
you energy
will need it for this next section
what is self-care and what does it mean
to me why self-care important to me
what acts of self-care works or has
worked for me
think back on week one two and three's
reflections
when were you the happiest when did you
feel the lightest
what were you doing and who are you with
self-care to me means taking good care
of yourself
so that you can show up to the world
your best and most authentic self
and take care of others it also means
taking responsibility for yourself i
love this quote
self-care is an attitude that says i'm
responsible
for myself and this is from a book
called codependent no more
how to stop controlling others and start
taking care of yourself i
loved controlling other people still do
so this speaks
very very deeply to me why is it
important to me
though i'm not living for others i'm
living to serve others and to be able to
do that i need to first serve myself
well most of us are unintentionally
living our lives
and we all want to be on the other side
of that which is
more intentional living so what has
worked for me we're getting to the fun
part this
is creating your self-care toolkit
to help us break down self-care let's
take the dimensions of wellness as
inspiration and a starting point
breaking it down into physical
wellness mental wellness emotional
wellness and social wellness let's start
with
physical i personally think this is the
most straightforward and tangible
dimension out of the ones we're going to
be talking about moving your body
feeding your body getting proper rest
and maintaining an environment that
brings you peace
and joy as we've always talked about
there's a connection between
our inner and outer worlds what's on the
inside will manifest on the outside and
vice versa
whether it's the food we're consuming or
the environment we're living in
especially now that we're home
almost 24 7. be mindful of all of that
whenever i'm feeling stuffy or static i
get up to tidy for five minutes to clean
up my space
whip up something healthy using food as
fuel or go for a walk as it's
massively relaxing and helps me slow
down
so if you think back on 2020
what were your self-care go-to's for
physical wellness
and if they weren't where you'd like it
to be or if you feel like they're
not the ones that spark the most joy
what do you think they could be
dream lists are important next we have
mental wellness or personal growth
learning and trying new things getting
creative and just giving ourselves space
to breathe new ideas can arise at any
time but they tend to occur
more frequently the more relaxed we are
when feeling mentally drained or
unfulfilled reconnecting with
spirituality helps ground me the most
either through meditating or reading and
as you guys know i also love
learning through books either it's
getting lost in fiction or non-fiction
mostly
non-fiction but even sometimes fiction i
just finished the next person you meet
in heaven and i bawled throughout the
whole book but that is a story for
another time just
allowing your brain to fire up and to
dream up and just taking your mind
places that you don't usually take it if
you're just living your day-to-day
being yourself and consuming the things
that you usually consume which is
probably just like social media and
scrolling through your phone and youtube
which i am very guilty of
so reading is great for learning
and there's also taking breaks doing
nothing taking naps or even going to
sleep earlier
also massively helps my mental health
and as you guys can see
sleep can also very well fall under
physical wellness so this really is just
what works the most for you and knowing
what you can do
for these specific dimensions of
wellness so for all of us it could be
very different it could be very similar
but at the end of the day what matters
most is
what works for you moving on to
emotional wellness this includes being
aware of our feelings positively
handling stress
what helps me be most mindful and aware
of my feelings is really brain dumping
and writing everything out when in doubt
write it out
yes yes journaling is great there's so
much benefit in just
sitting in stillness with you and your
own thoughts with a pen and paper
writing everything down asking yourself
big questions small questions hard
questions
easy questions no questions just letting
it
all flow and pour out there's just so
much beauty in that
and when i need a little reframe to help
me positively handle stress i lean on
those who
know me well and who know what to say
exactly what to say
when i need to hear it which is mom and
dad or some of my closest friends
shooting them attacks hopping on a call
just letting it all
out and realizing that things aren't
ever as bad as you think they are
this is a great segue into social
wellness having a sense of belonging
acceptance as well as meaningful and
quality relationships what i've learned
over the years is that whenever i'm in
need of some tlc
sometimes giving that tlc to others will
actually make me feel a lot better
because seeing friends happy also makes
me happy so for example
acts of servicing your friends sending
your girlfriend flowers
doing things for friends doing things
for your mom doing things for whoever
you're living with with your roommate
seeing them happy serving them seeing
other people happy
makes you happy and that's also human
connection whether it's face timing a
friend
whether it's being proactive with
scheduling social distance
walks or coffee dates doing things that
will nourish your soul
so once we've defined our self-care
toolkit write it all out on a post-it
note and stick it on your most visible
wall or you can also write it in your
journal bookmark that page and revisit
it frequently as you work your way
through the coming days weeks and months
add to it with things people and acts of
self-care that bring you
absolute delight now to tie it all back
take a look at your energy crafts or
habit scorecard when you're experiencing
a dip in energy which self-care activity
could help the most
which draining activities can you do
less of and which energy boosting
activities can you do more of give this
new system a try and let me know what
you guys think of it you can also find
almost
4 000 productive potatoes chatting about
the weekly challenges
including this one of course in our
online community on the vibely app that
i'll link down
below and with that thank you so much to
hellofresh for sponsoring this video
one self-care act i've grown quite fond
of as you guys have seen is to slow down
by making myself a nice meal
at the end of a long day it's an added
bonus being able to use
fresh pre-measured ingredients and
recipe cards to easily whip up a
delicious meal in less than 30 minutes
hellofresh offers an array of recipes to
choose from each week which is massively
helpful when my brain is mush
by the end of the night and just want to
be told what to do
that happens sometimes you can easily
change your food preferences whether
it's low calorie vegetarian and
family friendly delivery days and skip a
week whenever you need
pre-portion ingredients also means less
prep time and less
food waste it's delicious it helps you
save time it's flexible you can eat more
sustainably
hellofresh has also donated over 2.5
million meals to charity in 2012 and
this year is stepping up their food
donation
amidst all that's been happening in
2020. if you like to give them a try go
to hellofresh.com and use my code 80
rowena tie to get a total
of 80 off across 5 boxes including free
shipping
on your first box thank you swedish
potatoes
for watching this video especially all
the way to the end i really hope with
this new
self-care toolkit walkthrough you guys
will be able to have
your best year yet we talk about this
every single year but i really do
believe
2021 many great things will be happening
then
and until then sending you guys the
biggest
voice hug you guys are the best love you
see you guys next week bye