Taking care of yourself Archives

July 17, 2013July 17, 2013

What Does Radical Self Care Mean to You?

I was on Facebook yesterday (big surprise) and I glanced at a post that said, “What does radical self-care mean to you?” I didn’t read the rest of the post or think about it much at the time, but as I sat down to write my blog today, I realized that I’ve been engaging in some radical self-care recently.

We all know that self-care is important, or at least we hear it from our friends and nod our heads knowingly. But how often do we actually choose to care for ourselves? And of those times, are we engaging in the minimum amount of self-care so that we don’t feel disgusting, like my recent self-administered foot massage and pedicure? Or are we actually practicing radical self-care? read more

October 17, 2012

How Self-Care and Personal Practices Can Help Anchor Your Day

A note from Shelly: Kassandra Brown and I found each other on the internet and instantly felt well aligned and connected. Rather than taking a “competition” approach, we’ve decided to help and support one another’s success. I think you’ll enjoy her guest post as much as I did. Excellent reminders to slow down and remember to take care of ourselves in the midst of our busy, service oriented lives.

Guest post by Kassandra Brown

Shhh – everyone is sleeping and now it’s time for you. What do you do with your alone time? read more

July 25, 2012

Five Signs I’m Not Taking Care of Myself

OK Moms, it’s time to get real. We take excellent, outstanding, superb care of our children almost all of the time. And then the rest of the time we yell at them or do other things we don’t like. But by in large, we are very good mothers doing a really hard job extremely well. But here’s the kicker, we’re not so great at taking care of ourselves sometimes. And that’s where we’re actually failing our kids.

By neglecting ourselves and taking care of others instead, we’re not modeling selflessness, as we might like to believe, we’re actually modeling martyrdom. And it’s no good. I mean do we really want our daughters to grow up and serve up a delicious and nutritious dinner for their families and then go in the other room and cry about how exhausted they are? I don’t think so. We don’t have to suffer to be good parents. In fact, we’re much better parents (and partners) when we’re feeling pampered and privileged, than when we’re on the verge of a mental break down. read more

August 17, 2011March 8, 2012

Parenting exhaustion

Boy, is it exhausting to be a parent or what?! You start off with the nighttime wake ups but at least when they’re that little, they’re not moving around too much. Remember when you’d put them down and they’d just stay put?! It’s like a distant memory, right?

And, by the time you’re actually getting a good night’s sleep (except for the occasional accident or vomiting in the bed), they’re running around like crazy people and screaming, “Play with me! Play with me!” and wanting to go to the park and the pool and everywhere else they can think of. Whew! I feel tired just thinking about it. read more

February 2, 2011October 12, 2012

Appreciating our bodies

Years ago a friend told me about a daily practice of self-love she had. During her shower in the morning she would honor, thank, and appreciate each body part as she washed it.

My friend would touch the body part, clean it with care and think to herself, “Thank you hands, for everything you help me hold and manipulate. Arms, I appreciate you for all the things you’ll help me carry today and all the things you helped me carry yesterday. Ears, you are so incredibly useful and enjoyable. Thank you for allowing me to hear music. Feet! You help me balance so beautifully…” Sometimes she would give extra special care to a body part that was hurting or ailing her in some way. read more