Did you tell yourself you are awesome today?

So I have been thinking a lot about self-care lately.  I think this is a term we throw out a lot, but it means something different to each person.  I see posts about “self-care sunday” where ladies put on facemasks and condition their hair and that is their ritual to get them in the right frame of mind for the week.  For others it is hitting the gym, or meditating, or daily Bible studies.

All of these are great, I try to partake in many of these things as well, and anyone who knows me and follows my feed knows I  LOVE a good Sunday spa night. But I don’t necessarily think this is ALL that self care should be.

I think at the end of the day, self care is much more simple.  For me, especially since being diagnosed with Lupus, it has become loving myself no matter what season I am in, and that comes down to loving even my BODY in spite of whether it always wants to work for me.

I know, I have probably lost some people.  Loving yourself is huge in our culture right now (as it should be), but there seems to be a lot of opinions about a fat man or woman loving themselves.  There is even an entire movement based around this called #effyourbeautystandards and it is was started largely in part to combat fat shaming. I am a big advocate of this movement but I think that going down that rabbit hole would take away from an even bigger picture I want to paint in this post.

Self-care at its core is understanding that our bodies need nourishment, rest, activity, calm.  But I think this really should go ONE.STEP.FURTHER. For me, personally, it has meant finding that balance between pushing myself, and being okay on days my body just will not cooperate.  

In essence, self-care means loving yourself in whatever season you are in and loving your body even when you are frustrated that it might not be working the way you want it too.  

There is a reason that the phrase Mind Over Matter is such a powerful tool in our arsenal of motivational sayings.  Its because it is true. You guys- we have this body, OUR body, and it contains all of these amazing parts and organs that do all of these super cool things and at the top of that list of cool things is our brain.

I am a firm believer that our brains have “feelings” for lack of a better way of saying it.  What we tell ourselves sticks with us and often we unknowingly trick our systems into thinking that we can’t do something.  Or that its not ok that our body is not acting right.

I always think about that saying “we are what we eat”, which is true but I find a more important one to be “we are what we say we are”.  If we get frustrated with ourselves long enough, eventually our mind is going to start playing tricks on us and actually believe something is wrong.  The minute we start believing those lies is the minute we stop allowing ourselves to dream and more importantly DO.

Congratulations, you have given yourself limitations.

THIS is the definition of destruction in my book and it just isn’t ok to do this to yourself.  So for me personally, it is about loving my body just as it is in this moment. Instead of getting frustrated that my fingers dont want to move and stopping, it means figuring out how to work with my body and type this article without bending my joints, or ya know- whatever the roadblock might be that day.  I doubt that my body enjoys feeling this way anymore than I do and I think that at the end of the day, self care means accepting where you are at, and loving yourself in that moment.

Now don’t get me wrong, loving yourself and accepting defeat are VERY different.  I mean that selfcare at the end of the day means being kind to yourself. Getting the right nutrition, taking that walk around the block, laughing a little each day, doing the hard things that you dont think you can do- and most importantly reminding yourself that you are wonderfully and fearfully made and that you are doing the best you can.  

What do you tell yourself when you are alone in your own thoughts? If it is anything less than “it is ok to feel like this, you are doing great, and lets do the best we can today” then you are doing yourself and the world a disservice by not showing up and giving off a bit of your light for everyone, including yourself to see.

What we say to ourselves in the privacy of our own mind matters- Marie Forleo