Mid-summer health thoughts
At the end of last July, I greeted you with thoughts on implementing acts of self-care, and I returned to that specific blog post this week for inspiration since it has been on my mind. I’m wondering if there’s something about summer that makes me think about taking extra care of ourselves? As a midwesterner by blood, maybe it’s thoughts of getting ready for the winter months ahead.
In the past, I’ve talked about scheduling self-care into your daily to-do list as a way to make it stick, which I’m assessing if I agree with now. Lately, I’ve really been trying to sink into the concept of self-care as something that is simply lived in order to remove the label “self-care” from the equation all together. If we take strides to put ourselves first, unapologetically, then it could effortlessly become second nature.
Aside from mentioning putting “self-care” tasks onto a to-do list a couple of times, the stance I took a year ago is pretty similar to today. How can we explore going deep within ourselves in order to find things that replenish our personal needs daily?
Thoughts on integrated self-care:
Eat healthy. The purest form of taking care of yourself. Add any and all of these foods to your grocery list.
Learn what type of movement suits you. When you find how you love to exercise, may it be dancing, hiking, yoga, working in the garden, cleaning the house, it doesn’t become a chore and really is replenishing for your mind, body, and spirit.
Prioritize your basic needs like sleeping, showering, drinking water.
Express yourself. Through clothing, words, writing, painting, whatever form of self-expression you find joy in. Something I love to do is make music playlists. Here’s my new one, which is actually sort of anti-summer!
Simply think about what promotes overall wellness for you and you only. Consider how to incorporate this creatively into your daily routine.
This is a frequent topic in 1:1 sessions with clients, in which we truly figure out ways to take care of themselves. This leads to further progress in health and life. Tried and true. If you’re ready to schedule our free consultation, simply book through Calendly to receive 10% off future sessions. My schedule is filling up fast these days, so be sure to get in while I’m free.
In other news, a show-and-tell of some things that I’m loving lately for my health:
Eating fruit. We are very lucky to have a few papaya trees in our yard, and they are POPPING OFF. Since I’m always referencing how added sugars are the devil in our food industry/today’s society, Chris and I are always discussing the amount of sugar in fruit and if it’s too much. This article is a great, easy to read, way of describing it. Bottom line, fruit has so many vitamins and nutrients that our bodies love and it is absolutely not the same as eating a carb loaded sugar bomb packaged food nasty thing.
No oil/cream water based moisturizer. My oily, acne-prone, sweaty summer skin has been loving Khiel’s water based moisturizer, and I’m actually pretty bummed I haven’t been using water based cleansers and moisturizers for years. I just love facial oils so much, so it’s been hard not using them daily. But, my skin’s been loving it.
YOGA. My go-to virtual classes have been from a dear friend, Jeanae, with a beautiful Costa Rican backdrop and Yoga Glo.
Summer blooms. Though the principles of Feng Shui lean towards having no dead flowers in your home, drying flowers is such a lovely way to bring summer brightness into the dark winter months.
Creating a website for my best friend’s real estate business. I must plug her and share my work. Check it out!
