Cater to Yourself: Self-Care

We encounter stress on the daily. We stress over school, family, relationships, finances, and more. If you're like me, you automatically shut down under stress. When I am completely overwhelmed and stressed out, I find myself back in my room in my bed with snacks scrolling through my social media feed for the 1000th time avoiding everything and anything. Is that productive? Not at all. Over the years, I've found better, healthier ways of dealing with my stress even though I still find myself shutting down sometimes. It's a journey to self-care and self-love, but one thing I've learned is that you waste so much time and energy being stressed. Life is too short for all of that. I'm going to share some of the tips and advice I've been given about self-care: 

  • Use Positive Self-Talk: When you are stressed, you automatically start to talk down to yourself, and you blame yourself for what is happening. When your state of mind is low like that, you don't want to do anything. It's important to be kind and gentle to yourself and keep reminding yourself that all you can do is your best and take each day as it comes. 
  • Spend Time with the People You Love: Make sure to create some quality time with your family and friends - anyone you love. These are the people who care about you no matter what. You don't have to act a certain way around them. You can be comfortable just being yourself and let them know how you are feeling. They are here for you! 
  • Find Something You Love to Do: Find a hobby! If you like working out or dancing or drawing or blogging (lol), make sure you create time and take a break to do something you love to do! It'll definitely relieve some of the pressure you are under and help you relax. 
  • SLEEP: Make sure you are getting enough sleep each night. Take care of your body. It's so important to feel rested and refreshed each day, but you can't do that if you are pulling all-nighters or sleeping for short periods of time. When you are sleep-deprived, you can't function how you normally would and perform to the best of your abilities. You should be getting 8+ hours of sleep each night (easier said than done, but your body needs it!)
  • Say No: This is definitely a hard one for me. I want to do everything and anything. I am always trying to see people and do as much as I can. There is nothing wrong with being busy, but you shouldn't feel the need to say yes to every single activity. It's okay to say no sometimes. If you need time to yourself, do not feel bad about saying no. The ones who love you will definitely understand that you need time to yourself sometimes. It's not selfish letting your body rest. 
It's so easy to forget about yourself when you are stressed out. No one likes it, but we deal with it all the time. Some of us (like me) potentially fall into unhealthy habits to deal with the stress, but it is so important to practice healthy self-care so your body is being treated right. One of my favorite quotes is from Ferris Bueller: "Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it". When you are stressing out, you miss out on so many things going on around you because your energy is being used up on that. It's so important to live each day reminding yourself that you are important, and you need to place yourself as a priority. Please practice self-care and don't forget about yourself! 

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