Achieving Wholeness through Self-Care

If I was a day of the week, I would definitely be Sunday. Sundays, for many, are days spent in reflection on the past week, communion with God, enjoying time with loved ones or simply sitting in silence. For me, Sunday’s are my self-care days – a full day dedicated to listening and doing whatever it is that I want to do.

Packed with the knowledge that each person will have their own ideas of what self-care actually looks like, how do we define it? Self-care is simply the practice of taking action to improve or preserve one’s health. This can mean physically, mentally or spiritually. Ideally, self-care consists of a combination of all three- nurturing the mind, body, and soul to foster love, kindness, and compassion to oneself. However, self-care also includes more raw details such as holding space for oneself in the midst of stress, pain or grief. Basically, anything that entails leading to a better and healthier you fall under the scope of self-care.

I personally consider myself a self-care connoisseur. I love being relaxed, soothed and peaceful. For me, self-care is essential to my daily life. There are a numerous amount of ways that one can incorporate a self-care day or practice into their daily routine. It all depends on what you believe is best for you. A simple practice that I have been cultivating over the last year or so is simply sitting in silence or meditation at the beginning of my day and asking myself “Jannah, what do you need from me today?” Although it may sound a bit odd, this simple questions allows me to create a space in which I am completely in tune and listening to myself and my own needs. It is very often that we are consumed with doing what others want us to do or even doing things we don’t want to do – but feel we have to. How does our subconscious process this behavior? In the act of listening to others over ourselves, we reinforce this internal idea that we are not as important as the rest of the world. In reality, the world will continue spinning regardless if we take 5-10 minutes to take care of ourselves. Time will not stop. Life will continue to go on. As soon as we are finished, we can return to our tasks, duties, and obligations with our complete and total attention. If we don’t take care of ourselves than who will? In truth, the most important person in this world who is need of love, attentiveness, and care from yourself is YOU. You deserve love, kindness, and compassion. You are enough. Love, embrace and nurture everything that you are – because you deserve it just as much as anyone else. So in the name of self-care ask yourself this very question – “___________, what do you need from me today?” See what answer you come up with. You may just surprise yourself.