After this action packed weekend of professional development conference and backstage studio showcase monitoring I am feeling the burnout big time. As spring begins to creep in this is the perfect time to check in with our self care habits.
Burnout is a beast. It often derails my self care habits due to exhaustion which then perpetuates this cycle of inactivity around my self care. The less I fill my cup, the less energy I have to start filling my cup, and so it goes.
What Self Care Habits are Surviving this period of Burnout:
Skin care routine (Morning and Night)
Blog writing
Staying Hydrated
Moving my Body with Hubby at the Gym
Evening Reading
What Self Care Habits I’m Changing to Better Serve Me:
Journaling: I am now, at a very bad time with day light savings almost upon us, getting up an hour earlier than normal to give me dedicated, nay, sanctified time to devote to this practice without feeling rushed near bedtime, or as an afterthought, or as the last slot on an endless daily checklist.
Fueling my body: I am not a fan of breakfast, but one thing this conference weekend did was make me engage with breakfast. PArt of my adjustment in a consistent, earlier wake up time is to manage my fuel better by leaving enough time for my body to wake up enough for food.
Stretching: I am endeavouring to start my day with a stretch and release any tension built up from twisting and turning in the night and then shorten my evening stretch to a more manageable practice that fits into the nights that get late.
I know that dedicating my energy, limited though it may be right now, to self care will give back tenfold. However, it is in the burnout that these knowns slide away in favour of lingering in sleep, or worse, slouching on the couch. Building these habits and being able to adapt when they no longer work for me is key to overcoming burnout blues.
What self care habits are you building in your daily life or creative practice? How do your self care habits help you in your creative practice? Any pieces of advice or wisdom to centering self care more in your (and my) life?
It might sound counter intuitive as self care, but I take one day a week (Tuesday mornings) to take myself and my laptop to a cafe and work there. yes, it's work, but it's also self care because it allows me to leave every other thing I have to think about at the door for a few hours and focus on the writing that got me here in the first place. No cat walking over my keyboard or dog asking to go out or plants silently screaming for water or other people needing my attention. Just me, the laptop and a few words.