When Self-Care leads to Self-Loathing…
Having trouble sticking to a self-care practice or morning routine?
👉🏼That’s because it’s not meant to be rigid.
It’s meant to teach you how to listen to what your body and spirit need in each moment and evolve accordingly.♥️
It’s meant to teach you how to be gentle with yourself.
Stop doing yoga videos on YouTube and just turn on some music and let your body flow and move in the way that feels good to YOU.
⚡️Not to some blonde yogabitch on YouTube.
The problem I see so many people falling into is trying to form a super rigid self-care plan that looks like this:
wake up a 8:00am
write for 30 minutes
drink matcha
meditate for 25 minutes
go for a job
There are a plethora of variations here- but it doesn’t really matter what it is, so much as the rigidity of it all sets you up for failure.
Why? BECAUSE WE’RE HUMANS. We are in constant evolution, from moment to moment, day to day, and sure as hell week to week!
Sometimes I might genuinely NEED to wake up and write for thirty minutes just to get to the truth of what is inside of me. Sometimes, that might not benefit me at all.
You want to know the truth? I use to teach self care through writing. I use to lead people to their healing and self-actualization through journaling and consciousness writing.
And yes, still to this day I believe writing is one of the MOST potent tools we have to find out who the hell we are, what we want, and bring what we want to us through manifestation journaling.
However, I’ve had years where I journaled everyday- and sometimes when we use the same medicine over and over and over- it becomes part of the problem .
I became SO good at journaling day after day after day, that it actually wasn’t helping me get to the core of who I am. It sort of started to feel like I was mindlessly writing positive affirmations and gratitude lists - therefore, avoiding the ugly. I got so good at the positive mindset journaling I was bypassing the blubbering, the self-wallowing, the gross parts of you that you can leave on the page because no one will ever see.
When we overuse the same tactics of self-care, they can become a means of bypassing.
If there’s anything I’ve learned on this self-love practice train over the past 4-5 years, it’s - LET IT FLOW.
Wake up in the morning and take a moment to tune into what your body and soul genuinely want. Maybe if you can’t hear… writing is a good way to listen. But often, the more in tune we become with ourselves, the easier it is to hear the stuck energy in your back saying stretch this bitch out I am emotional and STUCK!
We can hear our heightened morning energy saying DANCE! We can feel the weight in our shoulders asking to sing and do neck roles for 30 minutes.
It’s kind of magical, really.