Self-Care is Personal
It is easy to feel bombarded the past few months with constant messages about self-growth, intention setting, and the importance of improving our lives. Like taking better care of ourselves, giving up toxic addictions, living with less pain, or managing stress. It may seem easy until we hit a wall because we’re all dealing with something that growth comes into conflict with—and it’s often dealing with our physical, energetic, mental, emotional, and even spiritual health.
But the truth is, we are all moving forward from where we’re at right now, and that’s unique and different for each of us. At the same time, when “dealing with” whatever we’re confronting, we may reach outside of ourselves to make ourselves feel better. Maybe it’s alcohol, food, work, exercise, shopping, or finding other ways to cope. When we overdo it or use it a tool to numb what we’re feeling, we soon learn that those things cannot fill us up or make us feel whole. The relief is only temporary and reminds me about the Buddhist tradition of hungry ghosts.
Instead, when we feel disconnected, we may want to engage in self compassion and self-care. I invite you to think about self-care as respecting what you as an individual need, but don’t always prioritize or want.
This is an invitation to carefully notice the energies that revitalize you and make you feel alive. It could be a stranger’s smile, a walk outside, petting an animal, listening to birds outside, feeling the sun on your skin, a trip to the beach, a yoga class. Maybe it’s a long bath or dancing your heart out to your favorite song. What does your heart need to feel alive and full? Start paying attention the answer and take its advice personally.
Experts have found positive emotions such as compassion and love generate a harmonious pattern in the heart’s rhythm, leading to coherence and greater emotional regulation. When harmonious interactions exist among the body’s systems, this is referred to as physiological coherence. As this increases, so does the brain’s alpha activity which supports stress relief and creativity.
The upside is plentiful as to why we should increase our heart’s harmony. With an electrical component about 60 times greater and an electromagnetic energy field 5,000 times greater than the brain’s, the heart has a significant influence on the body down to the cellular level. The brain’s rhythms along with the respiratory and blood pressure rhythms entrain with the heart’s rhythm. This is the optimal state for human functioning. Not to mention its energy is a powerful communicator. The heart's energy is said to reach about three feet outside of the physical body and can be detected in another person sitting nearby via an electrocardiogram (ECG).
There will always be other people, places, and energies that we cannot control. On the days when we feel down or depleted, remember what revitalizes your heart space and to prioritize your self care. Here’s a practice to try:
Set a timer on your phone for 3-5 minutes, depending on how much time yo have.
Bring focused attention to your heart. You can also place your hand(s) over it.
Use the 4-7-8 Relaxing Breath Technique. Breathe in for four seconds, hold for seven seconds, exhale slowly with a wooshing sound for eight seconds. Repeat four times. This lowers the heart rate.
Bring to mind something that makes you feel joy, peace, love, or gratitude. This could involve visualizing time with a child, pet, or somewhere in nature. Savor the moment and feel free to smile!
Visualize sending these feelings from your heart up to your neck, throat, and head to your brain. You can picture healing white light coming from your heart upwards and outwards. Then expand to other areas of the body.