”The six best doctors: sunshine, water, rest, air, exercise, and diet.”-Wayne Fields
Everything you need to feel better, look better, and heal is right at your finger tips. The best resources that are available to us all is free and limitless. Going outside for a simple walk provides fresh air for you to breath, activity for your limbs, new scenery for you to recharge, and a distraction from all the problems holding you down. Dieting doesn’t mean deprive yourself of all the good food. It’s about moderation and portion control. Simply cut your portions in half, drink more water, and add activity. You will begin to see a difference in your body. To begin healing and feeling better it all starts from within. Open the blinds and curtains to let natural light in. I guarantee you the instant boost to want to do something with yourself and for yourself will kick in. Secondly, give yourself permission to rest and unplug from work, home, and technology. It will clear your mind and heart to move forward with a clear lens. JUST TAKE ONE DAY AND BE WORRY FREE Lastly, get outside and get you some fresh air and look at a life from a different perspective. You’ll feel lighter and brighter instantly. Enjoy the rest of your day!!!!!!!!
”Never discourage anyone who continually makes progress, no matter how slow.”-Plato
It takes a lot for someone to make a change, stick through it, and see their vision through. Any type of life altering decision will have it’s ups and downs. No one needs to hear judgement or criticism on how slow they are in reaching their goals. If a friend has a weight loss goal and doesn’t seem able to reach it by the date desired, they don’t want to hear negative feedback. Keep encouraging and motivating them to continue on with their goal. Giving unwanted or negative feedback doesn’t feel good to the person receiving it and in the long run no one feels good after giving it. Life is a journey and not a race. 10 WAYS TO LIVE HAPPIER Each one of our journeys and paths takes us on different twists and turns. The more you encourage, motivate, and inspire others the more you feel motivated yourself. Enjoy the rest of your day!!!!!!
“Focus on the solution, not the problem.”-@meditationmoments
One of the biggest factors that keeps us in a funk or dark place is dwelling on what happened. We’ve told the story a million times over. The situation is on repeat in our head. We can’t sleep, eat, work, or do anything else. What we focus on and put our energy into is what we become. So instead of repeating the problem or situation that happened, think of solutions to correct the problem. What do you need to learn from it? How can this problem be avoided in the future? Focusing your attention and energy on the solution will lift your spirits, give you motivation to move forward in your dailylife, and heighten your awareness. WE HAVE THE POWER TO MAKE A CHOICE Yes, we do need to acknowledge the problem. How it happened and what our role was in it. After that, redirect your attention to the solution. Enjoy the rest of your day!!!!!!!!!
We are very capable of reciting all the bad things that took place in our week. I wanted to do something fun and talk about my 5 wins of the week. At the end of the week it’s good to reflect on the good and positive that came out of the week. They could be small or grand, either way a win is a win.
Wins of the Week
Took a lot of really good notes on ideas and topics. Because we are very slow at the office I’m able to use that time brainstorming, researching, and taking notes on potential blog posts. I have quiet in the office, free from distractions, and I can be free in my thoughts.
Maintained my cool with my mother. It’s no secret if you didn’t know that I’m in a toxic emotional abusive relationship with my mother. Most of my tears comes from her not acknowledging me and giving me the same love and attention she does my brother. But in a phone conversation this week, she was sarcastic and passive aggressive. I just let it role and didn’t say anything. I knew that would start an argument.
Hair deep condition of the week turned out amazing. I used a new conditioner (at least new to me) that I’ve never used before. It was the Garnier Whole Blends Restoring Conditioner Maple Remedy. (https://amzn.to/3IrO8le) I always would see it on the shelf and never picked it up. Well it was on sale and I was amazed at the results. Would definitely try it again.
Amazing time with the family this week. Starting with the fourth of July celebration to the ice cream splash on Friday. Keeping my committment to enjoy local festivities has been fun.
Those are my 5 wins of the week. Each week will be different and have peaks and valleys. But focus on the good and try to repeat it again each week. Before we head into this new week, take a moment and reflect on your wins. What would you like to take with you into next week?
Who doesn’t love to be pampered and get pampered? We all deserve the pleasures of feeling good and looking good. However, having treatments done head to toe can get expensive. Here are some simple things you can do to have a spa day at home. Feeling good and looking good can be achieved everyday.
Set The Mood Before beginning to pamper yourself, you must make sure your space is free and clear. Clean and tidy your home. Declutter, dust, and disinfect your space or home. Now that your physical is clean, set the mood with an aroma or scent of your choice. Candles are great options and provide aroma that will last and cover a large area of your home. You can opt for calming scents like Lavender or Vanilla. However, I love a good clean fresh scent that isn’t too harsh or loud, like fresh linen. Lastly, to set the mood, get you a beverage of choice and music. Wine, tea, coffee, water, or whatever you enjoy to make you feel good. A good choice of music, something soothing and slow. Jazz is always a good option.
Hair Everything begins with hair, right? If we are having a bad hair day, then the entire day is off. Prep your hair routine by mixing your deep conditioner first. https://amzn.to/3OLJxNf I have a bowl purchased from the dollar store specifically for this. Get your favorite deep conditioner or regular conditioner and mix in some of your favorite oils into the bowl. https://amzn.to/3AvGy7m I’ve found using a drugstore deep conditioner mixed with oils is a better treatment than going to the salon. Just because it’s expensive doesn’t mean it will be more effective. Then you’re ready to wash, condition, and deep condition. After placing the deep condition onto the hair and combing through, place a shower cap on for heat activation or reuse an old plastic grocery bag. It works the same. Most of the time I allow my deep condition to set for an hour.
Face/Neck First figure out what your face and neck needs. Are you feeling dry? Do you see alot of dead skin cells and need to exfoliate? Are you experiencing large pores? What kind of facial mask do you need? I begin with removing unwanted cheek hair, chin hairs, and upper lip hairs. https://amzn.to/3OKTqL1 From cheek bones down I epilate to get rid of any unwanted tiny hairs that may have popped up. Next, cleanse with a good oil cleanser to remove dirt, makeup, and sweat. https://amzn.to/3OKrNSr Follow up with a double cleanse to remove any impurities that the oil cleanser didn’t get. https://amzn.to/3yhRmmE After that you may follow with a mask for moisture, tighten pores, or anti aging. My favorite is a good clay mask. Self Care Beauty Routine Final step after rinsing is to treat and moisturize.
Bonus Tip: Don’t forget to scrub your lips of dead skin and moisturize. https://amzn.to/3NKout1 You can purchase a lip scrub for under $5, use a toothbrush and vaseline, or just a little of your facial scrub will work as well.
Body Here you have a choice of hot shower or bubble bath. Because I have a hair mask on my hair as well as a facial mask, I’ll probably opt to hit the hot shower. Here again, what does your body need? Are you experiencing dry skin? Does your body need a good exfoliation? Using your favorite soap bar, body wash, or cleanser give your body a good lather. https://amzn.to/3urFJbITip: Between washes, because we’re going to wash up twice in the shower. Rinse your hair mask out and then your facial mask off. After that, wash up again. Because you don’t want the oils and conditioner that ran down your back to give you acne. Once out the shower, moisturize and put on something cute and comfy.
Bonus Tip: If you go to a spa or salon to groom yourself and do hair removal perfect. But, if you don’t, use this time to do an at home wax, use hair removal cream, epilate, or shave if you have to.
Feet/Hands If you are one who treat yourself to a mani/pedi weekly or biweekly, you are awesome. For my ladies that don’t, you can definetly experience it at home. Using a rubber dish tote for under $5, warm water, and foot soak you can give yourself a great pedicure. A good foot pumice stone is $3 and you can get rid of dead skin on your feet. https://amzn.to/3P6avih Lastly, don’t forget to moisturize and lock in the moisture with some cute fuzzy socks. You can opt to polish your toe nails or leave them clean after shaping and filing them. As for your hands, clean, exfoliate, and moisturize. Keep your nails filed and shaped.
There you have it. An at home spa day that didn’t cost you a car payment. You can get your money worth and use the products again. Furthermore, the amount of me time you’ve experienced with yourself is priceless and will be forever rewarding. If you are feeling like you need a pick me up, plan yourself an at home spa day to get back in tuned with yourself.
We have to be very careful at easing our foot off the gas pedal. Don’t lose focus on yourself and drift off into another lane. When we lose focus and drift off, accidents happen, we hit a bump in the road, end up going down the wrong street, and stuck between trucks that hinders our vision front and back. In result, we have lost time and now playing catchup trying to get back on track.
Keep your focus on why you started in the first place. Anytime you get a little tired, take a break and regroup yourself. Don’t lose focus on why you started that new course, financial savings goal, relationship, healingjourney, or whatever else you’ve begun for yourself. Take a moment and list all the milestones you’ve reached so far. The lessons you learned thus far. Make a list of 3 goals going forward. 7 SELF REFLECTION JOURNAL PROMPTSJournal your thoughts and experiences on how your journey is going. Regrouping and reassessing will give you clarity and motivation to keep going.
Don’t lose your focus yourself and keep going even when you feel like nothing is happening. Even when you don’t see physical results or change happening, every little step you take is progress. If we saw results, activity, or change every time we took a step then we’ll have nothing to look forward to. That is the idea of hope and faith. Believing in the things not seen or heard. When feeling a little discouraged pray, meditate, and center yourself. https://amzn.to/3I8TuSt Remind yourself that you are here for a purpose, a vision was placed in you to fulfill, and you have everything needed to complete the assignment.
When you get bored and lose your focus it’s time to get creative. Switch things up, try something new, and renew your focus. As we grow, what worked for us will no longer work. The more we heal the more we grow. Therefore, the need for new and exciting is broadened. Creativity allows for endless space to grow.
Are you tired of all this selfcare talk? Don’t want to hear about routines, habits, and caring for yourself? Guess what, we have to stay in our lane so we don’t veer off. That’s whyselfcare, routines, and creating habits are a constant must. Focusing on you, being the most healthyphysically, mentally, and emotionally, will allow you to withstand whatever is going on in the world. Keeping your focus on you is motivation for others to focus on themselves. It inspires everyone to be whole thus having a healthy community of support.
Staying committed to yourself is the best selfcare you can do for yourself. The relationship you have with you, will be the best one you have and the strongest. You owe it to yourself.
Keep your focus. Empty out the negative. Focus on the positive. Believe in your own strength.
We’ve all had those moments of feeling anxious. Sometimes we don’t realize it, until after the fact that we were in a frenzy. When your heart start to pound, your hands get sweaty, your body becomes unsettled, or you just have a sense that something isn’t right you’re probably feeling a little anxious.
Often times we think it takes huge measures to calm down. In actuality, it’s your small selfcare practices that will help ease your anxiousness. Here are some things I do when feeling a little anxious.
Exercise/Go for a walk
Clean
Listen to music
Call a friend or family member. If the first person doesn’t pickup, I keep calling until someone does.
The key to calming myself when anxious is to focus on myself. Do things to get my mind occupied, figure out why I’m feeling the way I’m feeling, and to move past it. Most importantly it doesn’t last forever. Relying on your selfcareactivities and do the things that makes you feel you is key to overcoming your anxiousness. SIMPLE SELF CARE MORNING ROUTINE WHEN FEELING BLUE
Even if you have a moment of anxiousness at work, doing certain selfcare practices will help calm yourself down. Several practices from the list can be done at home, work, vacation, or anywhere you may begin to feel your blood pressure rising.
Whatever you do, don’t ignore those feelings. It’s important to acknowledge them. Understand the why, and grow through it. We can’t stop them from happening but we can manage it well if we keep our self awareness high.
Look around no more!!! You have to be your own cheerleader. Whatever affirmations or reassurance you’re needing right now, give it to yourself. The things you are needing to hear or want to hear, tell it to yourself.
If you’re at work, go to the bathroom, look yourself in the mirror, and cheer yourself up. Take a 15 minute break, step away from the desk, and give yourself a pep talk. If you can, go for a quick walk and come back to work. We have to be our own cheerleader.
Talk to yourself out loud. Remind you, how great you are. The hard work you’re doing is going to pay off, keep going. WELLNESS: EVEN THE STRONGEST NEEDS A BREAK You are a good mom. You are a good dad. Pray, do a 5 minute meditation, and sing yourself some praises. Pump yourself up.
If you’re at home and not feeling well, go step on your porch and breathe in some nature. Tell yourself you’re going to be healed, relationships are going to be restored, the financial setback has turned around, and you’ve done a great job. You aren’t tired. You’ve just exhausted all the energy that was allotted to you today.
You have to be your own cheerleader even when the circumstances are good. When you get a promotion, jump for joy, scream, and toot your own horn. You worked hard. Whatever accomplishment you’ve achieved or been recognized for, celebrate it. And don’t wait for someone else to start the celebration. If you’ve saved for a specific goal and that goal has been reached, celebrate that.
What we want from others we have to be able to give to ourselves. Then we’d be able to celebrate someone else genuinely, happily, and unselfishly. We have to be our own cheerleader.
When we seek praise or affirmations from outside first, it makes us subconsciously rely on others validation to make us feel like we’re enough. That will lead us down a path of self destruction. Someone else’s validation or reassurance doesn’t add or decrease our worth. However, does it feel good when we get noticed, absolutely. Anyone who tell you differently is a lie. Do we want others to recognize our hard work, absolutely. But that shouldn’t be what we base our worth off of.
If you’re feeling in a little slump, no matter where you are, get up and cheer yourself up. Pat yourself on the back. Guess what, it’s an accomplishment just to acknowledge you’re not feeling that well. No matter how small something may seem, praise yourself for it and keep stepping forward. Have a great rest of your day!!!!!!!!
I wanted to give everyone a quick mental note going into the new year, mistakes are good for you. Learn from your mistakes and never be shamed because you did make a mistake. We often beat ourselves up when we make a mistake. For some it’s very difficult to admit they made a mistake. In the mean time, others won’t even admit they actually do make mistakes. There isn’t anything wrong with making mistakes.
You Are Perfect The Way You Are
The honest to God truth is, we all are going to make mistakes over and over again. It’s all about how we grow and learn from them. Mistakes is how we learn what not to do. Whenever you make a mistake, and learn the correct way to do something, you’ll never make that mistake again. MENTAL HEALTH WELLNESS TIP: ONE STEP AT A TIME
In some situations in life, the only way to move forward is to make that one mistake that will teach us the who, what, where, why, and how.
As we approach the new year, I want the thought of being perfect to leave your mind. Embrace whatever mishaps happened. Figure out how you can learn and grow from them, and leave it as an after thought.
The humility, courage, and confidence you gain from admitting ”I made a mistake” is a power no one can take from you. When we deny, deflect, or dismiss we actually hurt ourselves. We give our power away. Admitting you made a mistake shows character, strength, courage, and humility.
Right now many people are gearing up for the ”new them”. One way to sit in who you are is to acknowledge the mistake that made you a better person today. It could be choosing the wrong partner, career choice, job, move, or conversation. Never regret the decisions or choices. Instead learn from them.
Whatever “it” is, just let it go. Don’t worry about what they said about you. Let go of what happened at work. Don’t be mad if someone didn’t call you back. Let go of the anger and hurt of not being invited. Just let that stuff go. It’s too heavy, it prevents you from laughing, and focusing on something good.
Just Be You
If you feel wronged, let it go. You can’t change what happen. So often we take things personally, and it literally has nothing to do with us. Remember people project their pain and hurt onto you. They want and need someone else to feel as hurt as they do. Just let it go. The More You Grow…
Let it go and don’t let anyone stop you from enjoying yourself. When we spend time trying to figure out why someone said what they said. Or why they left you out. Did you deserve to be treated so unfairly. You are questioning yourself and trying to figure what you did to make them do what they did. You are internalizing something that has nothing to do with you. That is infectious and grows like a cancer.
Shed the confusion, wondering, and questioning. It’s going to put you in a place of darkness. Once you are in this place of darkness for a while, it will become increasingly hard to get out of.
So, if anything happened this week or today, let it go. Don’t hold on to yesterday’s trash or any other days trash. Get rid of it, before it starts to stink up your mind, spirit, and body. If you still have no answers then you probably won’t get any. And if you do, it most likely, wont make things better. Let it go. Furthermore, it had nothing to do with you. Make a mental note and set some boundaries.
