day spa, Guide, Healthy Living, Tips and Tricks
Creating a Self Care Plan
A self-care plan can help you enhance your health and wellbeing, manage your stress, and maintain professionalism at work. To develop your self-care plan, you will identify what you value and need as part of your day-to-day life and the strategies you can employ when or if you face a crisis along the way.
Even if you have a busy schedule, there are plenty of ways to fit self-care into your day-to-day life. Here is everything you need to know about creating a self-care plan.
What is a self-care plan?
A self-care plan is a roadmap to dealing with times when your life feels like it’s getting off-track. Having a written plan in place helps you visualize how your personal and professional lives can be integrated and encourages you to take a step back when you’re overwhelmed—or about to be.
A good term to use here is “holistic” because effective self-care tactics treat aspects of mental, physical, emotional, and social health in order to protect your whole self.
How to Create a Self-care Plan
Here is how to create a self-care plan:
Write down practices that support your needs
Decide what self-care activities will help you meet your needs. Consider asking yourself questions like:
- What activities bring me joy?
- What helps me feel energized?
- When do I feel at peace?
- What makes me feel fulfilled?
- What’s helped me cope with difficult moments in my life?
Write down the self-care practices that you plan to do daily and those you’ll only do once in a while. For instance, you’ll want to eat healthily every day, but you may only schedule dinner with a friend once a week.
Note any barriers that may be in your way and how to shift them
As you write down each activity in your self-care plan, ask yourself what barriers might get in the way of you being able to accomplish it. Then, try to strategize ways that you might be able to shift these barriers.
If you find that you can’t shift the barriers, feel free to adjust the activities. Your Self-Care Plan is NOT written in stone! It’s meant to be a living, breathing guide that adapts as your life circumstances and demands change.
Balance intentionality with flexibility
When building a self-care regimen, it’s important to be intentional about including activities that are relaxing and calming. But keep in mind that you might have to make changes to your regimen as needed. Also, try to be organized as much as possible in order to feel more grounded and settled.
Make a commitment to yourself
Remember: Just like the flight attendant says, you need to put on your own oxygen mask first before you can be of help to others. So, take a moment, think it over, and then make your personal commitment to your own self-care.
If you find making a commitment to be a challenge, then take some time to explore your reservations. The truth is that your self-care is not only essential to your well-being, but it is also a necessary element for you to be effective and successful in honoring your professional and personal commitments.
At Changes Salon and Day Spa, we help you to commit to your self-care plan throughout the year. Make self-care a priority in the New Year, schedule appointments in advance, so you do not give up on your self-care routine early. Check out our Changes Series to see the one that fits you best.
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