It’s Not You, It’s Me

SELF-CARE

This is huge! I mean as important as self-love. I kind of consider them best friends, they totally go hand in hand. However, just like self-love, self-care is one of those things that gets tossed aside until we find ourselves in a place of feeling rough, stuck or exhausted, or worse we find ourselves in the midst of a panic attack or burnout, then we suddenly wake up and think “Oops, I think I should have looked after myself.” I’ve totally been there too. I’m still slightly puzzled by my younger self, who I think didn’t look after herself in the way she deserved to. Seriously, though, we have this one life and if we don’t take care of ourselves, our mind and body will start acting out in different ways that really aren’t good for us.

Self-care is suddenly this trendy concept we see in magazines, as if it’s some elaborate thing we should do for ourselves. Let’s get real, guys, self-care is not a luxury, it’s your birthright and an absolute must if you really want to live a happy, fulfilled life with rewarding relationships. It’s so easy to neglect yourself when your focus becomes the needs and feelings of your partner, your children, your job, but when you start to suffer so will all your relationships. So just like anything else in life, and as we’ve seen throughout this book, it all starts with you.

I’m going to show you how to declutter your life from all the crap you don’t need to waste your energy on and help you figure out how to make self-care part of your day-today routine. You will soon reap the rewards once you see how looking after yourself improves your relationship with yourself and others.

A self-care plan

I’m going to share my absolute favourite tools with you, some of which I’ve used for over a decade. I’ve handpicked tried-and-tested self-care exercises that have seen my clients and me through every scenario you can imagine, and I’ve created a 7-day easy-to-follow self-care plan to help you get started. After doing that, you can pick and choose the tools that work best for you. I want you to be able to return to the plan again and again whenever you feel like you need a reset, or just need to feel cared for, and be reminded that it’s totally fine to take time for you! If you’re worried about finding the time, don’t be. Most of the exercises only take a few minutes, so there really is no excuse not to make time to care a little more about yourself, right?

Clint’s story

Before we get into the exercises, I want to share a real-life story with you, one that sums up perfectly how when we look after ourselves everything else falls into place.

When I thought of asking Clint, a regular student at my class at Unplug Meditation, to talk to me about how self-care had helped him, I was amazed by how far he’d come on that self-care journey in three years. He is now the co-founder of one of Hollywood’s most innovative media companies but, like many of us, went through a time of struggling with feeling okay within himself. But he dramatically altered the course of his life because he took back his power and gave himself the time and care he deserved. He got in the driver’s seat of his relationship with himself and realized that that was where it all had to start if he wanted to make meaningful change in his life. I loved our honest chat and I hope his story will inspire you and many others to take time for self-care and to know the ripple effect and power it can have on your life and relationships. Here’s what Clint told me…

“There was a point in my life when I realized that something had to change. I’d started a new job, thinking it would be everything I had ever dreamt of, but I really wasn’t enjoying it – far from it, in fact. It was starting to make me someone I’m not. It’s a hard thing to focus on the relationship with yourself – it gets buried when you’re so busy and you give away so much of your power in the course of a day. It became hard to remember that it was my relationship with myself that was everything, but I was about to find that out. I suddenly found myself feeling totally overwhelmed and I was struggling to find my footing – the job was seriously affecting my mental health. Because I was in an environment at work that didn’t suit me, I was in a constant state of feeling “not enough”. I needed a new mechanism to cope with the environment. Of course at the time I thought I was the only one feeling like that but I know now that I wasn’t.

I found it really helpful when Camilla explained in the meditation class how the negative things we think and say to ourselves affect us. It was a great reminder of this internal dialogue and once I was aware of it I started reframing “not enough” to “I am enough”. I realized I had identified getting that job with my success, my own identity. So coming to the realization that it wasn’t the right job, definitely not a good fit for me, and that I had to leave was daunting. It felt like an identity loss; it felt horrible and truly sucked, not least because I had a family to look after.

I gave myself three months to figure out what to do next and meditation became my daily act of self-care, my constant. I’m glad I let my friend know how I was feeling as he introduced me to a meditation app and took me to Camilla’s class at Unplug Meditation in LA.

I’m also grateful to my wife for understanding the importance of me taking that time for me – this meant everything to me. She said, “Let’s take the summer and then see how you feel.” Feeling this bad pushed me to look at myself and flush out all the things that didn’t work any longer – the old beliefs and habits – and find new ways of doing things. I was the main provider and I just had to figure it out, so giving up was not an option. Instead it was about finding a new way that would serve me and my family. Meditation helped me find my footing and begin to think constructively about how to rebuild my relationship with myself, which created a way to look at my career with fresh eyes. I started to feel different right away.

I remember Camilla doing a meditation in one of her classes that turned out to be critically important to me. It was about planting the seeds of intentions in the garden of opportunity. I have returned to that garden many times since. It became a safe place to go in my mind and a lot of good thoughts and intentions were planted and grew from there. I rebooted my entire life in 2015, as I started to believe that it’s your relationship with yourself that is everything. I began to start each day with self-care, which was a workout then meditation and then, and only then, I would figure out what else I needed to do each day. Self-care was how I aligned myself with what was to come next for me. I also learnt the importance of a morning ritual, which I still do to this day.

The beauty of having gone through this time is that I now listen to my mind and body in a way I didn’t before. I now have tools I can rely on, such as positive affirmations, breathing exercises and meditation.

I started with self-care and that has helped me develop self-love, although that is still new to me and it takes a constant reminder. Looking back, this was the best thing that ever happened to me. Getting knocked down emotionally led me to find the courage to found my own company and that led to me meeting the business partner I run my company with today. It felt like a deconstruction. And in retrospect it had to happen. I went to the life gym, I guess. I was a high achiever and dependent on other people’s validation, thinking I needed it. Now I know the validation starts with me.”

MEDITATION AT YOUR FINGERTIPS

Clint was one of the first clients at Unplug Meditation to encourage me to record my meditations so my students could listen to them whenever they needed them. I followed his advice and recorded my first meditation, which was called “I am”. Clint told me he has used this meditation daily since. Little did I know back then that years later my meditations would be serving all over the world and that they had over hundreds of thousands of plays through meditation apps like Insight timer and Unplug Meditation. If you’d like to try some out, head to www.zenme.tv.

A common story

Clint’s story moved me so much because I know many people have gone through something similar at some point in their lives. That was why I wrote my last book Reinvent ME, because I wanted people who needed support through times like that to know they are not alone and that there are tools there to help them.

As an athlete for most of my life, before becoming a Life Coach, I wasn’t very good at saying no. I would just power through and, although that has its place in sport and in business at certain times, I headed straight for a burnout aged 35 and learnt my lesson the hard way. So I take self-care very seriously in my own life. It’s what I call non-negotiable because I have seen first hand what can happen and the power of prevention. And that is why I love serving my clients as a Life and Mind Coach because I’m passionate about what I teach, and sharing the importance of self-care before it’s too late. Some call me their personal mind trainer.

On my last book tour I spoke to many people going through relationship issues and challenging times. I realized, just like Clint, how so many were not looking after themselves. In fact, during stressful and challenging times taking time for self-care was the last thing on their list of priorities when it needed to be the first, mainly because people often considered self-care a kind of extra thing they had to pay for, such as a massage, a spa day or even a holiday. Of course it can be all of those things too, but self-care can just as easily be having a hot bath with no disturbances, a power nap in the afternoon (my absolute fave and how I navigate through my busy schedule most days – well, that and meditation) or an evening to yourself to do exactly what YOU want. It can also be the way you talk to yourself, nurture your thoughts and relationship with yourself and the way you create positive behaviours and habits in your life so that you can show up for yourself in the best possible way.

YOUR TOOLBOX: MY 7-DAY SELF-CARE PLAN

So now let’s get started. I’ve put together 7 simple, yet effective, exercises, which are all from my personal self-care regime because they totally rock.

I’ve written it as a 7-day plan to be done on consecutive days, but please create the plan that works best for you, even if that means repeating the same exercise 7 days straight. You may be drawn to certain exercises and find they fit in with your day better, and that’s fine. The main goal is to get you into the habit of knowing it’s okay to take time for YOU every day! I’d especially like you to get into the habit of using the morning ritual daily, though. It’s such a simple, but powerful, self-care tool.

DAY 1: MORNING RITUAL

I believe 100 per cent that how we start the day, and the intention we set for the day, lays the foundation for how the rest of the day will play out. As you read in Clint’s transformational journey (see pages 135–8), a morning ritual was a vital component in him learning to look after his own needs first. If we start the day taking care of ourselves, it’s a way of saying to the universe “I respect and take care of myself first,” which will have a positive ripple effect on your day. Why would you ever want to invite other people’s energy into your energy field before you have checked in with yourself and asked, “How am I feeling today?” Crazy, right?

My morning ritual has become my favourite thing over the last couple of years and the benefits have been out of this world for me personally. Never in a million years did I think that it would affect my day so much that I would even be able to call myself “a morning person”. I was always a complete night owl and loved my lie-ins. Partly I thank Mel Robbins’ book The 5 Second Rule where she explains how we can talk ourselves in or out of something in 5 seconds and how within that time we have to do an action, like actually get out of bed, because when we physically move the brain starts to build a new habit.

This has become the first part of my morning ritual. I literally count 5, 4, 3, 2, 1, as she suggests, and then jump out of bed. It has stopped the feeling of wanting to hit the snooze button and procrastinate about whether I should get up now or in 10 minutes. Plus it has inspired me to go to bed earlier – the ripple effect I’m talking about. You make one change and, boom, other things start to change in a positive way too.

I’m pretty strict now about what “noise” I let into my sacred space in the mornings and I definitely do not pick up my phone and check emails until I have showered and done my positive affirmation meditation. This ensures that I’m centred and ready to interact with others. We can’t control others, but we sure can take responsibility for the attitude and energy we bring to people and situations. I do this in the best way I can each day before venturing out into the world and sitting in LA traffic with an attitude or seeing a client and dumping any shitty energy on them.

And, by the way, before you say, “I haven’t got time for this ritual,” let me stress that it can take as little or as long as you have. You could start by simply taking 10 deep breaths, put the coffee on whilst reminding yourself of everything you have to be grateful for, and then have a shower before you look at a phone or any emails. And if you have kids it may mean setting the alarm for 10–15 minutes before they usually wake up, but I also have clients who swap things around and do their morning self-care after they’ve dropped the kids at school.

Now it’s your turn to decide what your morning ritual looks like. Try to think of three things that you will do for yourself each morning as a sign of self-care before you start taking care of others and checking your phone or computer. It can be as simple as sitting up in bed and taking three deep breaths in and connecting with your own breath; having that cup of coffee in silence before everyone wakes up; or repeating some beautiful affirmations to yourself whilst taking your shower, where you use a few drops of essential oils such as eucalyptus or peppermint for a bit of extra pampering.

Write down your self-care morning ritual.

“If one wishes to know love, one must live love, in action.”

Leo Buscaglia

HONESTY FOR GOOD HEALTH

For self-care, it is vital that we are honest with ourselves. What we want, speak and do needs to be in alignment for the happiness to flow. If there is opposition in any of those areas, they will come out as unhappiness or disharmony in an area of our life. I remember asking a client who struggled with insomnia “What’s keeping you awake?” She told me how she was no longer happy in her relationship, as she and her partner wanted different things, but she was fearful about breaking up as she enjoyed the lifestyle her partner provided and that would have to change if she left him. I asked her what exactly the relationship provided. She replied “Financial freedom”, to which I asked “At what cost?” She replied “Emotionally I feel in prison.” So all that time she thought she had freedom she felt in prison emotionally. Those two opposite energies were keeping her awake at night because there was a message that she was denying. She knew if she truly stopped and listened to her intuition or guidance, she would have to go through some discomfort and turmoil to align herself and her lifestyle again. What she was putting out there energetically was that she valued the money more than she valued her own happiness and that was never going to align her with attracting more happiness now, was it? She and her partner broke up not long after because she realized that she deserved to be happy as well as having a good lifestyle, and that she didn’t have to settle for one or the other long-term, but just make some adjustments temporarily. Like Phil Stutz and Barry Michels explain in the book The Tools, endless possibilities lie outside of your comfort zone on the other side of the pain you need to go through to get there.

DAY 3: LET THE LOVE FLOW

I love this breath-focused meditation, also known as the Heart Breath. It helps you to drop out of your ever-thinking mind for a moment and connect with the heart. When we connect to the heart, everything seems simpler and it reminds us that there is a kinder more compassionate way through even the most difficult times. Breath by breath you will feel your vibration rise. This exercise is extremely helpful if you feel emotionally blocked and are someone who is in your head a lot trying to work everything out when really what you need is to FEEL what guidance is within you instead. You may also find that it clears hurt, frustration or sadness from a past or current relationship.

Let’s ignite the heart energy.

1. Sit somewhere comfortable and close your eyes.

2. Visualize a big bright light surrounding you and beaming through you.

3. Now focus on your breath getting slower, and how it’s flowing in and out of your heart.

4. Imagine each breath getting deeper and longer, each breath representing love flowing in and out of the heart.

5. If it feels comfortable to you, you can place your hands over your heart to feel the connection with the body a little deeper and you can also focus on words like “love” on the in-breath and “let go” on the out-breath. However, simply focusing on the expansion and love flowing in and out of the heart is powerful in itself.

Notice how raising your vibration brings new energy to the body, how the light you are imagining shining through you is getting brighter and how the breath is getting deeper.

Go to www.zenme.tv/mindtools for the guided version of this meditation.

DAY 5: CHAKRA BALANCING

A long time ago I came across an audio recording from Deepak Chopra of his Chakra Balancing Meditation and it’s been on my iTunes ever since. I first used it when I was touring in a UK sell-out play called Calendar Girls. I was acting for the first time in my life and in desperate need of some self-care – this exercise became my go to. I fell madly in love with it and still use it weekly.

The chakras represent the 7 main energy fields in the body and they run from the bottom of the spine up through the middle of the body through the belly, solar plexus, chest, throat, the area between your eyebrows and the top of your head. Think of them as spinning wheels of energy in the body, when they are all rotating at the same rate we feel aligned and energized because the pathway is clear for our breath and energy to flow freely through our body. However, when one of the chakras slows down we feel out of alignment and start saying things like “I feel stuck”, “Things aren’t flowing for me”, “I feel blocked” and so on. There are different ways we can align and balance the chakras – I personally use certain yoga exercises as well as the exercise I am about to share with you.

When we go through emotional challenges, we can store some of that trauma and those feelings in our bodies and suddenly the body starts to act out with pain, discomfort, skin problems, even as a disease or a cold. In their book The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Chakras, Betsy Rippentrop Ph.D. and Eve Adamson explain how your health, both physically and mentally, and the chakras are interlinked on a spiritual level, which can help give you a deeper understanding of yourself. Do, however, always consult a doctor with any health issues. Each chakra represents different types of emotions and feelings we may be holding onto. I love the analogy in The Essential Guide to Chakras by Swami Saradananda: “If you block a river by throwing waste into it, its flow is reduced. Similarly, if your body is filled with physical toxins, the flow of prana is inhibited.” Prana means universal energy that flows through the body. This makes so much sense and explains why we say we feel stuck or blocked or that things aren’t flowing. It could mean you are holding onto past or current emotions and feelings around a relationship or situation. There is also a colour and element connected to each chakra, as I will guide you through in the meditation, and each chakra represents different areas such as confidence, passion and communication.

I have seen incredible shifts in people when I have worked with them on releasing held emotions from relationships. I have seen them let go of stagnant emotions and improve stomach discomfort and digestive issues. I have seen clients walk in so tight chested with anxiety that they were completely disconnected from their breath – once they’d released old emotions of hurt and sadness and forgiven people, they often described becoming balanced as a huge weight being lifted off their chest and sometimes shoulders. Another common one is when clients tune into their throat chakra and finally let go of things they have wanted to say to someone for ages, but never communicated – holding onto it has caused stress and tension in their throat and neck and even affected their immune system.

I have recorded an extended audio version of this meditation for you. Just head to www.zenme.tv/mindtools. If you are ever in LA, check out my events calendar on social media or on my website for any upcoming events, as I regularly guide chakra balancing classes.

Before you begin please get comfortable either on a yoga mat on the floor, couch or bed and at a time when you know you won’t get disturbed. Some people like to lie down rather than sitting as you can really become aware of the energy flowing through the body as you balance and cleanse each chakra. You can place your hands over each chakra as we move through them or just relax them down by your side.

If you like to work with crystals, then you can integrate them into this practice, placing them along your body on the energy fields to enhance the meditation. A quick guide to working with crystals is to match the colour of the crystals to the colour of the chakra, so if you happen to have a green crystal at home it goes with your heart chakra, and so on.

Like in any meditation (see page 9), know that your thoughts will come and go and pull you away and that’s okay. Let the focus you use to bring you back again and again be the colour of the chakra. You may or may not see the exact colour or any colour at times as everyone visualizes differently and that’s totally okay – just know you will go on the journey that is meant for you as you try to imagine each colour in that moment. When it comes to repeating the sentences, it’s fine to do so silently but, equally, if it feels right for you to say them aloud then that’s great too. You can find what works best for you.

Start by bringing your focus to the 1st Chakra – the Root Chakra based at the bottom of your spine. Colour: red / Element: earth

Imagine the colour red as you connect with this chakra. Notice what you notice as you slowly tune into this area of the body. Are you becoming aware of any tightness, stress or tiredness here to be released? Sometimes fear can be present in this chakra – fear of changes and what will be, financial worries and concerns about living arrangements, but as you focus on the red colour, letting go of whatever you need to let go of, imagine it floating away with your out-breath into a big bright light and being dissolved. You are allowing for the connection with the earth energy. Imagine that earth energy flowing up through the feet easily and effortlessly and up through this area of the body. You will start to feel more and more grounded, rooted and stable. Repeat the words, “I am safe”, three times slowly here before you move up along to the next chakra.

Bring your focus to the 2nd Chakra – the Sacral Chakra – based in the middle of the belly beneath the belly button. Colour: orange / Element: water

Through this chakra you connect to your creativity, passion and inspiration, but if you hold onto emotions from situations that are draining you, this flow could be blocked, leaving you feeling empty, exhausted and even stuck. The aim is to get everything flowing again.

Tune into the orange colour flowing through the belly like water as you notice whether there is anything here blocking your flow, any stagnant energy or emotions you can let go of and let the water cleanse away. The beauty of letting go is that you create space for new energy to flow through you. Nurture and give back to yourself through this area and allow for new ideas to be born through here. As you fully balance this chakra, you ignite and connect to the passion, inspiration and creativity within you. Repeat the words, “Everything in my life flows with ease”, slowly three times and then move up along to the 3rd chakra.

Bring your focus to the 3rd Chakra – the Solar Plexus Chakra – based in the solar plexus, in the abdomen above your belly button. Colour: yellow / Element: fire

As you tune in here to the colour yellow or the fire in your solar plexus, notice whether there is any tightness or discomfort in this area. This chakra represents the upper digestive system so ask yourself, “How am I digesting life and situations through here?”, or “Is there anything here that is repeating on me?” ie an issue, emotion, relationships, and then just notice what comes to mind. As the element is fire it can feel very powerful to imagine a yellow light shining right through the body here cleansing away any stale energy. Sometimes emotions and feelings of anger, resentment or controlling behaviour can appear to be released. And as you balance this chakra you connect to your confidence and self-belief, turning up your own light allowing you to feel empowered as you let your shoulders fall back and the solar plexus open up for your light to shine brightly. It feels empowering when you visualize yourself standing fully in your own light! Repeat the words, “I am shining my light brightly and I am enough”, three times slowly.

Bring your focus to the 4th Chakra – the Heart Chakra, based in the middle of the body next to the heart. Colour: green / Element: air

Tune into the green colour now. This chakra represents all matters of the heart. From this space you can tune into the guidance you are feeling here and also notice if there is anything weighing on your chest making it difficult to breathe easily, and then literally asking yourself, “What am I feeling here?” or if there is a specific situation on your mind you can ask, “How do I feel about it?” The key is to drop into what you’re feeling rather than thinking. This chakra is all about feeling everything and allowing all feelings that are no longer serving you to come to the surface to clear. From here you can choose to forgive and let go of issues and emotions like hurt, sadness and grief as you allow for the infinite loving energy to flow through you. Remember, if you are withholding love from a situation, resisting letting it go, you are also withholding love from yourself as love and energy can’t flow through a blocked chakra. You forgive to set yourself free, to open yourself up to give love and be loved again. Forgiving someone does not necessarily mean agreeing with their behaviour – it just means you stop it from poisoning you over and over again, carrying it with you into the now. Repeat the words, “I am love”, three times slowly (see the exercise Heart Breath on pages 145–6 to work further with the energy field of the heart).

Bring your focus to the 5th Chakra – the Throat Chakra – based in the middle of the throat. Colour: blue / Element: ether (space)

This chakra represents the centre of communication and our immune system is also connected though this centre. Notice as you focus on this calming blue colour flowing through the neck and the throat whether you are aware of any tightness. It’s helpful to notice if you are holding onto something that has gone unsaid. If so, you can say whatever you didn’t get to say to that person in your mind now and let it go, rebalancing this chakra. This area is very much an area from where we tune into speaking our truth. So it’s helpful to check in with yourself and ask, “What am I communicating through here?”, “What am I not communicating here?” This chakra is also about finding balance between speaking and listening and resting and doing so you don’t run yourself and your immune system down. Listening to the guidance is key here. Repeat the words, “I communicate with clarity and I speak my truth”, three times slowly

Bring your focus to the 6th Chakra – the Third Eye Chakra – based between the eyebrows. Colour: indigo / Element: all elements combined and light

This chakra represents your intuition and is also referred to as the eye of the soul. As you tune into the indigo colour, notice if there are feelings of being overwhelmed, confused, stressed and anxious. As you keep focusing on that area between the eyebrows, opening the eye of the soul and tuning into your intuition, let it show you what guidance is here for you, allowing you to see with more clarity and focus, calming the mind in the process and letting the thoughts settle. Imagine you have laser vision seeing straight through the confusion and everything is as clear as looking through a piece of pure ice. Surrender to the guidance of your intuition. Repeat the words, “I see the guidance clearly”, three times slowly.

Bring your focus to the 7th Chakra – the Crown Chakra – based at the top of your head. Colour: purple / Element: no element or thought

This chakra represents your higher self, whatever that means to you, that feeling when you connect to the oneness and unity in the world or spiritual connection. Here you tap into the sense of being guided and knowing, exploring the sentence “I have all that I need right here within me.” Sometimes when you are busy working everything out in your mind, especially speculating about how things will work out in the future, it’s helpful to return to the present moment and allow yourself to focus only on the guidance here and the one thing you can do now. Bringing it back to now allows you to let go of anxiety about the situation or relationship so that you stop putting your mind into a spin about what may or may not happen in the future. As you start to trust and believe that you are guided and that everything is playing out just the way it’s meant to for you, you will notice your thoughts settling. Repeat the words, “I am guided”, three times slowly

To complete the Chakra Balancing exercise, start to imagine all of the chakras aligned and spinning in the same direction at the same speed. Imagine your breath and energy flowing through the body with ease. To conclude the meditation, imagine a big bright light shining from above your head and down through your body, letting the light flow down through each chakra, sealing them and keeping these aligned and cleansed energy fields protected.

May this wonderful chakra practice become a steady tool in your toolbox and one you return to again and again like a trusted friend.

“We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are.”

Anais Nin

REJECTION

There are certain times in our lives when self-care becomes even more important and one of those is when we’ve been rejected. We definitely need self-care to regain our strength and positivity. Rejection is something most of us experience early on in our lives – it might be wanting to be friends with someone at school who doesn’t feel the same. We’re left hurt and wondering if it is because we are not good enough or pretty enough. The feeling of rejection never goes away, whatever age. When I first read the words, “You were not rejected you were protected”, probably inspired by the words “Rejection is God’s protection”, it summed up in one sentence what I had taught my clients for years – that when something doesn’t work out, open yourself up to the possibility that something even more suitable and better for you will arrive instead, and that it will all make sense one day. In the moment of rejection it’s hard to think that you were literally protected in that moment but, wow, when you truly choose to believe that, your mind switches immediately from a place of “poor me” to “yay me, something better is on its way”.

It may take a few meditations and conversations with your friends or coach to come to that conclusion, but I can tell you it is definitely a much more compassionate way to look at it. If you are feeling rejected, repeat this affirmation, “I am protected, I am guided and I am loved”, a few times. It will help you to refocus on your healing rather than on the person who has rejected you.

Looking at rejection from the other side: let’s say you are letting go of someone who you have been trying to fix or save. Remember when we save others we actually prevent them from learning valuable lessons they need to evolve on their path.

“When we truly care for ourselves, it becomes possible to care far more profoundly about other people. The more alert and sensitive we are to our own needs, the more loving and generous we can be toward others.”

Eda Leshan

DAY 6: ULTIMATE SELF-CARE

We are almost at the end of the 7-day self-care plan. I hope you are starting to enjoy taking this time for yourself and feeling the benefits of doing the exercises, valuing taking care of yourself and letting it become a steady practice in your life. When I work with clients who are feeling unloved, hopeless or lonely, they know they need to take care of themselves, but they don’t know how to get started. The feelings that have made them feel low may have been triggered by a relationship difficulty, but as we have explored in the previous chapters, it is often an old pattern that has popped up from the past, a part of them, their inner child, that needs some love and care. By doing this self-care visualization you will learn how to be there for yourself at any time in your life.

Let’s visualize…

• Go ahead and close your eyes.

• Bring to mind how you are feeling in this moment.

• Try to remember a time as a child, or another time in your life, that you felt this way too, or if nothing comes to mind work with the situation present now.

• That’s the part of you that is longing for love and support. I want you to imagine you as you are now going to comfort that part of yourself and give that part of yourself what you need. Ask yourself what do I need? Then tell this version of yourself you are here to help and provide what you need and that you are enough, you are safe, heard, loved, supported, whichever words come to mind for you that feel right and comforting to you. Feel how healing this moment is as you tell yourself “You are safe with me.”

Doing this is such a healing experience and it can give you a real sense of having come home within. You can talk to your younger self and tell yourself you will grow up to become confident and awesome. And when you feel at peace and you are ready, you can go ahead and open your eyes. This exercise can take as little or as long as it needs for you to feel the healing and make the peace you need to make. (Go to www.zenme.tv/mindtools for the audio version of this visualization.)

INTENTION BEHIND THE INTENTION

Have you ever found yourself saying things like, “I should really catch up with xyz so they don’t get annoyed” or “I have to go to a friend’s dinner tonight”? Consider the words “I should” and “I have to” – the intention behind those words is very different from “I want to”. The intention is a need to please or not rock the boat – you are doing it for the other person, not for yourself. Saying no to a friend or leaving a friendship group brings the same feelings as leaving a love relationship, where you want to move on but are worried about hurting the other person.

Hanging out with the right friends can be such an uplifting experience and a real act of self-care – you can leave a conversation with a good friend feeling so elated, heard and free, but when you start filling your schedule with things you “should” do or “have to” do it will drag you down and steal your energy, leaving you exhausted. Would you want your friends to hang out with you because they feel they have to or because they truly want to? To attract that into your life you have to walk the walk yourself by making choices that are in alignment with your wishes and true intentions in relationships.

To get to the bottom of your intentions in a relationship, ask yourself: What’s my intention behind hanging out with this person? And then check in and ask what’s the intention behind the intention. For example, you might choose to hang out with a friend because you don’t really want to be sat at home alone or because you quite fancy watching the same movie rather than because you actually want to hang out with them specifically. Then when you actually meet up you find being with them draining and realize that a night in alone, or seeing the movie alone or at a later date, would have nurtured your soul more. The clearer you become about your intentions being aligned with what you truly want in any relationship, the more you will start to attract more harmonious relationships.

The same goes for business, too: if you are going to work events because you need to and not because you want to, consider a different way of networking, perhaps online instead. The key is to choose the way you want to network – the way that’s right for you, that allows your energy to flow – because if you’re in a space of “I have to” it will create a heavy, blocking energy instead.

DAY 7: NURTURED FROM INSIDE OUT

The final exercise is one I suggest to many of my clients and, although it’s a pretty straightforward one, it has a multitude of benefits. I’m so grateful I came across it as it is self-care on a deeper level – an exercise that can really nurture you from the inside out.

We are going to work with the vagus nerve, which is the longest nerve running through the body from your head down through the heart and into the stomach. The vagus nerve plays a vital part as it represents the parasympathetic nervous system, which controls your heart rate, mood and digestion amongst many other important bodily functions. When you stimulate your vagus nerve through breathing, you can help lower inflammation in the body and reduce stress and anxiety. And, guess what, as well as breathing, singing at the top of your lungs is another brilliant exercise you can do to stimulate and keep the vagus nerve working for you. So next time you are singing in the shower or in your car (or is that just me?!), know that you are exercising your vagus nerve and that it has benefits way beyond lifting your mood in that moment. Yoga and laughter are also great ways to stimulate this nerve.

You can do this exercise standing or sitting with your back straight.

1. Take a deep breath in through your nose for 4 counts.

2. Exhale through the mouth for 6 counts as you purse your lips together and the air makes the sound similar to the ocean, making it audible.

3. Let the belly expand with the in-breath and drop with the out-breath.

Repeat this exercise for 3 minutes.

The goal is to slow down the breath so there are fewer breaths per minute as you breathe deeper here and allow the out-breath to be 2 counts longer than the in-breath.

YOU DID IT!

You committed and you get to reap the benefits! You can carry on using the 7-day plan or choose to use one or more of the exercises from this chapter daily, or create your own plan made up of your favourite exercises from the book. See page 168 for a checklist.

One thing I have come to believe is that creating positive habits and having a routine works! I see it time and time again with my clients, when they make space for self-care in their schedules, whether that’s taking time to cook healthy meals, exercise and or meditate, their days flow with more ease, they feel less stressed and overwhelmed and, more importantly, they deal with challenges in their life more comfortably. And with everyone being “plugged in” most of the day and feeling under pressure, creating balance in our lives may mean scheduling small pockets of self-care over the day or week rather than being able to switch off each night at 6pm like in generations before us. I know that’s wishful thinking to many now and that’s why I help my clients schedule in self-care rituals at different times during their week to give them moments to breathe.

I hope that doing these exercises throughout the week has encouraged you to set aside at least a little time for yourself daily. Once you start making a self-care practice part of your day it soon becomes a positive habit you will never want to be without and one you can rely on to support you every day.

Mindfulness every day is an act of self-care

If you have been reading the exercises in the 7-day plan and thinking, “I wish I had more time for self-care but I don’t”, then I would like to remind you that you can easily introduce mindful moments into your day. You can reap the rewards by simply becoming more mindful through your daily actions: when you are sitting on a bus or train, having a cuppa, eating your lunch – these can all be mindful moments. Give yourself that time to allow for you to be doing just that one thing and for thoughts to flow in and out of your mind without needing to do anything more than acknowledge them – there is no need to judge or work anything out. Each time you notice a thought, just come back and refocus on the task at hand. One of the most beautiful things about practising mindfulness is that it allows you to just be with whatever you are feeling – accepting, for example, that you are just going to sit or be with anger allows it to actually pass through you more quickly.

I remember one morning a lady rushed into my meditation class looking all stressed out. Afterwards she told me that she almost didn’t make the class because her child had taken his time as they were walking to school, pointing out a beautiful tree and some stunning flowers that he wanted to further investigate, and even stopping to say hello to someone he thought was nice. I said to her, “You rushed to get here to sit and meditate and yet you missed all the signs your son gave you of practising mindfulness on the way to school.” She looked at me completely confused and then the penny dropped, “Wow my son was fully present and in my mind I was already in the car driving to the studio!” Don’t let the special moments of the present get away, those are magical and deeply bonding in any relationship. So before we go blaming anyone else for their behaviour, it’s good to tune in and ask “Am I fully present in this relationship?” So much can be solved when we hold space for each other and truly see, feel and hear each other.

Go forward with self-love

Throughout the book, as you have worked your way through becoming more self-aware and accepting, learnt how to love yourself and take care of yourself, you will have peeled back those layers to find the issues lying at the core of whichever relationship you were working on when you started this journey. You have allowed yourself to perceive the relationship and yourself in different ways, learnt from it and taken the opportunity to heal what was unhealed within you.

I truly hope that the book and the exercises have inspired you to know that whatever challenging relationships you are faced with, you have the tools to return to for support whenever needed. Hopefully you will approach relationship issues with a newfound curiosity and allow yourself to figure out what that challenge is there to teach you. I also hope that it has reminded you of how powerful you are when you take back your control and focus on you.

You can now go forward with a deeper understanding of yourself and an abundance of compassion and self-love, yes? If not, I suggest returning to the self-love chapter and repeating the exercises, until you can shout YES to that question!!! Remember, I told you, you deserve to LOVE yourself!

Celebrating You

Thank you for going on this journey with me through the book. It’s been an honour to support you. I hope by now you know that you are an amazing human being put on this earth for a reason. Never let anyone convince you that you have to dim your beautiful light so that they don’t feel inferior. The world needs you and your light, so shine it as brightly as you can – there is room for everyone. And if you ever have a moment of doubt, a little stumble, know that you are not alone – we all have those moments. Say these words to pick yourself back up. From my heart to yours

I am love

I am a beautiful radiant light

I am safe

I am enough

I am

And so it is

Love & Light

Camilla x

I hope to connect with you either online @camilladallerup or in person at one of my workshops or classes.