We are about to head into an exciting yet challenging season. The upcoming holidays can be a time full of such joy and celebration, but at the same time they can also be a very stressful time as we all know. We are getting pulled in different directions, we are busier than ever and let’s face it we have more excuses firing around in our heads.
I want to challenge us to reframe this upcoming stressful season and use it as an opportunity to invest even deeper in ourselves. When stress and chaos makes you want to crumble and give away the time you had set aside for your own health and self care, take a moment to pause, take a deep breath and reframe.
As we all know if you don’t take care of yourself you can’t take care of anyone else. So you aren’t doing anyone else any good by sacrificing yourself. It’s the easy choice to make, but that doesn’t mean it is the right one.
Here are the top three things you CAN do to remain in your routine and invest in yourself rather than sacrifice yourself…
- Adjust your goals: if your current goals are a part of the stressor, pick how you can adjust them to alleviate some of the pressure on yourself. Ex. gym 4x per week instead of 5, protein and veggies with every meal but allowing yourself to indulge in the holiday treats, staying hydrated but allowing space to enjoy that glass of wine or hot chocolate with family. Stay as on track with your goals as you can but allow yourself to adopt a more flexible mindset.
- Practice gratitude: be grateful for the fact that you have something to celebrate, instead of always leading with the negative, look at all the positive things you have in your life. Ex. I have to travel 2 hours to see my family for the holidays through tons of traffic becomes I am lucky I get to be with my family. I am way too stressed to get to the gym I don’t want to go becomes I am lucky that I have access to a gym and can workout.
- Give yourself grace: if things are harder than you want them to be right now that’s OKAY. The worst thing you could do is beat yourself up about it and negative spiral. Recognize that if you are doing your best that’s all that you can do for now. If you can do better than just simply try to and be proud of yourself for that effort.
The best thing we could do going into this season is double down on taking care of ourselves and putting our best foot forward. Set the intention to do your best going into this next season of life and then hold yourself accountable to it.
I’ll leave you with our quote of the month which speaks really well to this concept “be thankful for what you have; you’ll end up having more. If you concentrate on what you don’t have, you will never have enough.”