Self-care is essential. It's not just a luxury - you need it to be present. Read why

I am writing this because it's important. I am also writing this for myself - this will cover MANY things, to entice you and keep you reading here is a brief summary:

• WHY SELF-CARE IS like brushing our teeth, breathing our air - we need it. Self-care is not just a luxury, it's truly essential in our worlds so that we can keep knowing who we are. so that we can show up as us. So that we can experience this life! <3

• Food, bodies, binge eating...

• Zooming out, finding grace. Knowing that our "big problems" are not as big as we think sometimes.

I was chatting with a young woman working at a skincare shop today. We were talking about self-care, and it made me think a bit deeper about it and go into preaching mode. I was telling her that self-care really is drowned out these days.

The words “self-care”, feel “luxurious” in a way, like a treat. Treats are good for us, yes. But truly, self-care should be the same as brushing our teeth. Hopefully, you brush yours. It should be part of our lives. SOMETIMES life does not allow for as much self-care - yes we go through seasons of life and that is normal. But, self-care is absolutely 100% essential.

No matter where you are in life. Because without “self”, we are “robot”, and when we are “robot”, we are not functioning. This robot mode is sometimes a gift, in fact, showing us what we DON’T want to feel like. Where we don’t want to be.

But, there are always small ways to soothe thy self. To stay connected to self. And to know who we are - to do our best to not separate from “what if feels like to be us”, should be the goal.

To not be perfect at it, to aim for perfection, but to know that we are very important. We are worthy - and we are deserving of feeling good. Joy is truly our birthright here as humans. If we don’t believe we deserve joy, then what do we believe we deserve?

What got us talking about this, was me telling her that I have been eating a lot this month. She quickly replied, “me too”. I asked her, “emotionally?” And she said yes.

I had this feeling that we were on the same wavelength. I, like her, have had a very long month of emotional eating (something of my past, that comes up in certain seasons of unsteadiness).

I had just written a post about it earlier on IG so I showed it to her. I shared about how I was struggling with this but also was reminding the world that though we struggle sometimes, it doesn’t mean we aren’t still having good moments.

It doesn’t mean we have to only be in “life is bad” mode - we can also be in “im okay” mode. We can have good and bad feelings all within an hour. We can have yin and yang. Eb and flow. This is life.

I wrote something the other day that felt so good - so freeing. It was this:

“Thank you for this body that I get to use to explore this life. Please, while I’m in it, can you do your best to take care of it? So I can really see this world” It’ll be better that way. Thank you <3”

I wrote this after a little binge episode. My soul, my heart… desires to be so in this world. Desires to feel every feeling of joy, of presentness that I have the opportunity to feel. Tuning out and trying to ground me with food is not what my soul wants.

We have these gorgeous beautiful bodies that hold us - our souls. Our hearts. Our essence …. And all our souls want is the chance to really be here. Taking care of ourselves (mentally, physically, and emotionally, will allow us to be here.

When I am separate from myself, I come back to a list of things that make me feel like me - Caren. A few of those things - flowers, dancing, musicals, country music, wearing cute jeans and boots, strutting, the color rose pink, being around light pretty places, and many more things :)

So know that if you are going through a tough time… it’s okay. It's okay! You know this. Life is not stagnant. Just know you’re never alone, as we are all just these little sparks living in this very temporary life as us. Allow yourself to zoom out a bit, find grace, and find beauty in the small things. Find joy. <3