My battery died the other day. Not only did it die, but for a moment, I started to believe that it wasn’t going to come back on for me. I burn myself out with all the activities and social groups that I am a part of. Then people tell me, “Welcome to adulthood.” But I find this narrow mindset of working through burnout too hard a concept for me to accept. I’m a part-time student, full-time worker, and part-time freelance writer. I’m trying to squeeze in some dance classes on the weekend to feel like I’m taking care of myself physically. And I can’t help but feel conditioned to take on a heavy load versus a light one.
Don’t get me wrong, I love being a busy body. It really refreshes me to take on new challenges and have something new to do. Yet sometimes, my busy body ends up running on E, and the short two-day weekend just doesn’t cut it. People I interact with always tell me when they ask what I do “Wow, that’s a lot… How do you have free time?” The answer for me is simple: I don’t have free time. I must take the time to recharge the battery for my busy body so that she is able to run long distances without ending up shutting down.
Self-care is a very hard term to describe besides its denotative definition. It’s hard to describe because it is so unique to the individual, and sometimes the habitual things we as self-care may not be perceived that way by others. In a very basic understanding of the term: self-care is replenishing the body and mind through personal best practices. That can be through rest days, alone time, playing video games, or going out to engage in culture.
Social media does a great job of falsely advising us to feed into trends and fads about self-care. And I, for one, have bought into some myself: the face masks, the candles, meditation, yoga, skincare routines… and it goes on and on and on like this. But sometimes self-care is just doing laundry, or preparing home cooked foods, or even just taking a nap to refresh yourself. But that’s considered the less glamorous side of self-care. My point is, being the busy bodies that we are, going to do yoga every day or even for me, doing dance once a week, might lean toward being impossible if we are doing it to feed into trends that give the illusion that we are “happening” people, or even implying at times we are less complete people unless we engage in these activities.
My fellow busy bodies, when was the last time you reflected to check on yourself? When was the last time you were in your own body and mind WITHOUT thinking about your next task? When was the last time you sat with yourself and asked yourself if the load you are carrying is too heavy?
It is so important that we take the time to catch up to ourselves and how we define self-care. Let’s not wait until we’re at the point where we don’t have the energy. From my own perspective, it takes a lot to catch up to my body after a long week of being pulled in different directions. This is why I urge you to take care of your busy bodies, starting with your mind. Deliberately water and nourish your mind the same way you do all of the hard work that you do.
There is nothing wrong with “taking the load off” to rest. Please understand that ‘No’ is a totally acceptable answer if you have too much on your plate. Reaching out is important–even young, freshly planted trees sometimes need poles of support to grow into a tree strong enough to stand on its own. Remember that you are never alone. There are so many of us busy bodies out there… and this one has your back!
Featured image photo by Brandy Kennedy on Unsplash.