Implementing and following self-care sounds easier said than done. It is easy to give in to temptations or be too involved in your work to pay attention to all the key areas of your life. Instead of expecting yourself to be healthy and add self-care – you need to develop a comprehensive plan. Then, even when you have bad days, you can pick yourself up and keep moving forward to your best self and life.
Here are the four steps to building a personal self-care plan:
Step One: Evaluate All Areas of Your Life
The first step is figuring out where you are now regarding the level of self-care you provide yourself directly while also determining what triggers your anxiety or stress to start eliminating or healthily dealing with these stressors.
For example, if you feel anxious trying to get the kids and yourself ready for the day in the morning, how can you make this reality easier? Perhaps getting clothing ready the night before working from home or home-schooling is the answer.
Step Two: Develop Short-Term and Long-Term Goals
Starting with the short-term goal of just making your mornings less stressful, write out your goal for that. For example, your goal might be to eliminate rushing and hurrying in the morning by setting up your morning the night before. A long-term goal might be to stop having to get up so early in the morning by radically changing your life. As long as you write SMART goals that are specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, and time-bound, no goal is too hard to help you make your life better.
Step Three: Act (Do Stuff) and Monitor Your Results
Once you have designed the steps to take to reach your goals, you’ll also want to schedule them and monitor the results of your actions. Create a way to track and monitor your results, get an accountability partner, make graphs or charts, or keep track through smartphone applications.
Step Four: Practice, Update and Take Risks
When you first seek to change how you live your life totally, it’s not going to come easy and be an overnight cure to whatever your problems are. Instead, you’ll need to set short-term and long-term goals so you can experience success. Keep practicing goal setting, action-taking, and monitoring the results. Don’t be afraid to take calculated risks.
Use these steps as a blueprint to develop your comprehensive self-care plan. It is important to note that your strategy should be personal to you and only you. Don’t add something to your routine you know will make you uncomfortable in the long run or because you believe that is what others want from you. The key is finding your happiness and health and then taking the right steps each day.