How to Be Sure Self-Care Improves Well-Being

As far as we know, we only get one life to live! It’s best for all of us to make the most of this gift we’ve been given. To do so, we must take good care of ourselves. This includes looking after both our mental and physical health. Ideally, we need to manage stress, watch what we eat, and enjoy fun experiences and exercise, too. It can feel a little daunting having to pay attention to so many different aspects of our lives. But it doesn’t have to be that challenging. Read on to learn more about how to go about applying self-care in meaningful, practical ways that will stick.  

Monitor Your Happiness

We all go through periods of happiness and times of doubt.

It’s unavoidable, as we humans are prone to frequent changes in mood and emotions.

However, when we feel like happiness is becoming elusive for longer periods of time, it’s time to consider making changes to improve our mental health.

And to focus on our own personal self-care basics.

Depending on our unique circumstances, our self-care basics may look different. For example, if we suffer from anxiety, getting support and looking into anxiety treatment may help. For those of us with chronic anxiety, this should be at the top of our self-care basics list, when our feelings of anxiety begin to rise. Other things that may help even out our mental health can include reviewing both our dietary and sleep habits. Sleep deprivation can really affect how we feel each and every day.

Reducing Stress is Part of Self-Care

Stress is not ever pleasant. To make matters worse, it often takes hold of us when our mental health is already suffering. Stress also takes the worst toll when we haven’t been looking after ourselves. When we start to feel stressed, we may feel overwhelmed and make mistakes or poor decisions. Sometimes we may also find ourselves feeling less calm, snapping at small things that don’t really matter.

When we notice these changes in our attitude, we must take some time to reflect. And make a commitment to look after our own well-being and to re-prioritize some self-care basics. We each can reduce the impact of stress and put ourselves in a better mindset. But first, we have to realize the toll stress is taking on us – and acknowledge that we need to do all we can to relieve that added burden. 

Staying Healthy is Part of Self-Care

Getting ill can be worst when you haven’t been looking after yourself in other ways. Whether you have come down with a cold, or feel like you may be fighting one off, indulging in a few self-care basics will probably help. Take a warm bath or find a good book to read. Indulge in a Netflix binge, if that’s your thing. Whatever makes you happy and cared for, do a bit more of it.

Regularly taking care of yourself with self-care basics will help you to feel happier and more relaxed.

It will also reduce your chances of getting ill. And increase the odds of a speedy recovery when you do.

Things like getting more exercise, walking, spending time with friends, and correcting your diet can all help reduce your chances of getting ill and help you to look after yourself. 

Boost Your Energy

If you haven’t been looking after yourself for a while, you may find your energy levels depleted. Your motivation may also be lagging, and you may wake up feeling sluggish. This is unfortunately common when you’ve been neglecting your own mental or physical health. Luckily, it can be remedied by applying some self-care basics, and you’ll soon be back to your energized self.

Tips to improve your energy levels include drinking less alcohol. 

This can lead to a major improvement in both your physical and mental health.

Other self-care basics may involve changing up some other healthy habits. Seek out enjoyable changes that may help you to lose weight, get more exercise, eat a balanced diet, ensure you get plenty of sleep, avoid smoking, and more. Do research on the areas where you feel you may have the most to gain. There are many more tips to improve energy levels that you can apply to your day-to-day life. 

Are there additional tips that you think are important? Which of the above points do you agree with most? Is there anything you would like to add that will benefit our readers? Let us know in the comment box below. We would love to hear from you. 

Thank you as always for reading.

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KindCompassCoach

Joan Senio is the founder of KindCompassCoach. Her career includes 20+ years as a private sector corporate executive and 15 years as a consultant. The common thread through her professional life has been a commitment to compassionate coaching and leadership, including mentoring early and mid-career professionals as well as current and future executives and leaders. KindCompassCoach articles are backed by research and include facts and advice from relevant experts. Joan is a member of the International Organization of Life Coaches, serves as a thought-leader for KuelLife.com and is a regular contributor to PsychReg and Sixty and Me.