Last year was a big year for me in terms of self-care. I finally understood how important it is to me and my mind and have set it as my top priority. If my mind is not okay, nothing around me will be. So, today I bring you the self-care routine that finally worked for me and how I believe it will work for you too.
To start, we all need to know this: there is no perfect self-care routine for each of us. You need to build your self-care routine. Yes, I said on top of this post and in previous ones that I was going to show you how you could incorporate this self-care routine, but the truth is, I’m going to show you how to create the perfect one for you and incorporate it too. And that is the real nugget that will help your 2024.
We already understood how important self-care is in this post, so I will not go again through this, let’s go right into how to build your self-care routine!
Start with a Selfcare planner
No, I’m not going to make you buy another planner or even use another planner! What I’m going to recommend you is to download the free Self Care Planner from ShineSheets and set some time to go through it alone. Each page has a space for Daily, Weekly, Monthly, and Yearly self-care ideas for you to fill up for each life category and more: Mind, Soul, Skin, Hair and Body. If you find yourself struggling to get ideas: do a bit of research on ways to de-stress, hobbies you would like to try or get back to, make a list of 20 things you enjoy doing, or just check on what you have been saving on your Instagram saves or Pinterest. I bet you have things you feel yourself craving for regularly that would make you wonders if you add them to these lists.
Gather the daily, weekly, and monthly lists
Set them in your bullet journal, Todoist, Google Calendar task, or whatever tool works best for you. For example, for me, I have gathered all the daily ones and keep them on my Todoist with a recurrency set for daily, the weekly, and monthly lists I keep on bullet journal weekly and monthly spreads.
Choose 3 or 4 daily
Now how to really incorporate it in your life? Check on them regularly. It will not take a long time, I promise. If you keep your lists on tools you are already using, you just need to incorporate checking on them daily while you plan your day. For example, I set a space on my daily spread for 3 or 4 Self-care-to-do’s I would like to fill up that day. For making that list I check the monthly list, the weekly list, and then the daily list. Usually, the daily starts to get so part of your life that you find that you already filled up several before your day has even started. But if you check on the 3 lists, you will find that you’re taking care of the things that matter most to you and that make you feel the happiest.
Example of my 3 lists
Monthly:
- Have a Mental Health Day
- Check on my Mental Health Days’s Hit reset questions
- Read 1 Mental Health, self-improving, book
- Have a Me End of Day / Take myself on a date
- Have a Girls Meet Up
- …
Weekly:
- Eat a guilty pleasure – enjoy every bite
- Listen to music that brings me joy
- Do whatever I feel like doing
- Cry if needed
- Watch/attend a mass
- Exfoliate face, body
- Face mask
- Hair mask
- Videogaming
- Go to a park
- …
Daily:
- Eat well
- Listen to a Mental Health Podcast – I’m currently listening to Good Morning From the Chicken Coop
- Moisturize bump
- Be in Nature
- Pregnancy Vitamins
- Prioritize 7 uninterrupted hours of sleep
- Rest when my body says so – this is a daily reminder for my pregnant self
- Say no if needed – to work, at home, to anything that you need to, to focus on what matters today…
- Skin self-care – use those fancy creams!
- Take time to do something I enjoy doing just for me – peaceful
- Vitamin D – get some sunlight
- Walk – fill my Apple Watch movement
And what about the Yearly?
If you’re like me, you will find that the yearly list is a lot smaller, so what I do is this: I set them as one of my year goals and assign it to a Quarter, a month, or a fixed date on my calendar. For example, one of mine is to go to a music concert or festival, so I keep them in my 2024 goals for this year plus Q3 goals because I know I will make it happen during the music festival season here in Portugal, which is between June and August.
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There you have it. Everything you need to get your winning self-care routine set up and working for you. You have everything you need to start. Don’t feel like you have to stick to this if you feel it’s not helping you. Change. Get more things on the list as you find them. Remove things from the list as you feel they are not helping you. Make this list you! Because you deserve to have fun, feel joy and loved every day.
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