Enjoying the little things in self-care

I struggle with self-care; I think it’s a difficult thing to work with. Living out my days here at my university, it feels like I am always going through something or juggling a lot of things at once. It gets to be very overwhelming, and I always try my best to manage the best I know how. The mind is one of the most important things to take care of. It is one of the more internal practices of self-care, and it takes a long time to learn what works. Practicing mindfulness through journaling, self-reflection, and being overall kind to yourself in any way you know is important.  

On an average day, I find myself scrolling on Instagram to unwind and just get away from reality for a bit. Even though social media and Instagram have the reputation it does for mental health, I try my best to make it a safe space so I can indulge in some leisure time. 

During my time there I see these decorated posts about self-care, tips on caring for yourself, inspirational quotes, and prompts about mindfulness. When I see these things on social media, it’s engulfing and brings me back to reality. When I take a second and change my perspective and start looking at these posts in a different light, I start to feel like I am not doing enough for myself. Suddenly, there’s this added pressure surrounding the idea that I am doing a bad job taking care of myself. 

In those moments, I step back and put my phone down, and I try to sit with those feelings. I remind myself that not everything I think is true and go from there. I work with what I know, and I like to think I take good care of myself. It was during one of these moments that I thought about how I take care of myself.  

I started to think, could I be doing anything else for myself? I tried giving myself a new perspective on self-care, was there anything that I could do that would make my life a little easier and maybe even a little more fun? 

I realized that anything could be self-care. For me, it never has to be this huge gesture I am doing for myself. Oftentimes it’s the small things in my routine that I do that mean the most. Things like taking time to carefully put on my mascara in the morning to make sure it doesn’t clump and maybe adding colorful eyeliner. Going out of my way to pick out some jewelry and do my hair nicely in the morning, or grabbing a cute hat so I don’t need to stress about my hair. 

Sometimes I set aside extra time for myself by picking out my outfit the night before, and from there I can have extra time to cook myself something good for breakfast. Adding to my night routine, I try and treat myself with a new shampoo and conditioner, exfoliate my skin, paint my nails, and put on extra comfy clothes to crawl into bed. If my space is messy, I try and pick things up where I can without putting too much pressure on myself to deep clean my room the second, I get home.  

Taking things in small strides and creating these small manageable pieces in my life really gives me this feeling of security and comfort. I try my best to create a place where I can have a soft place to land if everything goes south. Putting something as simple and precious as time aside for myself turns into an opportunity where I give back to myself by replenishing or resetting my energy. Anything could make me feel good even if it is something very simple, a little goes a long way.