A wise man named Swami Vivekanand once said,
“You are the creator of your destiny.”
Think about that for one minute.
Life doesn’t happen by accident. Everything, even the ugly and extremely challenging obstacles have a place in our life experience. You don’t have to like it (I don’t) but you do have to accept that life isn’t meant to be a smooth path paved solely with happiness.
Life is meant to challenge you and make you grow and learn and adjust (this year is the perfect example of that fact). “Life’s stuff” is going to happen regardless of how you feel about it, BUT you - and you alone - get to choose how you experience “life’s stuff.”
You can spend your time wallowing, living in the past, or wishing for a different situation, but that’s only going to leave you more bitter and hopeless, because we can’t change “life’s stuff.” OR you can accept all of “life’s stuff” and create your own destiny.
HORSES AND WATER
We’ve all heard the saying, “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make him drink.” Throughout my time as a health expert this saying has rung true when it comes to health and self-care; information is great, but information alone isn’t going to change your life.
Think about it; you’ve probably looked up information on what foods to eat and what foods not to eat and yet still find yourself eating the foods you’re not supposed to eat, right? So what does it take to get the “horse” to “drink the water”?
You have to WANT a different experience!
It’s that simple. Whether you’re choosing to be guided to the water or you’re choosing to actually drink the water, it is YOUR CHOICE of how you act, and it all boils down to how you want to experience the situation. If you are not enjoying your current experience of COVID, then it is on you - and you alone - to change that experience by changing your actions.
CHANGE YOUR ACTIONS
I encourage you to reflect. Think back to March 2020 when COVID first appeared, and reflect how you’ve spent the last nine months. Have you been taking proactive action? Are you in survivor mode? Did you pick up a new hobby? This has already been nine months of your life…not knowing how long COVID will be around, do you want to experience the next nine months the same way?
When reflecting, notice the habits and actions you’ve been taking daily. Notice what experiences make you smile and which make you sad. Recognize trends and become the scientist of your own experiment. Really examine with curiosity how you’ve spent this time and consider what you did well AND what you’d like to improve.
Once you gain some clarity, ACT! Be the horse that actually drinks the water. Accept COVID for what it is, and CHOOSE to give it the middle finger and rise above. CHOOSE to act and improve your health. CHOOSE to evaluate and update your self-care plan. CHOOSE to make this next year (COVID or not) better than the last nine months.
SELF CARE PLAN
We talk a lot about self care here, and you’ve learned about what self-care and self-compassion are, the importance of strengthening your resilience shield, biochemical stress, and how to improve your physical and nutrition stress impacts. We’ve discussed mental and emotional stressors and the main things that cause stress in those areas, your beliefs, the outdated stigma around self improvement, and the importance of evaluating your relationships with the elements you experience daily. Along the way there have been worksheets and tools to help support you on your self care journey.
You have the information to change your experience, so now it’s up to you to act.
I have provided an epic self-care evaluation form below. This includes more than 100 different activities covering different aspects that all NEED a self-care practice. I encourage you to go through it and notice what you’ve been doing and make an action-oriented plan to improve.
ACT FOR A BETTER FUTURE
When I said information isn’t enough, I meant it. Reach out and connect. Connect with family and friends or coworkers and create partners or an accountability group. You can even reach out to ME to make it really easy! Whatever you decide, choose to act, choose to make the next nine months better than the last, choose to take care of yourself and show yourself some love….CHOOSE YOU!
Click here for the
EPIC SELF CARE EVALUATION