How I’m making self care a priority whilst running my own business.

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I’ve previously posted on how I had left my job to start my own business.  Now I’ve left that toxic environment there is one thing I feel very strongly about… I never EVER want to feel the way my ex-employer made me feel ever again!  I’m in a position to now do what I want to do when I want to do it (pretty much!) and no matter what; I’m making self care a priority and a big part of my own business.

Excercise

I want to join a gym.  The last time I had a gym membership wasn’t actually that long ago.. I joined New Year’s Eve of 2017 and lasted about 6 months!  By the time the summer holidays came around; I had no time to go and I lost the desire pretty quickly. I didn’t go back and cancelled early on this year.  I can’t say I enjoyed the gym particularly; I hate the treadmill or rather I hate seeing the numbers climb so ridiculously slowly in front of my eyes that it feels like I’ve been on it a week!  However I do love the classes. I’m not the best with my feet coordination in step but give me body combat and I am on it!

I’ve want to join a local council run leisure centre on an off peak basis (to save money!) and was really excited to see they do the Les Mills classes.

At the start of last year this was pretty much all I did at least once a week. I felt amazing after it; I felt I pushed myself every single time and although my weight didn’t alter (I need to measure myself this time around!) I felt so good !!!  Apart from that Friday morning 45 minute class I never had the time to really do anything for myself so if I can do a class a week again then I will be super proud of myself and if I know I can’t go the following week then I will do two.

I am making sure this time around that pretty much everything I do is done around MY self care.  If I’m not feeling good, my clients work won’t be as good as it can be, if I’m not feeling good my family suffer and then in turn by those two things alone; I will suffer.

Diet

I am already noticing I am eating better than I was at work because I’m a lot more focused, far from distracted by pointless things I have no control over and a lot less stressed. I used to eat to pass the time at work and it was never anything other than sugar.  Now although i’m still snacking in an evening during the day I will just have my breakfast, dinner and tea… maybe a breakfast bar mid morning but I’m no longer snacking because I’m bored!

Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT)

I obviously have the things I learnt from my CBT at the beginning of the year that I am now in a position to put into action (instead of being told ‘yeah we can’t do that that way regardless of the state of your mental health because we’ve done it this way for years’ [pretty much!]) and I am back on with my Notes to Self journal that one of my clients very kindly sent me.  It allows me to record my exercise, my self care, gratitude and so much more!  It really helps especially because a lot of my work now is digital … sometimes you just want to pick up a pen and write your thoughts down instead of typing!

Cleaner

Ideally I would also like a cleaner… it’s not going to happen yet (although I’m very close!) but it would help me so much knowing that the household things that I can’t do because I’m working are getting done whilst I work.  Obviously if I don’t work now I don’t get paid which is not ideal and something I keep trying to explain to my husband when I’m asking for help and because I’m working at home there is no escaping from it which doesn’t help mentally when theres not a lot you can do about the rubbish around you because you are working to pay the bills!

So that’s how I’m how I’m making self care a priority whilst running my own business and why you should too!  I talked about it a little more over on the weekly vlog if you want to have a look… this is a prime example of how although you can remove yourself from an environment that isn’t helping, your mental health issues don’t just disappear overnight!

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Thanks for reading!

Kirsty x