A Reminder to Practice Self-Love and Compassion

During these uncertain times and over the course of the pandemic, it has been easy to forget to cultivate care and love for ourselves. At our lowest, we deal with negative self-talk, being hard on ourselves, facing frustrations and shortcomings and our bumps in the roads. By taking the time to nurture our self-love and compassion, we can cultivate our wellbeing to its optimal level and balance our equilibrium.

What is self-love and compassion?

When you ask yourself, “What does self-love mean to me?,” your answer might differ from another person as self-love can mean and be different to those being asked. This is because people are at different phases of their self-love journey. So, what is self-love? 

Self-love is the affirmation and appreciation of one’s current state of well-being and happiness. Self-love is the ultimate form of self-acceptance and unconditional positive regard toward the self. Because of this, an important aspect of self-love is self-compassion. Neff & Beretvas (2012) describes self-compassion as focusing on self-kindness, common humanity, and being mindful when faced with negative emotions. 

It may be difficult but by allowing ourselves to be vulnerable with our feelings and emotions, we can feel compassion for ourselves and love who we are unconditionally. 

Why is self-love and compassion important?

Practicing self-love and compassion yields many benefits for the overall wellbeing and health. In a study by Henschke & Sedlmeier (2021), it was found that self-love and compassion act as barriers that prevent psychological diseases and emotional imbalances, which lowers levels of anxiety and depression. When we practice self-love and compassion daily, we can deal with personal limitations and struggles more efficiently by exchanging negative emotions and feelings with kindness. 

How can I practice self-love and compassion?

It may be surprising to realize that there are plenty of ways to practice self-love and compassion… you may be practicing self-love and compassion regularly without even noticing it! If you’re curious or want to learn how to practice self-love and compassion daily, we have a list ready for you to help you get started. 

Self-care. Self-care is defined as taking the time and energy to improve one’s own health. It means being deliberate with your time to care and love yourself by indulging in various self-care activities. Activities can simply be taking a shower or bath, sitting in the sunlight, napping or sleeping, and setting healthy boundaries within social interactions. The list of self-care activities can go on as these are just a few of the many activities that harvest self-care – some of which you may already practice!

Moving your body daily. Exercising daily has many health benefits as it aids in weight loss, reduces stress, increases productivity, and reduces the risk of metabolic diseases. Exercising doesn’t need to be reduced to going to the gym every day for vigorous exercise. It can simply include light to moderate intensity exercises a few times a week such as taking a walk outside, practicing yoga, and stretching. Moving your body can also include basic home activities such as cooking, vacuuming, cleaning, and gardening. Our seminar, “Functional Movement: Flexibility, Mobility & Strength From Home” can help you learn easy movements from the comfort of your home. When you get your body moving in any way, you’ll feel better about yourself…it’s a known fact!  

Sound nutrition. It is important to remember that eating healthy foods that are good for your body will aid in ensuring that you ‘re getting the right amount of nutrients needed to maintain energy levels. Our seminar, “Good Food: You Are What You Eat” helps identify the importance of good nutrition and how the foods you eat can help optimize your health. Nutrients help your body grow and repair and assists in preventing diet-related illnesses. 

Being mindful and meditating. Mindfulness meditation is important to help regulate emotions, decrease anxiety and depression, and assists us in being deliberate by focusing our attention to our feelings and actions without any judgements. Our seminar, “Mindfulness: Focused, Calm, Grounded” introduces you to the basics of mindfulness practice. It is through mindfulness that we can turn acceptance and kindness inwards by comforting ourselves with positive affirmations. 

If you are having trouble with mindfulness meditation, our 10 meditation sessions package is now available. Each session is 20 minutes and promises to provide relaxation and mindfulness during a mid-day break to assist with being centred with the mind and body. Contact us for more information to personalize it for your company.  By practicing mindfulness, we can be more kind to ourselves and relate to others and develop compassion for others. 

Conclusion

In Pema Chodron’s book, Start Where You Are: A Guide to Compassionate Living, she writes, “Compassion to others begins with kindness to ourselves”. As such, we encourage you to be available to practice self-love and compassion, starting with small actions and steps toward your own self-love journey. Without knowing how to love and be kind to ourselves, we will not be able to be compassionate and love others.

About Well Street

At Well Street, we are founded on the principles of introducing healthy practices to the workplace, which encompasses both mental and physical health. Comprised of medical professionals who have a background in naturopathy, we aim to help organizations foster a healthy corporate environment in order to boost productivity and morale. If you would like to learn more about how our team can help you or your company, consider contacting us to find out more. We are happy to provide you with guidelines and approaches to support the wellbeing of your team members through virtual seminars and programs.