4 Ways that Soulful Self-Care Can Help You Love Your Again
It’s the beginning of the year. Happy New Year! 
Given the disruption in the whole world with the pandemic, and all the political and social upheaval around the globe, are you looking for ways to love your life again?
I am.
And I’ve concluded that what I and the world and my clients and students all need now is a good dose of Soulful Self-Care. That’s because soulful self-care takes ordinary self-care to a deeper level and asks you to take an active role in both protecting and creating your own well-being and happiness, especially during periods of stress.
Overview
In this blog, I want to challenge you to explore the idea that soulful self-care can help you fall in love with your life again, no matter what your personal situation or what is going on in the world.
By:
- deeply listening to yourself,
- connecting to what makes you feel alive,
- no longer putting others’ needs above your own,
- and learning to appreciate your life just as it is,
you will repair your relationship with your own life and fall in love with it again.
My story
This year has been a challenge for me. First, there were losses. My family, my friends and my extended social circle all lost someone to this virus or knew someone who did. It wasn’t just a news story for us.
Second, my normal rhythm of business was turned upside down. There has been a hold on the corporate Emotional Intelligence for Leadership coaching that I do, which left a gap in my calendar – a large yawning gap that I fell into. It nearly swallowed me up.
And that’s what got me thinking about self-care. Except, the usual self-care practises could not do the heavy lifting I needed to get back up. Specifically, my go-to list of self-care activities, like exercise, facial masks, massages, reading a great novel, watching British Crime Dramas on Netflix, shopping, and hanging with friends was mostly all on lockdown in my town.
Besides, it was my soul that needed tending here. Hence, I started wondering what soulful self-care might look like.
One thing for sure, it wasn’t going to be a long list of things I felt guilty about not doing enough of!!! Do you know what I mean?
Do you ever feel like the list of what you are supposed to do to live a great life just weighs too much?
No. Soulful self-care had to be something different than that. I needed to fall in love with my life again instead of seeing it as a series of problems to be solved and disasters to be avoided.
Your story
How about you? Are you in love with your life?
Check in with yourself. Give it a number between 1-10. Is there room for improvement?
What I have learned from doing the research for this blog is that our relationship with our life is pretty much like any relationship. It takes intentional activities to keep the love flowing.
And so, here are 4 ways you can focus on soulful self-care which will help you fall in love with your life again.
4 Ways That Soulful Self Care Can Help You Love Your Life Again
Way #1: Begin to deeply listen to yourself
Deeply listening to yourself is a great place to start when you are practicing soulful self-care. As in all relationships, the act of listening without judgment, with an open heart, and a curious mind honours the other. In this case, your intentional listening to yourself honours your soul.
What is your soul asking for? What are you feeling called to do, or say, or have or experience?
I have a coaching client who doesn’t start her day until she has spent time quietly tuning into herself. It’s her meditation. She does some slow deep breathing and then she listens. It’s like stepping back for a few minutes from participating in her life and instead just witnessing and listening within.
What happens is that she connects with feelings, thoughts and ideas that have been crowded out by the activities of life. Here, in this quiet time of deeply listening to her soul, she can hear what is really going on for her.
Furthermore, she will stop throughout the day and continue to check in with herself.
Like in any great love affair, listening is caring. She is showing much love for herself with this practise. She understands where the problems lie because she is present to them. That empowers her to deal with them.
I had a coach once who asked me, “Are you living out of the longing of your soul?”
This is such a powerful question and I explore this with all my coaching clients.
I’ve learned over the years that most people don’t know what that longing is. That’s why beginning to deeply listen to yourself is a great first step in growing your life and falling in love with it again.
Way #2: Connecting to what makes you feel alive
What brings you joy! Okay. Go on now and practise that for 10 minutes.
Ah. But what if you don’t know what brings you joy and makes you feel alive?
Our day-to-day life can get very monotonous, stressful, challenging …well the list can go on if you are not connecting with the things that make you feel alive.
Right now, try thinking back to the most recent time you felt fully alive, fully present or joyful.
Maybe it’s a hobby. How much fun did you have playing charades? What about knitting, writing, colouring in an adult colouring book. What about walking in the rain, playing fetch with your dog?
You see, it isn’t that we don’t have these moments when we feel alive, it’s that we are not connected to them. They come. They go. And we hardly notice.
Soulful self-care means noticing.
And when we notice, we connect. And when we connect with those moments, we fall in love with our life again.
Truth is, it may just be a moment. But the point of soulful self-care is to connect with it somehow, someway and to let that alive feeling wash over you. It’s a surefire way of loving your life again.
For me, teaching our Bliss Om Life Coaching Certificate students makes me come alive. I get the feeling that I am in the right place. I get energized by being with them and working with my teaching partner Lora Lisi.
Learning something new, reading spiritual teachings, writing, listening to James Taylor records, playing with dogs, talking to someone about BattleStar Galactica… these all make me feel alive. (I’m not kidding!)
There are so many of these alive moments available if we go looking for them. But if you are anything like me, during the day, I can spend way too much time worrying, trying so hard, distracted, and simply out of touch with what feels good and right and mostly alive. I get caught in the cycle of “getting things done.”
Oh yes, and needing to be perfect!
Quite honestly, as I am writing this, I am realizing how I tend to make everything a struggle. Instead of sitting here enjoying the process of pouring out my heart, soul and mind to you, I am checking the clock, worrying about whether it’s good enough or even if it makes sense.
Heck. I know better. I love writing. Practising soulful self-care means I let myself love it, no matter how long it takes or how good it is. Connecting with the underlying energy of it, well that just feels good, and exciting, and alive.
Soulful self-care asks us to step back once in a while and really connect with the underlying energy that makes us feel alive.
Way #3: No longer putting others’ needs above your own
If you want to do a very quick and powerful soulful self-care practise then start to ask yourself in every situation: “What do I need here?” And then take action.
Mother’s in particular are so very out of touch with their own needs that they have lost themselves. But it’s not just mothers. Women in general seem to be conditioned that way.
It’s not helpful. It doesn’t actually serve others for you to lose yourself. I wrote a whole book about this Becoming a Mother on Fire: How to be a mom without losing yourself. And the one thing I learned from working with so many women who were mothers is that the main thing their children need is for their mother to be happy.
Soulful self-care in this instance means connecting with your own needs and honouring them.
It’s very hard to love your life when you are lost in someone else’s.
Do you remember the parable about the goose who laid the golden eggs? The owner of the goose was made rich and powerful because each day, there was a golden egg in the nest that the farmer could take to market.
But the farmer got greedy and may I say, a little stupid and decided to kill the goose so they could get all the eggs at once.
Okay, so they didn’t know much about biology. But the point of the parable is that in your life, YOU are the goose. You are the one who creates golden eggs in your life. Your soulful self-care is how you keep that beautiful goose producing every day.
And so, the third way to practise soulful self care is all about digging deep, understanding your needs and honouring them. Even if it means going for that mani-pedi. It’s you honouring your needs that gives you the lasting shine, not the colour of the polish.
When you take care of your needs, you will begin to love your life again for sure!
Way #4: Learning to appreciate your life just as it is
This soulful self-care practise is so powerful it could be all you need. It’s all about gratitude and appreciation. I think of it as making peace with where you are.
Another way to look at it is letting go of needing things to be different.
There are so many studies now that (study link) prove scientifically how gratitude changes the brain waves. It’s important to understand that you don’t have to find huge things to be grateful for. The power of gratitude comes when you can feel amazement for the small things.
Many mornings I grow in love for my life when I marvel at the hot water that comes out of my shower. I imagine and feel so grateful that strangers worked hard to create the highway of pipes that would bring me such pleasure every day. I say thank you to all those who figured it all out, how to pump the water, how to heat it, how to make it travel over 21 floors to my bathroom. And that I am so lucky to live in such prosperity.
I know right? I can get very carried away. But do you know how great I feel after one of those rampages? May I say that no matter what is happening in the world or in my personal life, after one of those shower love fests, I can’t help but love my life again.
Finding things you can love and appreciate about your life, about the people in it, and even about the condition of the world will heal your soul as quick as a wink.
You see, love is a force, not simply a feeling. And this force is what creates, maintains and sustains us. This life force pulsates within us. It’s part of the amazing energy system that circulates within our skin.
Focusing on what you love and appreciate in your life, as it is right now, activates that inner life force. It will open your heart. It will uplift your mind. And it will make you fall in love with your life all over again.
Practising these 4 soulful self-care practises
- deeply listening to yourself,
- connecting to what makes you feel alive,
- no longer putting others’ needs above your own,
- and learning to appreciate your life just as it is,
will take you back home, back to yourself, and so in love with your life, you’ll just have to smile ear to ear.
I hope you intend and commit to taking an active role in creating and protecting your well-being and your happiness.
We can rise above whatever 2020 has dropped on our doorstep. We can create a loving vibrant connection with our life that just makes us fall in love with it all over again.
Many blessings for a Prosperous and Happy New Year!
xoLisa
But Wait. There’s More!
I have an amazing event coming up that can support you fully in your Soulful Self-care going forward:
Self-Care Retreat – Join me and Lora Lisi, Certified Spiritual Coach and Founder of BlissOm Yoga Studio and Holistic Learning Centre, January 22 – 24, 2021 for a weekend of Self-care – Life Coaching Retreat, all online.
You can join from anywhere in the world. Amazing!
We will provide you with life coaching strategies that will give you the tools to help with your inner transformation and life. We’ll also practice gentle mindful movements through active meditation.
This Self-Care Retreat is ideal for the person who wants to receive the benefits of thinking and solving problems like a life coach but does not necessarily want to become one by profession.
⬇️ Right below here is the link to learn more and register.
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