THE ONLY Self care TIP YOU’ll need this autumn

Being honest with yourself is the truest form of self care you can give yourself during this season.

Are you starting to believe that this is just how life is? That being busy, not having enough time for the things that matter to you, being constantly spread thin, feeling like you are always being pulled in different directions, on the ‘wrong track’, exhaustion, striving and questioning your purpose in life are now just ‘the norm’.

Or is there a tiny part of you that still has hope, that won’t give up because deep down you know that life can be different, you know that you have something to share with the world and that you need to find a way, your way of expressing your story.

You’ve spent enough time experiencing how you don’t want to feel, feeling stuck, lost and like you’ll never find your ease. But how much time have you spent working out how you do want to feel and what you need to feel that way?

True self care is all about taking responsibility for ourselves and our wellbeing, for how and when we abandon ourselves and the life we have created and about intentionally cultivating a life within which we can navigate with ease and presence.

Restored, Sure, Paced, Safe

As we step into a new season, these are just a few of the emotions that have come up for me as I have been journaling around how I want to feel this Autumn.

Which may or not feel attainable as I sit writing and nursing my first cold since the kids went back to school, with the added annoyance of the wifi playing up to add in the mix.

September and October have historically been ‘high productive’ months for me as I revelled in the space which opened up after a long summer of mothering, with little (next to no) creation time.

However, in all the productivity, goal setting, planning and juggling I would always lose both my sense of self and the direction in which I truly wanted to head - towards ease and presence.

The fact is nothing every really ever goes to plan and the plan doesn't take into account the emotional journey we go on as we take action to fulfil our goals.

So our experience of life just ends up being unfulfilling and fraught as we convince ourselves we must be doing something wrong, or that we are simply not good enough and give up - But I know you are one of the ones who is determined and will never give up and I want to help you.

This year, post pandemic life, and everything that followed afterwards in my personal life, I'm laser focused on an Autumn that feels aligned with the way I want to experience the world.

Over the coming days I'm going to be carving out time for my future self and I.

I'm going to be pausing to check in with my truth and, just like Autumn teaches us to, seeing where I can strip back, simplify, let go, uncomplicate and make life feel a little lighter, in the process.

I’m going to stop lying to myself about how and when I’m overcommitting, abandoning myself and saying “yes”, when I mean no.

I'm going to be make sure that what I am saying “yes” to, where my time, energy and focus will be going, takes me in the direction of how I want to feel - restored, sure, paced, safe.

If we look to nature, Autumn is the season that teaches us about trusting enough to let go, so that we can create room for transformation, and about learning to have faith that what we let fall will be replaced with something more beautiful again in the Spring.

So, over the coming days I'm going to be carving out time for my future self and I.

I'm going to be checking in with my truth and, just like Autumn teaches us to, seeing where I can strip back, simplify, let go, uncomplicate and make life feel a little lighter.

Sometimes self care looks like taking responsibility for how and when we abandon ourselves, and the life we have already created, and how and when we bury ourselves under everyone else’s needs.

Above all I'm going to be make sure that what I am saying “yes” to, where my time, energy and focus will be going, takes me in the direction of how I want to feel - restored, sure, paced, safe.

Now don't get me wrong - I have goals (big goals), and I will be planning - I LOVE paper planning. However the goals and the plan, will not be my main guides between who I am today and who I want to be by the end of the year.

The emotions I want to feel will act like beacons of light, pulling me in the direction of my true north, even when life doesn't go according to plan.

I'll adapt, pivot and adjust as needed.

Before you are already counting the weeks down until Christmas (I know, I know), and wondering where the time went, how you spent it and why you feel like you haven't made any progress towards your goals, that what you are doing is not making a difference - I want to ask you a few questions:

• Do you know how you want to end the year feeling, and why is this important to you?

• Do you know what aligned action you can take to help you head in the direction of feeling that way?

• Do you know what you need to let go of that will hinder you from feeling that way?

• Do you how to write a permission slip for what you truly need?

• Are you able to communicate any support you might need in making the above attainable?

If you answered “no”, to any or all of those questions, you are not alone and it's OK, I've got you!

I'm a firm believer that the difference between you arriving at the end of the year either feeling, like all you have done is been busy, unfulfilled, wondering where the time went, like you have not done enough and/ or fallen behind or ending the year feeling like you made real progress, purposeful, at ease in your own skin, nourished and energised, has to do with choosing to live in your truth, over a prescribed way of living - You have to live your own way.

Living in our truth can feel so vulnerable and scary - admitting that perhaps we haven’t been doing what was best for ourselves - but it is only is facing our truth, we can identify our true needs, so that we can heal and come back home to ourselves.

Living in our truth can feel so vulnerable and scary, but it is only is facing our true needs that we can heal and come back to ourselves.

We are not taught to live in our truth, instead as creative women and mothers, we are conditioned to believe that feeling guilty, overwhelmed, exhausted and like whatever we do will never be enough, are just part of life, and that when life gets in our way it is a sign that we are on ‘the wrong path’.

I can assure you that although, yes, these feelings are all completely normal, and ones that we all experience - they should not be our default.

It's not your destination that is a problem - it is the way you are travelling.

I want to help you cultivate an Autumn that feels good, for you - Not one that ticks all the boxes, I want you to live beyond the busy, beyond the doubt and the overwhelm.

That is why I created a dedicated space in which you can take a moment to Pause, reset and redirect if needed.

Pause is a virtual monthly gathering and if you are feeling like enough is enough and you are ready to stop feeling like everyday needs to be a battle between you and a multiple of hurdles - doubt, comparison, distraction, expectation, not knowing, distrust, overwhelm, then please join us for the next pause by clicking here.

Give yourself permission to feel (fill in the blank with how you want to feel) free, rested, spacious, light, energised ______________________ because the journey of self recovery is all about your truth.

What you need. How you want to experience life.

You deserve to feel the comfort that comes from being at peace with yourself.

Let this season be the chance to say goodbye to feeling exhausted from the constant, busyness, striving and questioning and searching for that one way, your reason, the answer, that will mean you can finally feel at ease with who you are and why you are here - you will be enough.

Ready to walk towards a new way of being? Click the button below.