selfcare

Tips to Make the Most of Your Weekends

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A rejuvenating weekend is key to a productive work/school week ahead.

Here are some tips to prepare for your weekends.

  1. Check the weather; sunny weekends call for different plans than rainy ones. 
  2. Keep your partner or family members updated on your upcoming weekend plans at least two days ahead of the weekend and check in on their plans. I talk with my husband about the weekend on Wednesdays and let him know what I have in mind or already planned. If I have a morning of appointments or a night out with girlfriends planned out, he will make plans too. The same goes the other way around. 
  3. If you’re in the mood to go out somewhere nice as a couple, explicitly ask your partner and not leave it to chance. 
  4. Check IMDb ratings before watching a movie to have a pleasant movie night experience. 
  5. Check the expected homework load for the kids, which could impact family outings. In our household, we try to do most of the homework on weekends to have more leisurely evenings on school nights.
  6. As much as possible, run your errands and appointments and shop for groceries on weekends, preferably in the morning. This way, you’ll get done faster and relieve yourself from wasting precious evenings during the workweek. 
  7. Make sure visiting your parents, if geographically possible, is accounted for in your weekend plans. 

Weekends constitute 29% of your week. A well-spent weekend can renew your family bonds and help you make significant progress in your personal or home projects. 

Plan wisely.

Tips to Make the Most of Your Weekends

A Self-Compassion Example

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It was a Saturday, I woke up feeling already overwhelmed by the back to back errands that all needed to get done that day. I felt I did not want to wake up. I felt that I wanted to hide under the bedsheets. I felt resistance, and even regret, due to committing to all this in one day because of a deadline the next day.

Then, I started to talk to myself gently. I put my hand on my heart and patted softly saying “It’s alright sweetheart, you can do this, it’s okay.” It really felt good. Just like we calm our children when they are having a hard time coping, we still have this inner child that stomps her feet whenever she feels too tired or not in the mood to go on. I observed my resistance and nurtured myself back to adulthood that morning.

I did not realize I even practiced self-compassion just like I learned in the book Radical Compassion until later in the day, this book got to me and I put it into action when the need arose. It is such a good book, and self-compassion never felt more clear to me than when I read this book. Give it a try.

A Self-Compassion Example

Best Gift

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Finally, I got to feel that summer break has officially started as we enjoyed the first full weekend without any due homework or assessments to prepare for. I feel like the Universe created new hours, wrapped them up, and offered them in a shiny box for me. I am grateful for the gift of time.

I slept more, played with my kids more, and happily got overdue chores done. Please note the word “happily”.

Maybe not all summer weekends will feel as blissful. I am just taking the time, here is that word again, to honor the freedom to create our own schedules for the coming weeks.

Let’s make the best of this gift.

Best Gift

Magic and Energy

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A good night sleep, a rested body, a healthy gut and an alert mind, are some of the natural things that most of us enjoy every day but take for granted. When they go missing, however, we lose our magic.

We don’t have enough energy to process data or people. We find it hard to avoid road rage caused by a reckless driver who cut in front of us. We get edgy with our boss for making a very reasonable request. We feel needy when a loved one does not answer right away. We more than dislike online schooling and any newly assigned homework like the plague. We seek food for comfort that can’t be grasped. Our attempt to save our energy turn us into whiny selfish human beings. We feel like we lost the capacity for kindness or understanding. We take things personally.

This happens when you miss a good night sleep or two.

Imagine this state expanding over days and weeks. This turns into burnout. No time for self-care turns us into exhausted cynics. We feel we can’t make a difference and the light of hope dims in our eyes.

If you feel that what I described is how you feel most days, I am here to tell you 2 things. First, you are not alone and second, given your circumstances, it is still not natural to feel this way, no matter what others tell you.

You are meant to thrive. You are meant to feel hopeful. You are meant to feel your goodness and extend it to others.

Name it to tame it. This is burnout, and it happens when you put aside your needs and take care of the needs and demands of others for too long. It is not sustainable. You need to take care of you first before taking care of others.

Start your healing by asking yourself what are you depriving yourself of? And whose opinion are you depriving yourself for?

You need a break to just be, to give your soul some space to breathe unrushed, so that your body could restore the energy it lost.

Your magic will return when your energy returns. You and your world deserve you at your best.

We need your magic. Take care of you.

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Blog Post title inspired by this.

Magic and Energy

Open up

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Open up. Don’t keep it shut.
The door to your heart is not meant to be there.
You built it up when you got hurt.

Open up. Don’t keep it shut.
The door to your heart is not letting love in or out.

Open up. Don’t keep it shut.
Doors are not for hearts.
You think your door is protecting you but it’s only blocking the flow of love that is your birthright.

Open up. Don’t keep it shut
It lies. This door.
It tells you stuff like: “show them how it feels to withhold love from them“.
You think you’re the punisher. You are the punished.

Open up. Don’t keep it shut.
Whenever you feel your heart closing down, remember that.
Shutting down is not the way you handle life.
Keep it open and stay watching.
That’s the courageous choice.
Shutting down is turning your back to your life and to those you share it with.

Open up. Don’t keep it shut.
The doorway should be clear. The door must be wrecked off its hinges.

Open up. Don’t keep it shut.
When your heart is open, they can tell.
They will feel your unconditional approval of them.
And guess what? They, too, will crack theirs open.

Open up darling. Don’t keep it shut.

Open up

Forgive for you

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We communicate, and we clear the air, and we ask for forgiveness for our own sake. Holding it all in could make us sick, could delay us, could leave us sleepless and hopeless.

Forgive for you. Forgiving does not mean condoning the act that caused you pain. You do it for you. You see the light in the other even though it was overshadowed with their dark behavior. You distance yourself if you are in harm’s way. Or you try to fix the bridge that you thought you forever burned.

You get to decide if it’s worth it or not.

No matter what, though, you forgive, for you.

Forgive for you

Begin Again

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You wanted to start today perfectly, but you didn’t? You were not at your best behavior perhaps? You snapped at someone or criticized others? You were mean, even?

I listened to something beautiful recently from Waking Up App about the power of beginning again. It went something like this, and I am paraphrasing here: “When we notice how we are acting, we need to make amends if we can then forgive ourselves immediately and completely. After that, we decide to free fall into the next moment without any residue of the past. “

We don’t need to take on the weight of guilt to the next moment.

I loved it so much. Today I needed it again. Maybe you do too?

Begin Again

Seed Cycling

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I have shared the below recipe with more women than I can remember since I first read it in the eye-opening book Period Power by Maisie Hill which demystified the impact of hormones on my body and helped me honor it and respect its power. This is the seed cycling recipe to manage our hormones during the menstrual cycle. It helped me regulate my own cycle and minimize some physical and emotional symptoms I have before every period and also improve the health of my hair and the strength and length of my nails. Share this with all the women you know and start now.

“In the follicular phase of your cycle (days 1–14 of a 28-day cycle), or from new moon to full moon if you’re not currently menstruating, eat 2–4 tbsps of both ground flax seeds and pumpkin seeds per day to gently and naturally increase oestrogen levels. Pumpkin seeds are high in zinc which supports progesterone production and release in the second phase of your cycle.

In the luteal phase of your cycle (days 15–28), or from full moon to dark moon, eat 2–4 tbsps of both sesame seeds and sunflower seeds per day. The zinc in sesame seeds and the vitamin E in sunflower seeds both help stimulate the production of progesterone. The lignans in sesame seeds help to block excess oestrogen, and sunflower seeds provide selenium which assists the liver in its detoxification role and improve overall hormonal health.”

“Buy whole organic seeds and use a coffee or spice grinder to get a powder which you can add to porridge, soups, salads and smoothies. Or just eat them whole if you prefer. You can grind enough for the week ahead and store them in the freezer. Stay clear of pre-ground seeds as they oxidise rapidly and go rancid. You might experience a change in your cycle within the first month of seed cycling, but it usually takes 3–4 cycles to see a noticeable difference because that’s how long it takes for a follicle to mature and be released at ovulation.”

Source: Period Power: Harness Your Hormones and Get Your Cycle Working For You by Maisie Hill

Seed Cycling