It Is Not Selfish To Put You First,

Because looking after yourself should be your first priority.

Okay, this is a long one and I know, I know…you’re probably thinking ‘Ang mate, you’re one to talk…you are forever putting everyone elses needs and happiness above your own so what makes you think you can tell other people how to look after themselves’ & the answer is really simple;

*It is easier to give advice than to take your own advice on yourself*

I have spent the last few months working on myself and trialling different methods that help improve both mental and emotional well-being. I found the importance of putting yourself first and being able to focus on the things that make you happy and put your soul at ease. People often think that putting yourself first is a selfish thing to do but I compare it to a plane crash. When a plane is falling and the oxygen masks come down in front of you, they tell you to put on your own mask before helping others and life is very much the same. You cannot pour from an empty cup and so often we pour ourselves into people and situations that either don’t need our energy or that don’t reciprocate it. We must remember that we cannot help others or in fact lead a fulfilling life if we don’t refuel every once in a while.

Believe me when I say I understand how difficult it can be to find time for yourself, especially as a single parent or even someone working full time. We use the time we do have scrolling through social media, playing games on our devices or simply losing ourselves in Netflix but we do forget that we could use a short amount of that time to refuel ourselves and ultimately it would make us feel so much better in ourselves but we fail to do that and use the excuse of ‘I haven’t got the time to invest in myself’ when actually the biggest investment you will ever make is yourself.

Since taking the time for myself I figured I would share what worked for me and how it worked for me because you never know who it may help and who may find solace in learning that it is okay to take time for you especially when times are stressful, and our minds are filled with nothing but negativity from the world of social media and the news.

Routine Making

To begin with, I really struggled to create a routine. I would map out my entire day in 13–30 minute time gaps but by lunchtime if I had made a mistake or missed things out or woke up late so the morning section wasn’t followed, I would give up and feel like I had failed for the rest of the day. This harboured negative energy and in fact made my mental health much worse because I felt I had failed so the rest of the day was just becoming a literal countdown to bedtime. I then didn’t want to do anything either because I had the attitude of ‘What is the point’ which isn’t helpful to anyone. So, then I revaluated my schedule and trialled different ways until I finally found something that worked for me and made more sense than a really structured routine but still gave me the stability I needed as well as feeling more accomplished in my day.

Now I am not talking about mapping out your entire day down to the last minute, but we all have a period of time during the day where we have nothing to do. As an example, I end up falling asleep when I put my daughter to bed around 8pm and wake up around 2am every morning. Those are rough estimates, and I can wake up much earlier, but I use 2am as my starting point and 6am being my finishing goal. Normally I would watch Netflix or Prime all night until it was a suitable time to get up and sorted for the day, but I decided to make a short 4-hour schedule which would allow me time before and after to watch some films or catch up on a series but allowing those hours to focus on me. I didn’t want a strict plan down to the last minute but something I could follow so instead of time slots I decided on a list of things to do within the hour, and I’ll share that with you.

2-3am – This hour I focus on preparing my mindset for the day ahead and setting up my mood so I am in the right frame of mind for whatever the day may bring. I have a hot drink and something to eat, fire up the laptop ready for journalling and pick out clothing for the day. Listen to a podcast while eating/drinking of my choice & read a chapter of a book. If there is time fill in my daily planners for mood and sleep tracking too. I usually pick a podcast here that is about mindset and mood rather than the humorous ones I may listen to during the day. This allows me to focus on my positivity as well as journalling out any emotions and thoughts about the day before which is also known as a brain dump.

3-4am – For this hour I focus on self-care as a whole. So this hour I give myself a mini facial and skincare (twice a week I do a full facial including a face mask etc) and do all my skincare and makeup for the day. I sort my hair too but I take this hour slowly and sometimes with another hot drink. I enjoy this time to myself as this is normally the only hour I will get uninterrupted.

4-5am – This hour is all about wellbeing. I normally will put on some guided meditation, focus on my breathing and do all my stretches for my back and legs but yoga would work just as well in place of the stretches. The guided meditations I use are normally around 30 minutes long, minimum which allows me to focus within as well as focus on my breathing. During this hour I also drink my water (usually around 800ml) which helps wake you up more than coffee would.

5-6am – Let’s get set for the day! The final hour I use to make a to-do list of everything I need to do for the day including any cleaning, daily home-schooling plans, my own learning etc. and once that’s done and anything I can get done in that hour before the day actually starts I do (such as washing up, laundry etc) I sit and relax with a drink ready for the day to begin.

If I have time before and after I will usually just binge watch things on Netflix or Prime or read a novel, something that I enjoy or even do my nails. All these things help with mindset but having a routine that is only tied in by the hour means that I have more time to get things done but with enough time to actually sit and relax in between doing things. This also means that I don’t run the risk of feeling bad if I don’t get something done because there is no risk.

Favourite Foods

This should be a given but when we’re in a low mood, food is a perfect way to lift yourself back up again. Comfort food is perfect for this but you also have to be sensible with this because you don’t want it to turn into a binge eating situation. Finding a comfort food that is relatively healthy is a great option but so is chocolate! For me I switch between fresh melon, all butter M&S biscuits, clotted cream fudge and salt and vinegar snack a jacks.

Aside from snacks, having your favourite meal can also improve your mood and can help you feel better in yourself so why not either grab all the ingredients and fix up your favourite home cooked meal or better yet, grab yourself your favourite takeaway. For me, Chinese is my best option…it’s the one food that makes me feel better in myself. It’s my best comfort food and a sure-fire way to have me have a mood boost.

I try and do this at least once a week on an evening and throw on a family movie and have a great evening with my daughter.

Journalling

Now for some, journalling is hard and I get it. I too struggled when I started journalling as I had no idea where to start. I now have 3 journals that I use on a daily basis as well as 3 planners (I couldn’t find one planner than included everything I wanted in one place but am designing my own for next year!).

So my 3 planners include;

1. One that prompts me for morning and evening gratitude,

2. One that tracks my daily mood, fruit and veg intake, water consumption, hours of sleep & exercise,

3. One that tracks my emotion of the day and why I feel that way and my sleep in more depth.

These are filled in the day after so that my sleep tracker is accurate as well as my evening gratitude as I was forgetting to do it before bed.

My main 3 journals are;

1. My journal that’s on my laptop where I write about everything including what has been going on in my life and that’s where I am most open about my life. This gets shared to no-one but is a way for me to look back on things in more detail.

2. An A4 journal with my own prompts including daily mood and pain scale out of ten, goals for the day, highlight of the day etc. and

3. A normal diary with the basics of the day, what we did and just general information. (I have this one so that in later years if my daughter wants to look back I will use this one for her to look back on)

I also have;

- A weekly to-do book with all of my weekly tasks in that I want to achieve as well as having a box that tracks how many films I have watched and a score out of 10, if I posted on social media, if I managed to write any blogs and how many chapters I read etc.

- A book that has my goals and achievements I want to get done by the end of the week and an end of week evaluation.

- A social media tracker which allows me to write in my analytics per week so I can see what worked and what didn’t and what areas need improving,

- A daily task book for both me and my daughter with day to day tasks with tick boxes in that we can both fill in together at the end of the day and

- A goal getter notepad that allows me to write down 3 goals for the week and the steps I need to do to get there.

Now this may seem a lot of different books to some people but I found when all of this information was consolidated into one planner alone I was getting bored. I would find myself filling half of it in and then allowing myself to get distracted but with the different books all having different lay outs I found it so much easier to fill in. It normally takes me a maximum of an hour to fill in and that’s when I need to fill them all in including the weekly ones.

Of course you don’t have to do as many as me but I would suggest finding an A4 diary, preferably without any time slots in, and finding some daily prompts that suit you and your life. You can include prompts such as;

· How did I feel waking up / at the end of the day?

· What would I like to achieve today?

· What was my highlight of the day?

· What am I most grateful for?

And then using either Google, Pinterest or any other search engine you can search for specific prompts. I normally change my prompts each month and will search for things such as ‘journal prompts for personal development’, ‘journal prompts to improve mindset’, ‘mental health journal prompts’ or even ‘journal prompts for September’. You can switch these up each month depending on what area of your life you want to focus on or develop too.

Time Alone

Now as a parent I rarely get much time alone but when I have a spare hour that is unplanned, I run myself a bath with salts and bubbles as well as lighting some candles and just shutting the world out for a while. Sometimes I may take that hour to do my nails or just simply scroll through home accounts and websites and make plans for my home etc.

Shutting out the world I feel is so important to reset your mental wellbeing and there’s not much to say on this area. If you have a spare hour, it is important for your mental health to take some time for you and do something that makes you happy and makes your soul happy.

These may only be 4 tips but let me know how you get on with these, each month I will post a new tip that I have been using, book reviews for personal development and if there is an area you would like more information on feel free to send me an email (@AngeliaBurns89@gmail.com) or use the contact form on the website and I will get back to you!

Hope this helps!!

Ang_xo