Elect for Self-Care, self-love, real-lationships

05 Nov Elect for Self-Care, self-love, real-lationships

Contrary to popular opinion self-care has been debated to be myopic. There needs to be a greater understanding of what self-love means beyond the physical caring for ones body. What does a REAL-lationship look like with ourselves? While caring for your body is a great start, as this is normally the path that is most evident, starting from the outside in, once the process of peeling back the outer layer has started, this will reveal a deeper, more intimate understanding of who we are at the core of ourselves before we layered up in armour to protect the more vulnerable sides of ourselves. What are the more vulnerable sides of ourselves? That is revealed in answers to questions like “Can I take responsibility without blaming myself?” This is one of the quesitons to help uncover ‘”what does self love look like for you”. More from the wise words of Esther Perel, “I’m massively dependent on the expertise, help, presence, and love of others. We all are” So self-love includes acknowledgement of people who have brought you to where you are today. She continues, “It’s the awareness and acceptance of our incompleteness. It’s about letting others love us even when we feel unlovable because their version of us is often kinder than our own.” This is the kind of DEEP LOVE we need to have the awareness about and give to ourselves. Recognizing this type of acknowledgement from others will help The Self be more complete. More on loving ourselves in HIGH REGARD next.

Perel encourages the reader to ask what self-care means not from a place of self-reliace or self-sufficiency, but from a place of self-love. Do we continue to hold ourselves in high regard even when we mess up? And then can we extend “that understanding and self-compassion into our connections with others?” This is what “yoga off the mat” refers to, in our opinion. Working through a tough pose, projects, relationships with grace, understanding and commitment to not revert back to unhealthy ways of being or turn into a “hot mess”. High regard is knowing you are MORE than the problem itself and to not to get stuck in the in a toxic thought process of this event, issue, problem as defining who you are.

Perel is not alone in regards to the importance of sharing life with others. Here are a few others who believe and understood from experience the WHY of the importance of others as a means of self-love. Jillian Turecki, mentioned below, references “high regard” and how closest friends often see the kinder versions of ourselves through GRACE by “not expecting perfection in each other, accepting people for who they are and having each other’s back” That sounds like a lot of self-love for onself to be able to show up for another person in your life this way. Safety and trust fosters the connection of “deep meaningful relationships”** [Sinek, below].

1. CHRIS MCCANDLESS, whose life trek was depicted in the movie Into the Wild, was that “happiness [is] only real when shared”. Survivalist Blair Braverman details his last trek in the wilderness where Chris makes this discovery in this episode from You’re Wrong About. Braverman may have also said that the best survival tool is to have another person with you in the wild.
   
   
2. LESSONS FROM Flight 571: Supporting evidence from another survival story, most widely known from the movie ALIVE. The rugby team on FLIGHT 571 would not have survived without each other. They are not dying of hyperthermia as they “resorted” to teamwork by “punching each other’s feet to keep up circulation.
   
   
3. JILLIAN TURECKI: Jillian on Love podacst episode: ‘The Myth of “The One”. Fascinating origin and understading what “the one” means and origins of feelings of oneness comes from and how that is found in another, not just within oneself! “We are designed for connection, isolation is deadly for our mental health and our well being.” If the team of Flight 571 was not connected chances are they wouldhave all died outsode of the other natural disaster factors they were up against. Together the were able to experience “aliveness” that collectively as human “our unconscious s always seeking”
   
   
4. SIMON SINEK on “We’re not meant to do it all on our own“: “All you need is one person in your life, who says ‘you got this, I believe in you’ and you will find courage and energy to do things that you would not have had before, but more importantly, that person needs to also say ‘and if everything goes wrong I will be there for you, and I will be there with you, and I will be in the mud with you,’ and has the ability to say ‘something’s wrong, I’m worried about you.’ And I think burnout happens when you’re attempting to do all of the things you see other people do and not realize that THEY HAVE **DEEP MEANGINGFUL RELATIONSHIPS that you can’t see and you think, falsely, that you have to do it alone and that’s when burnout happens, becasue you as the individaul don’t have the energy, but in comminity and relationship and in friendship, it’s remarkable including knowing when to just take a little break to recharge.
   
   
5. STEPHAN LABOSSIERE (Stephan Speaks) talks about how CHEMISTRY is created among sports TEAMS. Listen to the whole videocast or at 49:23 about team building exercises to create chemistry; in time they [teams] can learn to have chemistry.
   

Perel also offers the questions to help expand your own real-lationship of what self-love looks like for you. For example: Can I accept help from another without jumping to the conclusion that they want something from me?

Or try number 009 from these unpopular acts of self care: thinking about why you feel the way you feel. As you can see self-care is trending toward understanding our relationship with and to others and how it then gets internalized and effects our mental state. Self-care is also about protecting our emotional bodies in addition to the physical body. And we can’t do it alone.

So where do we start? This topic is NOT new. Mentioned earlier starting with the physical body can speed dial your way into tuning in to where we need to focus the lens of our awareness. Be sure to check out the other blog posts about the DIMENSIONS OF WELLNESS and how each area can help effect our stress levels. Or how all this talk about self-care is NOT sexy because it takes work and often times saying “NO”. You can SAY YES to decreasing physical pains and mental stress, allowing for a more inspired and renewed perspective giving your mind, body and spirit that full body exhale by Booking at TAO NOW 🙂

PRO TIP: When receving Tao services know that we are seeing the kinder version of how you see yourself. Our goal is to do our best to help you return to seeing that side of yourself as well.