Speaker 1: 0:06

What's up, family? Welcome back. Welcome back to Self-Care. Saturday, and you're listening to the Sweet Spot and I am Dr Sweet. We have, for the last three Saturdays, been diving into this book called Real Self-Care by Dr Pooja Lashman. But before we get into that, let's do a quick recap of what we have learned so far.

Speaker 1: 0:33

In previous episodes we've covered three powerful principles that redefine self-care in a meaningful way. This book did a marvelous job of taking us outside of the aroma candles and the massages and all of the cool stuff that we enjoy about self-care, to dig deeper to find a broader meaning for self-care. I'll review the principles very quickly for you that we've been reviewing over the past three Saturdays. Principle one was setting boundaries. Right, it was about saying no. No is a complete sentence, by the way, you don't have to add anything after it. Yeah, it's about saying no when you need to, and you understand that you have to be first protecting your time, protecting your energy by saying no means that you're doing a radical act of self-respect and self-care. Remember, if you're saying yes to everything, you're more than likely not setting a boundary and you're saying no to yourself. So setting a boundary was principle one. Principle two was practicing self-compassion. How many times have you had that critical voice in your head telling you that you're not good enough, that you did that wrong? Maybe you should have done this differently, always criticizing or pulling yourself down. Well, practicing self-compassion as principle two taught us that true self-care is not about being perfect. It's about being kind, being kind to ourselves, especially when we fall short, especially when we miss the mark. It's about giving yourself the grace that you would offer a friend. Remember we talked about the way you would speak to a friend if they had messed up. That's how you should speak to yourself. More than likely, you're going to tell your friend good things and you're going to be encouraging. So practicing self-compassion as principle two helps us turn that inward and onto ourselves.

Speaker 1: 2:44

Principle three was about aligning our choices with our values. Last week we talked about the importance of making decisions that reflect who we truly are, not what others expect from you, but really what you expect from yourself. It's about living authentically. It's about living with integrity and choosing an action that resonates with your truest self and going by that value as opposed to what others expect of you. Very hard to do because there's so much pressure on us to conform to what others want, but when you're caring for yourself, you're going to make a choice that aligns with your values and not what somebody else expects. And that, my friends, brings us to principle four, which is called cultivating community care. This principle flips the script from me to we. It's about us.

Speaker 1: 3:49

In this principle, the author tells us that real self-care is not just about what I can do for me, what you can do for yourself. It's about creating connections. It's about seeking support and building a community where we can give and receive care. Think about it. How many times have you tried to go it alone, thinking, hey, I've got this, only to end up feeling a bit burned out, isolated and wondering how did I get here? We've all been there, but self-care doesn't mean doing it all by yourself, even though the word self is in there, right. Self-care does not mean doing it all by yourself. It means recognizing that we are stronger together and it's about leaning on our friends. It's about leaning on our family. It's about connecting with our team and letting them lean on us, too, about. It's about interdependence and about connecting those dots. Don't isolate, okay. That's a real problem when we get isolated and we become lonely.

Speaker 1: 4:58

All right, so I'll drop a. We've been using a lot of scriptural quotes this week. I don't know why we've been dropping dropping quotes from the Quran, we've dropped quotes from the Torah, we've dropped quotes from the Bible. Let me leave you with one here. Two are better than one because they have a good return for their labor. If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. Okay so, and a threefold cord that's not easily broken, and then, in a multitude of counselors, you can find wisdom. That's what the scriptures tell us.

Speaker 1: 5:37

There's strength in numbers, and this author, dr Lashkin, says that true self-care is about finding people and letting them in. All right, so that's our challenge for today. It is Self-Care Saturday, and your challenge is to reach out to someone today, whether it's a friend, a colleague, a loved one, someone, anyone. It can be just a text, you don't always have to call, but a call would be great and try to see if you can connect with that person, walk with that person, do something with that person. All right, this is Dr Sweet. Thank you, and we look forward to seeing you tomorrow, because it's Slow Down Sunday. Take care.