Self-Care Saturday Sets The Standard

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Well, well, well, well, well. It is Self-Care Saturday. Where does the time go, sweet builder? It is Self-Care Saturday here on The Sweet Spot. I'm Dr. Derek Sweet, and I'm here with you as your host on The Sweet Spot. We've been dealing with a wonderful series this week called The Standard. Yes, we have been looking at standards all week, seeing how standards protect us, how standards guide us, and how standards are what we can return to when life gets loud. So the title for today's episode is uh You're Running on Fumes, Protect Your Energy. You can't pour from an empty cup, guard your peace so you can perform. Guard your peace so you can perform. Right, it's so important that we pour back into ourselves because so many of us are pouring into others all week long. And sometimes we don't even notice how depleted we are until small things start to feel heavy. The texts start to feel annoying, the noise feels louder, the patience gets shorter, you stop feeling emotionally available, you start dragging through the day, just trying to get through. And if we're honest, a lot of us we're taught to just normalize that. Just push through, just keep grinding, just keep it moving. Who cares

When High Performers Normalize Burnout

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anyway, right? It's just that strong, the pressure that's around us all the time, until eventually we can't even hear ourselves clearly anymore. You know, one of the strangest things about high performers is how often they confuse exhaustion with commitment. Like if you're burned out enough and stressed enough and depleted enough, somehow that proves that you're really worthy. But exhaustion is not always evidence of purpose, is it? Sometimes it is evidence that we have slowly stopped caring for ourselves in the middle of carrying everything else. And that matters, because eventually depleted people stop recognizing themselves. They become more reactive, more numb, more impatient, more disconnected from joy, more disconnected from the people they love, sometimes even more disconnected from God, from themselves, not all at once, but gradually disconnected and isolated, even though they're surrounded by others. And that's why standards matter here, too, on self-care Saturday. Because self-care is a standard. Absolutely. Rest is a standard, peace, your peace of mind is a standard. Protecting our mental and emotional health. It's a standard. Because we're responsible for the version of ourselves that keeps showing up in the lives of other

Stevie Wonder And A Love Standard

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people. You know, there's a song by Stevie Wonder I wanted to share with you today. I wish I could sing it, I but you know, I want to keep you listening. But I I'll I'll I'll share part of the lyrics from the song, and the song is called As. Now, in the song, there's some lines that I think really resonate with the idea of what standards are. And one of the lines that gets me in the song is this Did you know that true love asks for nothing? Her acceptance is the way we pay. Did you know that life has given love a guarantee to last through forever and another day? Just as time knew to move on since the beginning, and the seasons know exactly when to change. Just as kindness knows no shame, know through all your joy and pain that I'll be loving you always. Beautiful, beautiful lyrics from the song As. I hope today on Self Care Saturday that you will do me a favor. Go look up this song as ES As by Stevie Wonder and listen to it and let it minister to you. The song is warm, it's grounded, it's patient. It reminds us of something we forget when life gets crazy and loud, that there's still humanity and beauty under all this pressure. And sometimes we're moving so fast we don't take a moment to be quiet, to slow down, to even notice that we're human beings.

Amygdala Survival Mode And Guilt

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That's real. That's real. Because when the amygdala, the nervous system, remember the amygdala, the threat detection center, I've been giving you a break from neurology and neuroscience for quite some time. But remember, we have a threat detection center in our brain called the amygdala. And when we let that thing go buckwild, we end up being anxious all day long, chronically stressed, too much cortisol in our systems, and we're constantly reacting instead of actually living. And the dangerous part of it is that survival mode that the amygdala puts us in starts feeling normal. And then we feel guilty if we have to rest, guilty if we have to slow down, guilty if we say no to something, we feel guilty if we try to protect our own peace. As if exhaustion is the price we must pay, and that we have to earn rest and recovery.

Rest As Fuel And A Simple Reset

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But rest is not idleness, not at all. Yeah, rest is critical to how you're gonna recover and how you're gonna perform. Getting real sleep, getting real rest, getting your hydration. Recovery helps us return to our lives with more clarity, more patience, more emotional availability, more steadiness under pressure. It's like putting gas into the car so it can move. You know you've gotta put gas in the car. Because the car can't function without that fuel. What's your fuel? When do you put fuel back into you? We can't keep abandoning ourselves and expect to feel whole. Yeah, protecting our peace matters today on Self-Care Saturday. It's gotta be one of our standards. How often have you thought about the standard you set for your self-care? So let's stop treating recovery like something we have to earn. Let's protect our peace today. Let's do something positive for ourselves today. Let's take a few deep breaths today. Let's relax today. Let's look up at the sky today. Let's listen to music. Listen to the song As by Stevie Wonder. Or maybe you have a song you love. Listen to some music. Invite your mind, body, and spirit to align today. This is the standard. Protect your peace, protect your mind, protect your energy, and come back to me tomorrow for Slowdown Sunday. Do it for the science. Do it for your soul. Do it for success. Love and blessings. This is Dr. Derek Sweet. You're listening to The Sweet Spot. Please share and subscribe, and let's get with this tomorrow for Slow Down Sunday. Love and blessings.