Nurture Notes for Helping Professionals- Psychological Self-Care
Photo Credit: Matthew Henry (@matthewhenry) via Unsplash
Last week I wrote my first blog post in a series about physical self-care for helping professionals. Today I’d like to address psychological self-care. Taking time for psychological self-care can sometimes be construed as a luxury and may not be high on someone’s priority list. I challenge you to consider making your psychological self-care (e.g., stress management, space and time for personal reflection, etc.) a priority. In the course of our busy professional lives we often don’t pause to take care of our own stress. As I mentioned last week, stress is a natural and expected part of our practice as helping professionals. But we also have other responsibilities (e.g., parenting, running a business, being a spouse/partner, caregiving, chores, meal preparation, etc.) that add stress to our daily lives. We can’t prevent all stressors but we can attend to our own self-care by assessing our current level of psychological self-care and selecting a few areas to address.
Here are some questions to ask yourself about your current level of psychological self care. Approach these questions with non-judgmental curiosity. Think of this as an opportunity to explore what you want to do to care for yourself. Self-care is about attending to your needs.
How aware are you of your inner experience (e.g., thoughts, judgments, beliefs, attitudes, feelings)? Are you able to notice your thoughts/feelings without judgment?
Do you make time for your own personal psychotherapy when needed?
Describe your level of comfort with letting other people know different aspects of you.
How often do you make time for self-reflection (including journaling)?
How often do you seek out comforting activities and places?
How often to do you make time to nurture hobbies and interest outside of work? How often do you engage your intelligence in a new area?
What was the last non work-related book you read?
How often do you do something where you’re not the expert or in charge?
How would you describe your ability to manage stress?
How would you describe the way that you speak to yourself?
How would you describe your ability to accept help from others?
Describe your comfort with saying “no” to extra responsibilities.
Self-Care Reflection:
What trends did you notice in your psychological self-care behaviors?
What strengths in your psychological self-care behaviors do you have?
Are there areas of your psychological self-care that you would like to begin addressing?
Pick one or two areas of psychological self-care that you would like to, and are willing to, consistently work on. Describe at least one strategy that you are willing to consistently implement. Approach self-care one small step at a time. Becoming aware of your psychological self-care needs is a great first step!
Example: Making time for self-reflective journaling
“I will take 15 minutes in the morning before I get out of bed to practice self-reflective journaling. I will keep my journal and a pen on my bedside table to help me remember.”
Notice in the example that I didn’t include “every morning”. An important part of goal-setting is to write feasible, attainable goals. Perfection is not part of this process!!
