The Relationship With Yourself

Here's a thought that didn't make sense to me for a long time; The relationship I have with myself, effects the relationships I have with others. Let that sink in for a second. Growing up I wasn't a huge fan of myself (I think most women feel that way). I was always looking for a diet so I could change the way I looked. I was constantly thinking negative things about myself every time I looked in the mirror. These might be the obvious tasks we do as humans that promote our self hate and self destructive behavior, but what about the other things?

If you ask me what the most important things are in my life I would list them off easily. My husband, family, faith, my business, my health and being overall happy. I can do without fancy shmancy cars and a big house, I just want to be surrounded by the people I love. As a women, I have a tendency to want to care for others. It's not a bad thing, I think we should embrace those nurturing tendencies we have and use them to fill up everyone's cup around us. But, and this is a big but, we need to fill up our own cup first. Until it's overflowing. And continue to fill it up for the rest of our lives.

So back to my thought from the beginning. The relationship I have with myself, effects the relationships I have with others. I was somewhat blindsided by this not too long ago. I know all about positive self talk. I understand nourishing your body with whole foods. What got me was understanding that my work(something I love to do and could do non stop) could also be something negative for me if I didn't approach it correctly. Most women can relate this to just about anything. Maybe it's your kids. Your kids are more than likely your whole world. You would do absolutely anything for them and give and give and give. And you know what? That's perfectly fine, as long as you are also giving and giving and giving to yourself.

My business became my baby. All I wanted to do was give to it. My self care (without me even realizing it) got put on the back burner. I stopped working out because I taught so many classes a week I didn't think I needed it. My personal development became creating content for classes. My journaling became writing blog post two days a week. I wasn't taking care of me and in return my relationship with myself began to suck and my business began to just kinda float. My negative self talk came creeping back, my self doubts and insecurities were surrounding me and for the life of me I couldn't figure it out. 

It is imperative that we put ourselves at the top of our list because it allows us to do all of things we're passionate about. My relationship with my husband is the most important thing in my life. But here's the deal, when I don't take time for myself I turn into a cranky wife. When I don't take care of myself my business becomes forced and I go on auto pilot. When I don't take care of myself I lose my value therefor my other relationships begin to suck.

So, here's what I did to get out of my funk. I took some great advice from, well, me. I sat and thought to myself, what am I telling my clients, and what am I not doing? Here's what I came up with.

1. I bought myself a month at a yoga studio, guilt free.
This is a big one for me because well, I love my studio. I love being there, and the energy and all the happiness that is created in there. But there's something to be said about going somewhere and being the client and not the boss.  I'm going 2-3x a week and it's finally helping me feel like myself again.

2. I've let things go just a bit. Again, my studio is my baby. Would you let some stranger be in charge of your kid while you're gone? It's not that easy! So for the past couple months i've had some amazing women interning with me and teaching them the iamwell ways. Not only is it exciting for me to see how stoked they are to begin teaching, but it's a sigh of relief when I can go on vacation and trust whats happening in the studio. It allows me to let go a little bit and work on filling my cup up.

3. I began to trust myself. Up until a couple weeks ago I was spending hours every day prepping my classes (classes that i've been teaching for years). That's a lot of wasted time. I've become more flexible and trusting my instincts when it comes to what clients needs. I give myself 15-20 minutes to go over a class outline and than trust my instincts from there.

4. I've put myself first, most of the time. I am of course still working on this one, but I do make promises to myself  I try to keep. When it comes to scheduling clients in I will schedule them so i'm sure I have sometime to get my own self care in. When I'm making a schedule I might have to re arrange a couple classes so I'm not teaching 6 days a week. Small tweaks like this remind me of my value and in return help me value my relationships more.

I know this post was based around my current experience and my business. We're not all business owners but I think it's easy to replace business with kids, husband, family, etc... Put yourself at the top of your list. If you can't care for yourself, you can't care for others.

I hope you all are having a great week and are being kind to yourselves!