There are a few different types of self-care, and reading self-help books actually hits two categories of self-care. Reading is a form of intellectual self-care – it’s good for our brains. Self-help (in the form of books, podcasts, Youtube videos, blog posts, etc.) is a form of emotional self-care. So self-help books are a form of intellectual and emotional self-care. And I’m here for it. Let me know what some of your favourite self-help books are! And keep making the most of it!
Tag: self-care
Hiatus!
Hello Readers, Warriors, Spoonies! I appreciate your support on this blog which I’ve been running (and writing) for several years. I’m going to take a small pause on new content (other than a few Sunday videos which were prescheduled) as I worked on a few other projects (new podcast) and focus on work, which is starting to pick up again. I also find these breaks really important for my mental health.
If you have ideas for content you’d like to read about on here (or see videos for) comment on this post as I’d love to hear from you. The podcast I’m starting with my friend and colleague is on personal growth, and I’ll definitely give more details in the near future. You can always follow Chronically Living on YouTube and follow me on TikTok @kelseyleighharris for coping skills. I hope to be back soon.
As always, keep making the most of it!
How to Engage in Micro Self-Care
Last week I wrote about macro self-care – doing something “big” for yourself as a way to recharge. These things are important, but also a little harder to do, especially for Spoonies/Warriors. The other side of macro self-care is micro self-care. These are little moments you can spread throughout your day in order to get that oh-so-important self-care in. Micro self-care can take as little as a few seconds, up to several minutes. Not only is micro self-care easier (and less expensive) to engage in, it can be done on various energy levels (so important for anyone with chronic pain and illness, as you all know) and it has more benefits than macro because of the frequency of it.
If you Google “micro self-care” you will literally see hundreds of different ideas for what you can do. Here are a few of my favourites:
- Meditation or deep breathing (or grounding, and so on). You don’t need to sit and meditation for 20+ minutes. In fact to start it’s actually better to just do 3-5 minutes. And it’s something you can find time to do at any point in your day.
- Gratitude Practice – say out loud or write down 3-5 things you’re grateful for (it’s been shown to boost happiness)
- Journal – you don’t have to write down every thought or everything that’s happened. When I journal I often reflect on something specific (i.e., use a prompt) or look at my physical, intellectual, spiritual and/or emotional bodies and see if there’s anything to reflect on, limiting beliefs I can forgive myself for and/or something I’d like to work on today.
- Stretch – stretching is something most of us can do more of as it’s really good for our bodies. Take a few minutes to do a few stretches is a great way to care for your body.
- Do some sort of quick exercise – walk around the block (my favourite) or even just marching in place or do 5 minutes of some sort of strengths-based chair workout.
- Read – set a timer for 5 minutes and read (or just read a poem, or a set a page goal for a book – 5-10 pages for example).
- Go outside – even if it’s chilly out, spending a few minutes just being out in the fresh air is great for our bodies and minds.
- Drinks a glass of water or tea – we often under hydrate so water is always the best option. Alternatively I always feel good drinking some of my favourite tea.
- Make your bed – this seems silly and simple and yet I (who often doesn’t make my bed) feel so good when I make it (and also feel better when I get into a made bed at night… actually I’m going to make my bed now).
- Make plans with a friend – this doesn’t mean you actually have to go out with this friend at this moment but even just making the plans via text or phone call can make us feel good and give us something to look forward to.
These are just some ideas to get you started with micro self-care. There are many more that I do. Some of these daily, many of these within a day, and some of these less often. I know that the more I do, the better I feel (mentally and physically). What are your favourite micro self-care practices?
Keep making the most of it everyone!
How to Engage in Macro Self-Care
I was listening to a podcast called Therapy Chat, on an episode about therapist self-care. The guest talked about 2 different types of self-care: macro and micro. While this certainly applies to me and other healthcare professionals, I think it also applies to everyone else, including my fellow Chronic Pain Warriors and Spoonies. Self-care is important and I’ve talked about it on the blog many times before. More recently the self-care posts have been about Activities of Daily Living. This post (and the next one) is going to broaden the definition of self-care beyond our ADLs (though I still firmly believe that ADLs is the best place to start).
What is Macro Self-Care?
As an adjective, macro means “large-scale” or “overall.” So we’re looking at big ways to engage in self-care. These ways tend to be more time consuming and more expensive that micro self-care. They are usually things we can only do for ourselves on occasion – a few times a year, maybe once a month depending on your income. Though they tend to be fewer and further between, they have the ability to really help us reset. Sometimes we need to fully disengage from other parts of our life in order to come back to our problems and difficulties feeling refreshed.
Examples of macro self-care include going on a vacation, getting a massage or having a “spa day.” Spending a weekend away with a partner. Taking a class that’s of interest to you (like an art or music class). Going on a retreat. Recently I went on an 11 day trip to Turkey and Egypt with my parents and a good buddy of mine. I hadn’t taken a vacation (other than my brother’s wedding) from work in a year. I also hadn’t travelled outside the country since 2019. It was much needed macro self-care. I also spent a “long weekend” (as in we both took off Friday and Monday) with my partner in a cabin. Another great way for me to get some macro self-care in. I definitely do try to prioritize some of this. Again, sprinkled throughout the year in different forms. It decreases my stress overall and helps me reconnect with the people who are important to me.
All of these things require planning and some money. This is what makes macro self-care important but unsustainable. Which is why next week I’ll be writing about micro self-care and how we can engage in that throughout our every day lives.
My Favourite Self-Compassion Practices
We all struggle with self-compassion. I’ve written about it before on this blog, talked about it on the podcast, written guests posts on other blogs about it. I do self-compassion work all the time with my clients. And most importantly, I do self-compassion work all the time with myself. Self-compassion has been shown to lessen chronic pain, improve resilience, and keep us motivated – all of which are important when you have a chronic health condition. It can also help when experiencing trauma symptoms, anxiety, and depression. Being honest, while my pain is much, much less than it used to be, self-compassion has and continues to help me deal with it. More recently I’ve noticed the great effect it has for me during trauma triggers and anxiety. Self-compassion is also hard – at first – eventually it becomes a lot easier and more natural to do (though there is always effort to be put in). When I notice (using my mindfulness skills), I’m able to pause and ask myself what would be helpful now. More often than not I end up doing a self-compassion practice, which helps me regulate, centre, and continue on with my day.
There are tons of different self-compassion practices you can do. I do highly recommend the Mindful Self-Compassion Workbook by Kristin Neff and Christopher Germer. I bought it, used in on myself, and now use the exercises with my clients. Beyond the ones from the workbook, I have some other practices that I quite enjoy, use often, and really help. Without further ado, here are my 4 favourite self-compassion practices.
- Lovingkindness Meditation – this is actually a really old Buddhist practice that is used secularly now. It involves generating feelings of warmth and kindness towards ourselves and others (typically someone we care about, someone we feel neutral about, a difficult person, and everyone). We then repeat lovingkindness phrases, sending them first to ourselves, and then to each of the others. The reason I like this practice is because it is easier to send compassion to other people, and we still get to practice giving it to ourselves.
Typical lovingkindness phrases include:
May I be happy.
May I be safe.
My I be healthy.
May I be at peace.
But can include any phrases that resonate best with you.
Try it here. - Kind Hand – this is a practice I actually learned from a counselling textbook (ACT Made Simple) and find I use it a lot with myself because it’s such an easy gesture and quick way to offer myself compassion. (My clients tend to like it too). Basically you imagine your hand filling with the same kindness and care you offer others, and then place it on the part of your body you feel the most pain (emotional or physical) and let the kindness flow into it and then all around your body.
Try it here. - Heart Opening Yoga – this is working with the heart chakra, which helps with self-compassion and self-love. I’ve done this both as a vinyasa class and a yin class (I personally prefer the yin class, especially when I’m feeling anxious/activated because it’s more grounding). This usually includes a lot of chest openers, expansions and back bends to help us make room in the physical, emotional and spiritual bodies for compassion.
I personally recommend Yoga with Kassandra on YouTube for some great practices (I’ll be launching my own as soon as I finish my Yoga Teacher Training). - Compassionate letter writing or journalling – if you’re open to writing and/or like journalling, this can be a very effective practice. My former therapist had me do this once and I did find it helped (and of course, I’ve had my own clients do this as well). It can be quite difficult if you’re not used to giving yourself compassion, so I actually recommend trying any of the above 3 practices first. The formula for the letter is pretty simple:
-mindfully write what happened – being open, curious, and nonjudgmental about your experience, thoughts and feelings (who, what, when, where, maybe why).
-write some words connecting yourself to common humanity – we all experience pain, hurt, emotions, etc. and telling ourselves something like, “everyone feels this way sometimes” (etc) can help us remember that we are not alone.
-write something kind to yourself – imagine what you would say to a friend who was struggling. What kinds words would you offer? Just write those down, offering them to yourself.
Try it here.
Self-compassion is a powerful and useful practice. The more I integrate it into my life, the easier my life becomes. And of course I want the same for all of you, so that you can keep making the most of it!
Ways to Engage in More Self-Care as a Spoonie
The difference between the media’s version of self-care and healthcare’s version of self-care is huge. In the media we see bubble baths, spa days, “me time,” wine nights, and girls trips. In healthcare we talk about activities of daily living – showering, getting dressed, eating nutritious meals, doing light exercise, etc. I mean, I’ll admit that I definitely engage in all of the media’s version of self-care as well (well, I prefer solo trips to girls trips, just sayin’). And that’s fine. It’s totally all well to do all of that. As a person with a chronic health condition, I find it more beneficial to make sure all of my ADLs are done on a regular basis. Why? Because it helps not only my physical health (I’m literally more mobile when I do them), it also helps my mental health (mood is better, anxiety is less). Yet it can be hard to do these activities when we’re feeling low, when we’re super anxious, when we’re in a lot of pain. The thing is, doing them can help with all of these things.
Read more here:
https://www.kelseylharriscounselling.com/post/5-ways-to-practice-self-care
Keep making the most of it!
Ways to Determine Acts of Self-Care From Acts of Health Care
First off, the media’s portrayal of what is self-care is VERY different from what mental health care professionals think of as self-care. Self-care in the media is bubble baths and spa days and bottomless brunches. I am not against any of this! In fact it all sounds quite fabulous. Counsellors and therapists such as myself think of self-care more in terms of activities of daily living (ADLs) like getting showered and dress and eating meals, etc. And then there is this weird grey area of overlap. For example, I see meditation as a form of self-care. It’s not an ADL, and the media would categorize it as self-care, and yet it can be extremely beneficial for mental and physical health. So I see things like that really as acts of health care.
Here are some activities that I see as health care (that are sometimes categorized as self-care):
- meditation and mindfulness – contacting the present moment to be here-and-now
- self-compassion – taking a moment to be kind to yourself through touch or words
- massage therapy – having a registered massage therapist do deeper work (than just purely going to the “spa”)
- acupuncture – it has been around around for thousands of years and sessions are usually between 20-45 minutes
- swimming and other forms of exercise – water therapy, strength, cardio
- baths – more water therapy!
For all of these, research actually supports that they are important for health and mental health. Mindfulness and self-compassion can release tension in the body, make us feel calm and centred and present. Massages and acupuncture can reduce physical sensations of pain and also create relaxation in the body. Exercise reduces pain and increases strength. Baths, swimming and in general water therapy is supported for pain because of its strength, flexibility, heat and relaxation effects (depending on what you’re doing).
Thinking in terms of how these things will benefit my health, as opposed to just being things to enjoy (I mean, these are all things I do also enjoy) makes me more motivated to do them. It’s funny, because the idea for this topic came to me as I’m having a massage later today (I write these about a week before they’re posted). Getting a massage purely for pleasure hasn’t occurred to me in the longest time. Instead I always consider my massage therapist part of my healthcare team. I’m just like, hey, it’s time to take care of those muscles, especially because I have fibromyalgia and I’ve been neglecting them recently! And honestly, this type of health care is also self-care. I think we can get pulled into all these labels, rather than just going with what we need, regardless of whether it’s real self-care or media self-care or health care or anything else. What will make your mind, body and spirit feel better today? Do that, and keep making the most of it!
Why Are You Attached to Your Illness Identity?
How many times have you said, “I am sick” or “I am a Spoonie” or “I am in pain” or “I am depressed,” and so on? And how often do you feel that is really so? That is what you are? If your answers to one or both of those questions is “a lot,” then know you are likely not the only one answering that way. I rarely use those phrases for myself anymore because I find them unhelpful, but before you run away I want to explain why they are unhelpful. Not just from my perspective from my lived experience, but also what theories in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) and related research suggests, particularly when it comes to chronic illness.
First I think I need to introduce you to a few terms. The first is event centrality. This can be described as the degree to which a person perceives an event (often traumatic but can also work for being diagnosed with an illness) as central to their identity. In other words, being a sick person is who you are because of your diagnosis. The second concept is the conceptualized self. This refers to who we think we are (in fancy ACT terms we call this self-as-content). The conceptualized self can take on all the identities we have such as being son or daughter, a parent, a spouse, a friend, and of course a sick person. It also includes our self-evaluations, so whether we describe ourselves as smart or dumb, happy or sad, fun or boring, and so on. What sometimes happens is that we get fused with one (or a few) of these aspects of our identity. In other words, we hold it tightly, are attached to it, and in the long-run doing so usually causes us more problems.
Now this attachment to the conceptualized self can happen to anyone, and we often see it in depression and anxiety as well as chronic illness and chronic pain. There has been some research suggesting that our illness self-concept is a predictor of our adjustment to chronic illness. When we are attached to the identity of being ill we tend to have a lower overall quality of life. I talked about the use of language once on the podcast, and you should listen to that episode if you haven’t already. I want you to think about these pairs of phrases:
- “I am anxious” vs. “I am experiencing the feelings of anxiety.”
- “I am depressed” vs. “I am experiencing the feelings of sadness”
- “I am sick” vs. “I am experiencing the symptoms of lupus” (or whatever illness you have)
- “I am in pain” vs. “I am experiencing uncomfortable sensations”
You’ll likely notice that you attachment to that identity changes. And when we aren’t overly attached we actually can take better care of ourselves (health behaviours, self-caring, etc.) and our quality of life improves because we find we are able to do more values-based activities that we enjoy (yep, even with illness and pain). When we remove the attachment to our conceptualized self we are more willing to allow our experiences and see them as passing.
There’s a few ways we can learn to do this. First, we can just start to notice and name are thoughts and feelings – “I notice I’m having the feeling of an uncomfortable shooting sensation in my hip” or “I notice I’m having the thought that I’m always in pain.” There are tons of ways to create some space between us and our thoughts and feelings when we are attached to them. This is just one way. The other process we can use to change this attachment to the conceptualized self is to develop self-as-context. This is what is also referred to as the noticing self. The part of us that just watches and notices all our experiences: what see, hear, smell, taste, touch, think, feel, do, etc. It’s a part of us that never changes. It’s like the sky and all of the thoughts and feelings and sensations are like the weather. The sky sees the weather but the weather cannot hurt the sky. And if you go above the clouds, the sky is still there, even when it can’t be seen. I’m going to encourage you to follow along with the video below to get an idea of what it is like to experience the noticing self.
I personally find this really helpful (and so do many of my clients) in creating a new relationship with my thoughts, feelings, and sensations, and forging out new identity, where I’m not limited by any of these things because I can notice them. They are not me. I am not chronically ill, I have the experience of having a chronic illness.
Keep making the most of it!
What Can We Control When We Have a Chronic Illness?
Here’s how I see it: in my life there are things that are out of my control. No matter what I do, I cannot change them. And then there are things in my life that are totally within my control, and I do what I can to change them. Seems pretty simple, right? Well, yes and no. There is this concept in psychology called ‘locus of control’ that has been vigorously studied. It basically describes how people make sense of different influences on their life. There are two types of locus of control. The first is internal, in which we believe what happens to us is caused by our own actions. The second is external, in which we believe that what happens to us is caused by outside forces. Would you believe that having a high internal locus of control is helpful? Especially for those of us with chronic illness or pain? Well, that’s what the research says…
There have been a ton of studies showing that people with high internal locus of control tend to have better health habits overall, are more likely to be screened and tested for health conditions, and actually have better mental health after being diagnosed with an illness. Janowski et al. (2013) found this was the case across chronic health conditions in their study. According to a study by Brown et al. (2018), people with high external locus of control have a lower quality of life, in their study on cancer patients. The great thing is, this is information we can utilize to make our lives better with our chronic illnesses. But how, you might ask?
I want you to take a moment and ask these questions to yourself. What do I have most control over in my life? What do I have the least control over?
We often focus on things that are not in our control, such as the behaviour of others, actually getting an illness, and our difficult thoughts and feelings that are associated with all of this (and are an important part of being human). When we focus on these things we end up feeling helpless, hopeless, angry, anxious, guilty, sad, and so on (the struggle switch). We get stuck on these stories of “if I wasn’t sick my life would be good” or “my life will be great when I’m not in pain anymore, and will be miserable until that day comes.” This is common when you have an illness or a severe injury (like a concussion for example). The problem is, we don’t know if or when we will ever be without our illness or pain or injury, etc.
What we can do instead is start focusing our time and energy on what is in our control, such as our actions/behaviours/whatever you want to call it. Self-empowerment is one of those now almost silly terms that was hijacked by the self-help life coach world, but essentially, having a high internal locus of control and then taking control of what we can is the epitome of self-empowerment. The better health behaviours we have = the better quality of life we have (even with illness and pain).
What can we do to take control?
- Unhook from our difficult thoughts and feelings – try this or this.
- Connect with our values to determine how we want to act even with the challenges that we face – listen to this.
- Take action, behaving like the sort of person we want to be, so that we can live the sort of life we want to live – listen to this.
If you currently have a high external locus of control and a low internal one, this switch might be difficult to do. You may need the extra support of a psychotherapist/counsellor, and you will definitely want to give yourself patience, time, and kindness. We all have the opportunity to live a great life, regardless of our health status, so let’s see if this helps us make the most of it!
Critical Coping: Problem-Focused vs. Emotion-Focused
I used to always use problem focused coping. Like 99.9% of the time. And it usually served me well, but not always, and certainly not always after my chronic illness snuck up on me. Then I started to use more emotion-focused coping, a totally different coping style. And here’s the thing, I now use both and you probably need to as well. But hold on! What the heck are problem-focused and emotion-focused coping anyway?
Problem-focused coping is typically used for solvable problems, ones that can be fixed, and make the problem go away. For example, if we lose our job due to company restructuring (this happened to me back in the day) then we would use problem-focused coping in order to find another job and make sure we can support ourselves in the meantime.
Emotion-focused coping is what we use when the problem can’t be fixed, and the problem will not go away. It is dealing with emotions that arise from an unfixable problem. Kind of like what happens when you have a chronic illness.
Both of these skills are necessary in life, but the problem is, most of us are taught more about problem-focused coping that emotion-focused.
Let’s look at problem-focused in the context of chronic illness or chronic pain. What are some solvable problems or areas in which we would use problem focused coping? Well, lifestyle changes are one area. We are told or we read up on different “diets” or exercise routines or incorporating meditation, etc that will help us with some of our symptoms. Or maybe it’s just taking medication as prescribed. We would use problem-focused coping because lifestyle changes and medication adherence are fixable problems. We’ll likely use SMART goals (specific-measurable/meaningful-attainable/adaptive-relevant/realistic-timebound) or other techniques to make these changes. And, while nothing is a guarantee, there is a lot of evidence supporting that certain lifestyle changes will help with symptoms, essentially “fixing” (I use that term loosely) the problem.
How about emotion focused coping in the context of chronic illness or chronic pain? While, chronic disease distress, anxiety and depression are all common in those of us with chronic illness. Our illnesses likely won’t go away and our emotions – well, we’re meant to have them. So with this I see a lot of acceptance practices being used and needed (here’s a link to one of my favourites). Self-compassion is another area where we are utilizing emotion focused coping (here’s a link to one of those practices). We have to learn to live with difficult emotions that come and go, and difficult sensations, such as pain. If you’re not good at this, I want to normalize it for you – most people aren’t! This is a skill set most people need help with.
Who can help you add these skill sets? Well, there are lots of places to go. A counsellor/therapist or health coach is one place. I would say the health coach would help more with problem-focused and therapist with emotion focused (as well as problem-focused). You can also look in the self-help section of your local library or bookstore. Those meditations I linked are another place, and I’ve done a number of episodes on these in my podcast (check out this episode on acceptance for example).
Once you have and start using both types of coping skills, you can start making the most of it!
Support my content on Patreon.
Chronically Living 