E155: Do Less of this ONE THING and Make More Time for Your Self-Care

To make an impact, you have to swap this detrimental mindset immediately! This quick episode challenges you to shift your perspective so that you can show up as the best version of yourself and make a greater impact in the world…

[00:29] Hello friends! Welcome back to the Women’s Empowerment Podcast. My name is Valerie and I am your host and Healthy Habit Mentor. I work with women from all walks of life. I work with mothers, business owners, health care providers, students, coaches, and other women-identifying humans making an impact on the world.

So I can take a WILD guess that you my dear, yes you, have a desire to make a positive change in the world. I will bet that you are a person making an impact on the lives of people who are lucky enough to know you and be in your presence and that you give a lot.

With all of the incredible things you do, people you serve, and impact you are making, I will also be so bold as to say, there are times where you feel burnt out.

Heck, everyone has such busy lives and schedules, how do you cram all the things in? How do you possibly find time for you? Most days it feels like there is not enough time. Would you agree?

[1:35] I could definitely agree. There are days where I feel completely drained, exhausted, at the end of my rope, lazy, and totally BLAH! I couldn’t take action even if I tried. And I think the toughest part is that it takes even longer for me to achieve goals or tasks or make an impact because I am reviving myself AND still trying to do all the things at the same time. And really, the truth is when that is happening, I’m running on fumes. You feel me?

If you’re nodding along, then I’d like to challenge you to do less of this one thing to help you make more time for yourself and your self-care.

You see, what all of these impactful women have in common when we are doing all the things, burning out, and repeating the cycle again, is our detrimental perspective.

It took me a long time to learn that “we can do anything, just not everything.” I was a “yes person” for a very long time. There are so many reasons why we wrap ourselves up in these identities. Maybe we’re afraid of what people will think of us? Perhaps we aren’t listening to our intuition so we do what others expect of us. Or it could be that we want to be everything for everyone else and aren’t making ourselves a priority.

[3:08] Whatever your reason, I challenge you to change your perspective and prioritize yourself first thing every single day. Before you make any excuses. Before you tell me that it cannot be done. I am saying: I challenge you to prove to me that shifting your perspective on your self-care to this new thought doesn’t give you more time, more energy, more fulfilment in your life. Prove it.

Here’s what I’m talking about: Right now we have the detrimental perspective that we have to do all the things on our to-do list. We tell people that when it comes to our self-care our biggest struggle is finding the time. We feel like we have to cram and force it all into our calendars. We know we should put ourselves first, but when we actually see our priority list… well I’m not seeing our names on it, or it’s at the very bottom of the list.

I said some keywords here that I’d like us to reframe. Did you catch them? They were:

Have to

Finding the time

Cram and force

Should

[4:32] This languaging, this perspective is detrimental. Here’s the swap:

Get to

Create the time

Prioritize and make

Want

We get to do all the things

We can create the time in our calendars

We prioritize and make the time for ourselves

We want to put ourselves first

The detrimental perspective is disempowering. It creates feelings of pain, suffering, obstacles, struggle, and dislike.

The new languaging and perspective is empowering. It encourages feelings of joy, happiness, space, creation, strength, and bliss.

[5:12] Do less of, or completely eliminate that disempowering and detrimental perspective so that you can create more time for yourself. So that you can fill your cup up and then pour onto others. I know the filling the cup analogy is becoming a cliche, but it’s the perfect example and visualization for this.

Imagine an empty glass of water sitting in the middle of your kitchen table. This is you. Your self-care is the water we are pouring into our cup. When we first begin this shift in perspective. When we say “I get to work through my to do list today” We fill our up ¼ of the way. Then we “create time in our calendars” for the things that lift us up aka our self care we fill the cup another ¼ of the way. Our cup is now half full. Next, we put ourselves at the top of the priority list. Cup fills up again. We continue to do these things over and over and over again and the cup is overflowing. Imagine it. Imagine water just pouring into the cup and more water spilling over.

[6:25] Guess where all the extra water goes? To everyone and everything else around us, and the best part… WE AREN’T BURNT OUT! We are OVERFLOWING!

We can give more, do more, love more, create more, show up more, be more when we make this shift in our perspective. When we prioritize ourselves first every day.

If you think putting yourself last on the list is helping you or helping more people I am bursting that bubble right now. Fill your cup first.

Let this be a reminder to us all - myself included - to make this change and embody this new thought pattern.

You can also share your experience and let me know that you’re doing the challenge over on instagram @vallavignelife I want to know about what action and self-care you are taking to prioritize yourself!

If you’re listening to this episode and thinking of a friend who could also use this powerful mindset shift, you can share it with them and invite them into the challenge also.

Podcast Host

Valerie LaVigne

Valerie is the creator and founder of Valerie LaVigne Life and the Women's Empowerment Show. She helps busy and empowered women create healthy habits so that they can become the best version of themselves and transform their lives. Learn more about Valerie here!