EXTREME Self Care

Cheryl Richardson who has written several books that focus on self care, always adds the modifier "extreme."  She says that her reason for that word is that just regular self care isn't nearly enough - especially not for women.  We tend to think that self-care is taking our vitamins and exercising - things we will get to as soon as we get everything else done.  But there's a lot more to self-care than that.

Luckily I started watching Oprah in the 1990s and Cheryl was a regular guest.  As a result I started buying and reading her books.  I may have all of them.  I was amazed at the kind of self-care she was recommending -  things like a weekly massage, leaving the office during lunch and going for a walk outside.  Ideas like that were completely foreign to me at the time.

Cheryl convinced me that if I wanted to have a good life I had to put extreme self-care at the top of my to-do list, not at the bottom.  So I began to try to do it.  What a struggle that was - a war with myself and my mind. 

I felt guilty and anxious when I took time to care for myself.  Then I heard her speak at a university conference, and she said that you would know you were on the right track when you felt guilty.  It was just a sign that you were going against your programming which was exactly what you were going to have to do.

Eventually, Cheryl said, you would get used to caring for yourself and the guilt and anxiety would go away.  She was right.  There are other benefits to self-care besides a higher quality life - other people enjoy the new you - lighter, happier, and more fun.