Happy New Year! 2021 has finally arrived!

Let’s start this year as we mean to go on…with purpose and strength #JanuaryStrong.

Let’s talk about a New Year, but the same you.

After all, just because the clock strikes midnight and the next year rolls in, you’re still you – right?

2020 was an unpredictable shocker of a year. Who knew that a virus would become a global pandemic and quite literally, grind the world to a halt. Whilst we’re still in the midst of this horror, we can still find ways to divert our attention to try and reclaim our lives and selves once more.

New Year, Same You

Self-Care

We can start with us. Self-care is a phrase often talked about but not so often done. It’s absolutely essential. Especially in a pandemic. We’re so surrounded by negative news and worrying situations. We can’t change that. But we can change how we absorb that information so that we don’t experience a debilitating overwhelm.

Let’s look at ways we can promote self-care. What can we do to prioritise our wellbeing? Scheduling you-time within your daily time management planning works for many people, especially time-starved women-in-business: self-care is crucial.

I use my Planner to schedule in a daily list of self-care activities for each day.

A few of my tried and tested methods of self-care:

  • Mindfulness
  • Meditation
  • Journalling – or Morning Pages, as coined by Julia Cameron in The Artist’s Way – 3 A4 pages of handwritten blah-blah of whatever comes to mind, first thing in the morning. Every day.
  • Sleep – quality sleep helps us to improve physical and mental health; consolidates our memory; improves concentration, productivity and creativity along with improving immune function.

“Even a brief period of deep sleep, in other words, helps us make the kinds of new connections that allow us to better explore our world. In a nutshell, sleep is what allows us to operate at our highest level of contribution so that we can achieve more, in less time.”

Greg McKeown – Essentialism: The Disciplined Pursuit of Less

  • Learning something new – SkillShare (get two months’ free Premium with this link) is a great platform, as is Udemy.
  • Have a hot bath with some oils or salts.
  • Read – get lost in a different world for a while
  • Doing nothing! Seriously, it’s a thing! Niksen is a Dutch word that translates as literally, “doing nothing” – a benefit in helping you reset and deal with challenging or stressful situation. The Italians also have a phrase for it: Dolce Far Niente which translates as “the sweetness of doing nothing” or pleasant idleness. It’s lovely to do something (or nothing in this case) that actually has a name for it!

These are just a few ideas that I find really helpful to use as part of my self-care routine. I hope you find them useful too!

If you haven’t got The Creative’s Planner yet, there’s a fabulous 20% discount throughout January. Link to buy one for yourself or treat a friend, here.