The Wellness Reset

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been fighting to get myself on track and feel grounded with everything that has been going on. I found myself reaching out to my therapist for a tune up session because I wasn’t certain that things were working, despite my efforts. She sent me a link (that I didn’t click, to be honest) and said, “if you still need me, let’s schedule for next week.” I haven’t reached back out yet and here’s why.

I knew that I needed a wellness reset, but I just felt stuck in the constant flow of things that I couldn’t pull myself. Work is work. Home is home. Everything is go, go, go. Last week, as I texted my therapist, I made sure to text my finanical rep, my tax man, resumed sessions with my trainer (I do this virtually because who has time for the trip to the gym?) and even reached out and scheduled with my cleaning lady. But then something happened…

There was a point where I felt, “woe is me,” “I suck as a mom,” “I’m too busy” etc, etc, etc and enough was enough. I got tired of beating myself, being unkind and not acknowledging everything that I am actually doing very well and FINALLY, I cleaned. Not to say that the house was a complete mess, but it was clutter EVERYWHERE. Just piles of things that needed to be put in their proper place creating mess. Do you know how it feels to feel as though you’re constantly cleaning and making ZERO progress?

I’m sure it happens to more than just me. Aiden was supposed to return home on Saturday and didn’t, which changed my plans and forced me into a cleaning fit. That was the reset. I was on the upshot towards one anyway, but that was the turning point—and I’m happy it came. Although, it gets untidy at times, I finally felt ahead of the game. I didn’t feel like my head was under water with the upkeep of home anymore and it feels good!

Here’s why a wellness reset was imporant: Everything is connected.

There are 8 Dimensions of Wellness: emotional, environmental, financial, intellectual, occupational, physical, social, spiritual. For me, all of them were out whack. My Environment[al] was making me anxious and disrupting my Emotional and mental health. Financially, I was making some poor, unplanned decisions and that impacted LIFE. Intellectually—I felt stifled creatively for a while, but I’m so glad to be back! Work has been a cycle of STRUGGLE following a lovely, long holiday break (getting back into routines is hard)—talk about Occupational hazard. Simultaneously, we were on break from working out for the Christmas holiday season until after the New Year, so there went my Physical Wellness—not to mention, I was down for over a week with what was probably the flu (no point in going to the doctor if I wasn’t planning on taking the medicine anyway—Aiden was also fine). I wanted to be out and about, but Socially I couldn’t get myself together to do so. And Spiritually, I was not focused. I resumed prayer, devotionals and meditating. I had to get it together and that was the kick that I needed.

That was a lot, but it took me taking a step back to reflect and see what was happening in the different areas of my life. I had to pull myself out of autopilot and just focus and be mindful. It all started there. Last night, I used my favorite mindfulness app, Stop Breathe and Think (no ad, I really love it!) and did a 6 minute meditation called ‘Review the Day’. It is a habit I would like to form that is grounded in gratitude, kindness and acknowledging your accomplishments. I felt so much better about my day because I was really tied up in some self-defeating thoughts that were not even real! I’ll write a post soon diving into that a little bit.

Here’s what I want you to takeaway:

Take a moment to just reflect on how YOU are doing and make sure that you are at least OK in each wellness dimension. You never know what’s affecting the other.