Self-care is all over the Internet these days. And because I’m a homeschooling mom of three and I also happened to run a business, sometimes I want to roll my eyes at the whole “me time” focus. At the same time, I do notice that when I don’t take some time for myself during the day, I’m much less patient with my kids, and I feel a lot more anxious and/or stressed.
But self-care doesn’t have to mean the same thing for everyone. For some people, self-care is a bubble bath. For others, a simple 5-minute “time-out” will do. And there’s all kinds of things in between.
Personally, I practice self-care by going for a walk and doing my physiotherapy exercises before the kiddos wake up. It means I get less sleep, but it also means I get to keep myself as healthy as I can, all things considered. Other ways I practice self-care, though it doesn’t happen every day, is to do some journalling and drawing.
Whether you want more ideas for your own self-care or whether you write about it, here’s a mind map that should help you out.
Self-care, in its simplest terms, means taking care of yourself. Exercise and nutrition fit in here nicely, so if you’re writing about self-care, you could also write about general health, including exercise, nutrition, and mental health. From here, you can get more specific.
For mental health, you could write about healthy relationships: how focusing on supportive ones and walking away from toxic ones is good self-care.
You can also write about gratitude and how that can improve your mood.
You can write about laughter being great medicine, and give suggestions on what people can do to have a daily laugh. Whether it’s reading a great comic or watching a short funny clip (don’t go down the YouTube rabbit hole, though), laughing can help you relieve stress and take care of yourself. [P.S. if you do believe that laughter is the best medicine, you should click that link for the YouTube rabbit hole. I LOL’d.]
You can be specific and talk about self-care for particular people, such as caregivers. You can write about the benefits of taking some time off and give suggestions on how to attain respite care for those who have children or other dependants with special needs.
You can write about how quiet time plays a part in self-care, and how it’s important even for extroverts. Within this topic, you can write about actions people can take during quiet time, such as reading or meditation.
If you write about chronic illness, you can combine it with self-care and bring awareness to the importance of the latter to manage the former. You can talk about how listening to your body and taking breaks is really important for those with unpredictable illnesses.
You could write about the importance of free time and the ridiculousness that is our obsession with 24/7 work—a post or even a book on reestablishing free time would be likely well-received in this age of overwork.
And the list goes on. What other ideas does this mind map give you for writing about self-care (or practicing it)?
Love my mind maps? Check out my book, Mind Maps for Freelance Writing Success, on Smashwords.
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