I think it’s so important to show up for yourself. And I don’t necessarily mean things like “dress for the job you want, not the job you have” or “remember your why” (a common one in teaching that I just can’t get behind). I mean showing up for yourself, even when it’s hard. I have felt like I’ve just been going through the motions for the past few months. I would wake up, go to work, try to work out or go to taekwondo (usually lacking motivation to do so), try to maintain a social life, and just feel completely wiped out at the end of the day. On weekends, it would be spent trying to get myself as mentally far away from work as possible, knowing that two days is way too short a time. As I’m finally coming out of the other side, there’s some irreparable damage that has been done on this school year. I’m counting down the days until we are done, and I dread Sundays knowing that I have to get up the next morning and return to work. It has really taken a toll on me this year.

In short, I haven’t been showing up for myself. I went from being a strict to-do list person who had 20+ tasks a week to accomplish to feeling like even the bare minimum was too much. Just within the past couple of weeks have I started making to-do lists again and actually sticking to them. They’re a lot smaller than they used to be, but it’s a start. Progress is still progress.

I don’t know if I’ve talked about it on here, but I’ve been in therapy for a few years now trying to understand everything that goes on (and goes wrong) with my brain. It has definitely helped me to manage my stress and anxiety among other things. But as I am starting to show up for myself again, I’m bringing to mind a lot of things I’ve learned in therapy. I treat myself kinder, I recognize I can’t do everything, and I know change is going to take time.

The old me would’ve felt so guilty for not being able to write posts or really feeling motivated to do much of anything. And while it sucks that my blog probably took the hardest hit, I recognize that beating myself up isn’t going to change anything that has happened in the past months.

If any of this resonates with you, or even if you’re curious, I want to give you some examples of ways I’m starting to show up for myself.

1. I’m writing my blog early and I’m not writing on a schedule– I’m starting a blog post on my notes app when I have an idea, and I’m writing until I run out of the idea. It’s new for me, but so far I like it. I spend time writing usually before I fall asleep, and I think it’s helping me sleep better because I can get the thoughts out of my head.
2. I made tweaks to my schedule– In January and February, I wasn’t really home any weeknight. I was trying to work out Monday, Wednesday, and Friday after work, go to trivia, squeeze a taekwondo class in, and hang out with friends two nights a week. It was EXHAUSTING. So I talked to my gym partner and asked if we could switch our schedules to Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday. Then I could leave Wednesdays open for taekwondo. Since working out doesn’t always take very long, that frees up time for the other things on my plate. It also gives me at least one night where I am home to stay once I get home. Finally, changing my schedule doesn’t make me worry about trying to squeeze exercise in on a Friday afternoon when all I wanna do is go home and start my weekend. It’s already helped so much!
3. I’m working on ACTUALLY being consistent– I talk about consistency, but I don’t feel I always do what I say. I’m trying to do things, even if I don’t want to do them. For example, I finally got around to cleaning my room the Monday I was on spring break. It took forever. It was hard because I feel like it could have only taken an hour or two had I been “motivated”. But I did it. I took breaks, and it did take most of the day. But it’s done. The other day, neither my gym partner nor myself wanted to work out. We both had mildly crummy days– not the ones where big things go wrong, but the small things all go wrong. It would have been so much easier to just skip the gym and go home. BUT instead, we gave ourselves a little pep talk, and we put in time at the gym.

Here’s the crazy part: when you start showing up for yourself, you want to do it more. Last week, I got two days in a row of working out with my gym partner and went to taekwondo on my desired time. When my last gym day of the week came around, my gym partner had something come up and she couldn’t attend with me. It would’ve been so easy to just relax or skip the gym. Instead, I ran an errand and then still went to the gym by myself. I put in the time and had an excellent gym session.

And for me, it’s obsessive and contagious. I want to show up more in every area of my life. I exercise more so I want to eat better. I work on my eating, so I want to take more steps. I move more, so I want to take care of myself in other ways. It’s a spiral and snowball effect that is impacting me in the best way.

I know that a few good days doesn’t mean that I’m automatically fixed and back where I want to be. Change is not always the same and always measurable. Even though I’ve written this much over the past week, I’m struggling with motivation to finish it. Part of me wants to put it off and finish it later when the motivation comes. But I know that if I show up for myself, especially when I don’t want to, it’ll be done quicker and off my plate.

This is a stressful week for me. My business partner and I are selling at our first event since we started this business. There’s a lot to get done and still get ready, so my stress level is pretty high. Hopefully, this will be my last big stressful moment until the end of the school year. I am so excited for the break and so excited to start fresh.

To help me show up for myself, and to remind me what I need to actually focus on, I wrote out a list of everything currently stressing me out. And this may not help everyone. It might make you more stressed. I’m just telling you what works for me. Then I could divide the stressful points into things I can control vs things that are out of my control. From there, I took five things I could control to focus on for the day, including my blog. At the time of writing this, I have already taken care of two things while at work. I will take care of the other two things at home later tonight. My original list of stress points was 14. But by only dealing with the things I can control and choosing a small section of those to focus on for today has already made my stress so much more manageable.

This is what showing up for yourself looks like. It’s not always big moments. Sometimes it’s a list of five items on a clipboard. Sometimes it’s eating a healthy meal when you would rather just order takeout. But I’m already seeing the change in myself from doing this. Part of me still wants to have these problems all solved now. However, the journey I have been on has led me here, and I know my journey is not finished. I still have more to go and learn. But in the meantime, I’ll continue to show up for myself in the small ways and on the hard days!