~ Bailey Shawley, M.Ed, CCTS-F, Specialized Parenting & Educational Consultant
There is a meme floating around about the 30-minute rule. It encourages us to take 30 minutes to ourselves each day, no matter what. It suggests going for a walk, planning a healthy meal, recharging, or relaxing. It also points out that it is not selfish of us to do so and that it is important to focus on our well-being because we cannot help others if we aren’t helping ourselves. I agree with the sentiment of the meme. I stress self-care and me time in my blog posts and in my consulting work. I also guide clients to understand why self-care is not synonymous with selfishness.
But, I also know how overwhelming it is for single parents, parents of multiple children, parents with more than one job, parents of kids with disabilities, and so many other busy and stretched-too-thinly parents to feel like they are doing something wrong – or even that they are failing – if they can’t find 30 consecutive minutes in their day to engage in self-care. It’s one more thing that they should be doing but just can’t figure out how to do. So, while the thirty-minute rule is a fantastic long-term goal for all of us, it is not going to be realistic for many of us to achieve just like that.
I’ve written before about how new, healthy habits take time to develop and how sweeping life changes cannot happen overnight. As such, we can feel far less overwhelmed about self-care when we view it as a practice instead of as a half-hour activity that we need to bulldoze into our schedules beginning now. I also bet that if you start viewing self-care as something that you do for yourself, you’ll find that you’re already doing some acts of self-care each day. And the sum of the minutes you spend on each act may start adding up to 10, 15, 20, and even 30 minutes each day,
What would happen if, when you lie down to sleep tonight, you reflect on your day and identify the moments you took for yourself? Did you take an extra few minutes to get a warm drink or real food today? That’s self-care. Did you walk to your mailbox and spend a few extra seconds looking at the sky or listening to the birds or watching the clouds? That’s self-care. Did you blast your own tunes in the car after you dropped off the kids? Did you sit in your car when you pulled in after work to prepare for your “parent shift” tonight? Did you turn on your favorite show or podcast while you folded clothes? That’s all self-care. And those acts all have meaning and value.
Should we all strive to reach the 30-minute rule? Sure. But, we cannot undo all of the good our smaller, brief acts of self-care do for us each day by feeling like a failure if we don’t have 30 continuous minutes for self-care, either. Every act of self-care reminds us that we deserve to take care of ourselves in the midst of feeling as though we have to take care of everyone else first. Every act of self-care reminds us that we matter. Every act of self-care helps refill our cups so that we have more to give to others, since we simply cannot pour from an empty cup. So, 30 seconds of listening to your favorite song before responding to “Mom!” or “Dad!” is just as important in the grand scheme of things as that 30-minute solo walk you’ve been meaning to take for three years.
It’s also okay if you cannot start practicing self-care without some guidance and support. Scheduling an individual consultation, Reiki session, or chakra reading with me also will ensure you hold yourself accountable for making time for you. All B Connecting, LLC services are confidential and judgment free.
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