4 Pillars of Self Care for Next Level Health, Happiness, & Fulfillment
SO, let’s imagine wanting to drop a few pounds gained over the past year of sheltering in place. The first strategies that come to mind - are they things like adding in more afternoon naps, watching more comedy, or developing a new circle of friendships? Well, these strategies have all been shown to help us become more svelt - with many other added benefits.
And how about if you want to reduce your stress - do you think about eating more yogurt, joining a kickboxing class, or starting a blog?
And finally, let’s say you are a runner, but now a knee injury is holding you back - are you considering increasing your abdominal strength, eating more fish, or learning to meditate - with the understanding that all of this will directly help your knee?
I created Fully Embodied Living because I saw a lack of integration in our holistic health practices, and I wanted to address it. The 4 Pillars - Connection to Body, Nourishment, Presence, & Growth - are all intertwined and influence each other. In order to create change in 1 area, the Body, for example, we have to also look at the other 3 pillars in order to create a change that sticks, and that is healthy for us.
I will give 1 more example and go into greater detail. Let’s say you have started to get headaches. While I always encourage consulting your primary health practitioner first and foremost - especially for something of this nature, I also encourage people to look at their lifestyle and behaviours through the lens of the 4 Pillars. Things that can contribute to headaches and migraines are:
Forward Head Posture - this is increasingly common with our increasingly sedentary lifestyles, where we are often looking down at our phones, or are sitting on the couch watching Netflix with a slouched posture, requiring our head to go forward in order to see the screen. Instead of letting the head balance on top of the spine, like building blocks stacked one on top of the other, which requires much less muscular effort, with a forward head posture, the muscles in the back of the neck have to work excessively in order to hold the weight of the head. Plus all the muscles around the neck get shortened, restricting blood flow, and possibly compressing nerves. Like all of the suggestions I am going to make here - improving posture is win-win. It may be a factor in relieving or reducing the intensity of the headaches, AND it also improves the biomechanics of the whole body, digestion, energy levels, and it makes us look more svelt! There are no bad side effects! Of course I believe that mindful exercise is one of the best ways to lengthen & strengthen the body from the inside out, AND to improve posture in a permanent way, but even just paying attention to posture - especially of the head & neck - throughout the day can make a big difference in head & neck tension. Here is a previous post I made about improving posture
Eating too many foods that contribute to inflammation - Headaches are an inflammatory issue, and it is well known that foods high in sugar, trans & saturated fat (including fried & processed food), as well as excessive alcohol or caffeine all have an inflammatory effect. What’s more, foods such as berries, leafy greens & other cruciferous vegetables, avocados, and fatty fish are all known to have anti-inflammatory properties. Changing our diet is no small feat, given our busy and possibly stressful lives (more on that in a moment) - and this is why it can be useful to seek the professional advice of a dietician, or a health coach (like me!) specialising in nutrition - so they can help educate and support the creation of new food & eating habits. 1 small thing we can do, is drink more pure water every day - especially in the morning. Headaches can often be exacerbated by dehydration, which is a very common issue in our modern society full of fizzy drinks & fancy coffees. Here is a previous post regarding the benefits of eating more cruciferous vegetables, plus some recipes
Ineffective stress management - It is difficult to avoid stress in today’s world, so we must learn to manage it. This is where developing a breath or meditation practice can make all the difference. With most things, I believe in the ‘goldilocks’ approach - not too much, and not too little. What I mean to say is, while it is important to take life seriously, to be involved in society, and to love wholeheartedly, not too much. When we become overly attached to our plans, our work, our relationships - we can get stressed. Meditation & mindfulness teaches us how to balance being fully present in our lives, with also being able to let go of needing things to be a certain way. These practices allow us to take a step back, to see the big picture, to understand what we have control of and what we don’t, and to access a bigger wisdom. My Meditation Video Page has several guided meditations that can be helpful for reducing stress & deepening connection to self.
Disconnection from a sense of purpose - When we feel like we are on the hamster wheel, unenthusiastic and basically ‘meh’ about everything - our inner vitality is dimmed and we can get trapped in negative states, such as resentment, hopelessness, & bitterness, and these states can contribute to headaches. On a biological level, when we are less enthusiastic, we have less seratonin, dopamine, oxytocin, & endorphins in our system (collectively known as the Happy Hormones) - and these all have natural anti-inflammatory properties. These are our natural pain killers. Connection to purpose wakes up our enthusiasm, makes us feel better, and literally changes our body chemistry. Purpose does not have to come in the form of a career at all - we can feel a sense of purpose in caring for our family (such as our children or our aging parents), volunteering, or just being a good neighbour. 1 simple practice is to try to be kind to at least 1 person everyday - and to make note of it. A few nice words to the coffee shop barrista or a close friend not only benefit the one who receives the kindness , but the one who gives it as well.
This is just a quick example of how we can look at the whole being in order to understand why headaches may have started to occur, and how we can possibly reduce them by looking at the 4 Pillars: Body, Nourishment, Presence & Growth. There are many other aspects we could look at as well, including hormone imbalances, environmental toxins, emotional dysregulation, or allergies, but this sketch was simply meant to illustrate how complex and intertwined the different aspects of our health really are, and that there is usually no ‘one magic bullet’. I used the example of headaches, but we could look at all aspects of our health & well-being in this more integrated way. My final point is that, although everyone’s situation is unique, the great part is that there really is no down side to improving our holistic health in these respects. It may require a little more investigation and effort, but it is win-win.
I will be regularly posting ways that we can look at things like weight loss, stress reduction, and achievement, through the lens of the 4 Pillars, so that we can set goals that are healthy, kind to ourselves, sustainable, and that can ripple out to the rest of our lives in more ways than we can imagine. Stay tuned!
Wishing you well. Take good care.