These detailed, science-based exercises will not only help you increase the compassion and kindness you show yourself, but will also give you the tools to help your clients, students, or employees show more compassion to themselves. But it also entails looking after our minds and emotions, which can take the form of setting time aside for activities that nourish our spirits and learning to understand how we can best replenish our energies.īefore you continue, we thought you might like to download our three Self-Compassion Exercises for free. It includes taking good care of our physical health, most notably by eating healthily, exercising, and sleeping well. Self-care is a sustainable and holistic investment in our minds and bodies. Qigong, meditation, and yoga are all techniques designed to restore our inner balance and prevent us from burning out.Ĭombining self-soothing and relaxation with resilience-enhancing strategies, Western-style self-care, too, promotes a proactive approach to our physical and mental wellbeing (Skovholt & Trotter-Mathison, 2011). The therapeutics of Traditional Chinese medicine, for example, revolve around preventing the exhaustion or blockage of “qi,” our vital life energy. Marked by a preventive rather than reactive approach to health, many Asian cultures seek to manage our energy economies before they become depleted.

Though a relatively new phenomenon in the West, self-care has a much older tradition in Eastern cultures, reaching back to antiquity. Self-care continues to be a popular buzzword.īut while it persistently grabs headlines, it also remains a fuzzy concept.

Mental health activity worksheet