Happy Monday!! Hope you had a wonderful weekend! Today I am sharing with you something a little different but very special. This blog was written for Emily Hwang Beauty Blog By Wellness By Josie. During these stressful times for all of us, I wanted to get the 411 from Josie on how we can practice self-care for our mind.

Josie is a Holistic Health Coach who completed her studies with the Institute for Integrative Nutrition. Her mission is to help women be their happiest self, using food and lifestyle changes as medicine to bring out optimal energy, confidence, and beauty (because true beauty comes from being your most authentic self). You can book a free consultation with Josie here

*Written By Wellness By Josie* In 2021, we know self-care well. We’ve been perfecting our at-home facial game for months, have sweatpants in every color, and know exactly when we need to turn off our phones and binge Bridgerton for the 100th time. But when we think of self-care, we’re often forgetting the most important piece of it: self-care for the mind. Yes, it’s about resting and treating yourself, but it’s also about making sure your happiness, stress relief, and self-love is the main priority. Here are 6 ways to practice self-care for the mind:

1. Tune in to the happy chemicals

    Mental self-care doesn’t have to be a long list of practices that feel unachievable (30 minutes of meditation???) or some self-help BS that you read about but never feel. Boosting happiness and caring for yourself can be as simple as learning more about the chemicals in your brain, and sparking the ones that make you feel happy. For example, serotonin (the “happy hormone”) can be increased through breathwork, sunlight, and good gut health, while your body releases endorphins when laughing, exercising, or eating spicy foods.

1. Keep promises to yourself

Confidence is a key piece of mental health, and the way you achieve better confidence is just to keep promises to yourself. That’s it: go to the gym when you say you will, eat what you plan to, and trust what your body is telling you and then listen to it. Also, keep promises to yourself with what you want out of life. Prioritize your mental health and disappoint other people when necessary to avoid disappointing  yourself. Set boundaries so that your energy is not taking up from your relationships or work life.

1. Practice empathy

    Thinking about other people’s feelings might be the last thing on your mind when practicing caring for yourself, but empathy is often the most overlooked factor of happiness. We can’t feel true, lasting happiness until we’ve mastered the skill of getting outside ourselves and caring about other people. Not only does empathy increase our feelings of connection with others (a basic human necessity), but we can also use other people’s positive feelings to increase our own when we’re overall empathetic. Plus, empathy gives us a framework so that we don’t become too inside of ourselves: when you practice empathy, you always feel grateful for what you have and feel compassion for other people instead of seeing them as different from you. Practice empathy by asking questions about other people’s lives more than you talk about yourself, helping someone else whenever you feel down (like donate money to an organization or check in with a friend who’s going through a hard time), and making a goal to better understand perspectives that are not your own. 

1. Say “thank you”

Gratitude increases happiness, which changes the way your cells work and literally keeps your brain healthy. Yes, really. Also, the more we appreciate beauty in other people, the more beauty we’ll find in ourselves. Start by saying “thank you” as often as you can and as genuinely as you can. Also say “thank you” in replace of saying “I’m sorry.” Say “thank you for waiting for me” instead of “I’m sorry I’m late.” Even a minor shift in language can change the way your brain thinks. Instead of coming from a place of self-judgment and critique, it comes from a place of gratitude. 

1. Prioritize pleasure

Pleasure is wildly misunderstood in our modern culture; we’re constantly mistaking it for instant gratification. But the definition of pleasure is actually a mix of satisfaction and contentment. Mindlessly snacking on potato chips or watching another hour of Netflix isn’t getting you closer to satisfaction or contentment, even if it does feel instantly gratifying. Try to make decisions based on what truly feels pleasurable to you. Also, don’t wait to celebrate significant milestones or to enjoy life on the weekends. Make every minute of every day more enjoyable. For example, try wearing your favorite lip stick (even if you’re staying at home), flirting more often (with your significant other, with the grocer, in what you wear to bed, etc.), turn everything you do into a special moment (like lighting candles and playing music while cooking or diffusing essential oils while working). 

1. Turn self-love into a ritual

Self-love is not a circumstance. It doesn’t just happen when you lose weight or get your dream job. It’s a skill, which means that it requires practice to achieve. At the same time, self-love is one of the most important factors of self-care. After all, it’s not caring if you’re not really loving, so turn self-love into a ritual you practice every single day. Get to know yourself more by exploring new things, talk to yourself as your childhood self (so you’re more compassionate), forgive yourself, and become more “you.”