How can you teach clients self-care strategies?

Clients practicing self-care is crucial to sustaining a healthy mind, spirit, and body. By assessing clients' well-being and raising awareness, counselors help clients recognize the significance of self-care. Through setting realistic goals and exploring various strategies, counselors empower clients to prioritize self-care. They can provide tailored practical skills to help clients integrate self-care seamlessly into their lives. With ongoing support and accountability, counselors ensure clients maintain their self-care practice, leading to enhanced well-being, resilience, and professional success.

Before we even talk about the clients self care…whats your self care strategies? You need to be in the correct mindset yourself, before you can help anyone else. Most people nowadays don’t even think about self care because life is so busy. Self care awareness is slowly increasing, but the practical follow through needs more self discipline. A lot of people confuse self care with being selfish, and this is one of the first barriers that needs to be overcome to start implementing self care. Self care is very personal because we are the experts of our own lives, which means we know our needs the best. A good starting point Is Maslow’s hierarchy of needs…ask yourself, are your needs being addressed? and if not, how can you change that?

Self-care is a personal endeavour that varies for each individual. Most people I encounter lack a self-care routine. While you can assist by evaluating their self-care needs, it's crucial to let them make their own choices and select activities they're comfortable with, otherwise, they won't fully engage.

Self care is a critical part of our day to day lives. With all the tugs for attention and demands of our new post pandemic working culture, most people are working to just get through the day. One thing that I have shared with my team is to set micro self care goals throughout the day. One of these is to set an alarm that alerts you every 90 minutes. At this interval, set a timer for merely 60 seconds to stretch your body, seated or standing...rotating in your chair, pausing for 4 count breathing in and out...a quick 60 second pause to recenter. You would be amazed at how much a tiny pause can have in your focus, energy, and concentration!

I hold a strong conviction that a 'one-size-fits-all' approach in mental health care can be detrimental. Customising strategies for self-care based on a thorough assessment speaks to the ethos of consumer-centred care, an approach I consider non-negotiable in contemporary practice.

I always tell my clients that a job search is a full-time job, but no one works 24/7. Even the most successful people have downtime. It's difficult to focus on anything else when you are unemployed, but self-care makes job seekers into better candidates by lowering stress and providing a much-needed outlet. Self-care should be part of every successful job search strategy because it really does help candidates find a job.

Self-care is about the practices you do everyday to maintain your wellbeing. I look at all areas of clients life and help them create sustainable habits. It could be having a water bottle handy to ensure you are hydrated, as dehydration affects cognition. Or it could be taking a regular walk or lunch breaks away from your desk. Breaks allow for your mind to wander and increases creativity. I encourage the cultivation of a gratitude practice as well. This helps shift perspectives and self-care helps build resilience.

Self-care offers numerous advantages, especially in a landscape characterised by rising living costs, long waiting lists for GP referrals, and mounting life pressures. For employers, the benefits are substantial: a decrease in absenteeism, a boost in productivity, and evidence that the company genuinely cares for its workforce. A recent Deloitte report underscores the value, showing that for every ￡1 invested in mental health training, there's an approximate return on investment of ￡5.60.

In my experience, there is no "one way" to self care. And, the self care you need today may not be the same that you need in one week, one month or one year's time. Take a moment to tune in to what your body is saying. Low energy - perhaps take a look at your hydration. Monkey mind - take a quick 60 pause to solely focus on your breathing. By listening to your body, you can start to recognize what needs to shift. And, through a continued practice, you will begin to notice earlier on in the cycle before things get too deep or challenging.

Self-care is a practice that all professionals need to learn and practice in varying ways throughout their careers. One of the most critical moments in one's career, when self-care is so necessary, is right after an unexpected job loss like a layoff or redundancy. At such a time, one goes through a high level of mental anguish and it is therefore especially important to have a self-care plan. Checking in on your emotional and mental state and applying self-regulation tactics like mindful meditation, deep breathing and journaling become critical practices to help someone cope during such a tough transition. When we don't practice self-care, we leave ourselves and our careers at the mercy of external forces.

When I conduct the two-day Mental Health First Aid England course, I ask attendees to list their self-care activities. More often than not, the list is disappointingly short. Common reasons include lack of time or childcare responsibilities, but in my opinion, the real issue is that self-care often isn't prioritised until one's personal health is at risk. My approach is to encourage people to formulate a plan, seek an accountability partner or mentor, and schedule self-care just like they would schedule annual leave, meetings, or birthdays. If it's in your diary, you're more likely to actually do it.

You have to meet people where they are in life. Once you understand their daily routines and mindset, then you can give them practical, easy to follow self care strategies that they will implement and see a benefit.

As someone is just beginning to step into a self care practice, I like to encourage small steps leading to successes and victories. No one is going to begin and successfully start with a 60 minute meditation! That's just too much of a stretch. Instead, set a more realistic goal - carve out 5 mins (or even just one minute) and focus on breath, the connection of air moving in and out of your nostrils. Set a timer so that you don't have to worry about time and close your door so that no one disturbs you. Focusing on both the inhale and exhale, feeling the air move both in and out of your nose, repeat several times. Once you have done a few rounds here, start to lengthen both your inhale and exhale. Be sure to schedule this into your day!

To assist someone in implementing a self-care plan, I'd recommend a multi-step approach. First, encourage them to create a tailored plan that aligns with their needs and preferences. Then, suggest they find an accountability partner or mentor to help keep them on track. To make self-care a regular habit, it's useful to schedule these activities in a diary, just like one would for annual leave, meetings, or birthdays. I would offer ongoing support through regular check-ins, share helpful resources, and assist in tweaking the plan as circumstances change. By putting it in the calendar, self-care becomes a prioritised commitment and is far more likely to be executed.

This is so important. As events in our lives, both personally and professionally, come up, we should encourage plasticity in our self-care plan and give ourselves GRACE. Further, taking time to reflect and reassess what's working and what's not working on a routine basis, can help us explore what we need in our self-care plan and what works best for us.

To assist someone in implementing a self-care plan, the starting point is to develop a tailored strategy that aligns with their individual needs. I would offer continuous support through regular check-ins and provision of useful resources. Acknowledging that the initial plan might not be perfect, I'd encourage them to be flexible and willing to adapt or revise their strategy as they go along. If they encounter difficulties or lose motivation, targeted guidance and words of encouragement can be highly effective. For those moments when giving up seems like the easier option, motivational videos, gratitude cards, or relevant books can be shared to help keep them focused and committed.

Self care is a buzz word that means so many different things to different people. Maybe it's meditation, but maybe it's getting a better pair of shoes so that you don't experience back pain. Maybe it is signing up for yoga classes or taking a day off work to reboot. The core of the process is tuning in and listening to your body. Spending time here and truly listening will help guide you to what you need in this moment. Make it fun. Make it part of your calendar so that you can get some additional wins in for the week. But, most importantly, make sure you make it realistic. Small shifts first, then growing and you will be amazed at how much can move in a relatively short period of time.