On course for self-care By Ann Elliott

In January this year I found myself feeling very low – for no apparent reason. From a logical and rational perspective, all was well after a pretty traumatic year from a business point of view.

 As a family, we were all healthy, including my 91-year-old dad living on his own in Yorkshire. The children (28 and 29 so hardly youngsters) were fine and I felt exceptionally lucky at being able to spend so much more time with them than normal. I had a number of non-executive roles I really enjoyed, I had lots of project work and was about to launch Luminary to help clients find talented freelancers for their own projects. I had a group of loyal, close and fantastic friends, a happy 33-year-long marriage and a house I love. Oh, and of course, the inevitable, I had bought Nell, a lockdown puppy, who brought much joy and laughter into our home.

 There was absolutely no reason not to feel happy. Of course, the third lockdown had just started, our Airbnb was still closed with opening looking quite a way off and I missed the camaraderie of working with my own team but really that wasn’t enough to explain the lethargy, desolation and unhappiness I felt. I gave myself a right royal talking too as I was marching across field after field with Nell running to catch up with me (or away from me, chasing anything that moved).

 I wrote lists of what I had to be grateful for. I thanked the universe at night for everything that I should have felt thankful for, adopted Dry January (for the seventh time, having failed to finish it every single year), read lots of articles on lethargy and told myself, rather angrily, to just get over myself and stop being so selfish.

 In the past, whenever I had felt like this, telling myself to think about others rather than being obsessed with how I felt, had worked. Focusing on helping others feel better really had made a positive difference to my mental attitude. It did not work this time. I didn’t talk to others about it. I have friends who do have real mental health issues whereas, I argued, I just felt fed up and sorry for myself. I just had to pull myself together and not load other people with negativity. Who wants friends who are depressed and always bleating on about themselves?

 The breakthrough came on a UKHospitality call that Tea Colaianni, founder and chair of WiHTL (Women in Hospitality, Travel and Tourism) was also on. She mentioned a course called Selfless Self-Care, which had made a huge difference to her. It seems Tea had experienced some of the same feelings as me and this course had helped her regain energy and sparkle – she said she felt great to be herself again.

 I signed up for the three weeks of self-care. I didn’t resume drinking at the end of Dry January. I gave up sugar, dairy and gluten, exercised more and slept better. For goodness sake, I read these things all the time. I know what to do and I could write the book. I could have done all the elements of this on my own and really didn’t need someone to advise me what to do. It seems that I did.

I suppose what this (and I am sure there are many other similar courses like this out there) gave me back was a sense of control over my life. I couldn’t make one of the course’s Zoom calls because I allowed another call to overrun. I told the coach I couldn’t make it. “Every decision is yours to make,” she said in response. That has had a profound impact on how I now choose what to do and what not to do. On what to think and what not to think.

If I am honest there are still days that aren’t great but when I really think about them it’s because I have failed to care for myself. Just as you are meant to do in an airplane disaster, I haven’t put my own breathing mask on first. How I start the day is how usually how I end the day. If I can’t be bothered to exercise or eat well to start with, the rest of the day goes to hell. There’s much I cannot control or change – the only thing I can change is how I think and how I react. I’m still a work in progress I would say.

Ann Elliott is a hospitality strategist, connector and adviser