Self-care Results

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Hey gang 🙂 Travelling at the moment and can’t sleep so extra time for postings 🙂

You probably see regular articles providing tips and key things to focus on for your mental health and general well-being. I wanted to share some actual results (my results) from the past 4 weeks having taken a fresh focus on sleep, eating better, exercising and managing stress/energy. I wanted to share it as actual evidence it can be done and you can see benefits 🙂

The flood of information hitting your insta feeds each day come at this from a range of angles depending on their focus on general wellness, mental health improvement or even broader happiness and life satisfaction. I think in general though if you are looking at anything from improving how your feeling day on day, to seeking ultimate physical and mental well-being then topics such as self-care and mental health tips all land in the same rough area and would be useful. From managing things like stress, depression and anxiety all the way into finding great careers and relationships. For me it is just where you want to focus, but there are a few common elements; eating well, sleep, exercise and stress management. Here are two examples…

So let me share what I have managed over the past few weeks.. actual data. The top line is my average stress levels for the day. And the bottom two are example days – the grey blue background fill is my energy levels, blue columns are low stress recovery and orange is high stress draining time 🙂

So you can see in the image on the right with lots of yellow columns I didn’t come into the day very well recharged and stressful activities started at 7am without any down time, by lunch I was toast. On the left other side, I set myself to start the day well with good sleep and perhaps a less stressful day before, I had a much better balance of stress and recharge which resulted in keeping relatively high energy levels till mid arvo, but good enough to recover well and setup for another good day.

I chose these two bits of data to show that overall I continue to reduce my daily stress levels which translates to more energy, better coping ability, better interactions, and more determination to stick to the healthier habits. The bottom two ‘typical days’ highlights that with some increased awareness on what causes me stress and where I sit in balance has helped me both manage it and make decisions to keep it in balance.

Now I still eat pizza and a few drinks with people, so this hasn’t been achieved by some massive lifestyle change. I aim to hit normal 8hrs sleep, daily normal step counts, squeeze in some more exercise than usual, make better food choices on average, and find activities and ways to recharge 🙂

I hope this helps and provides some motivation!!!

As always, with warm regards

Jason