Self-Care & The 5 Minute Vacation

We hear self-care talked about a lot, but how can we practically practice it each day?

In today's conversation, I share a simple action that gives space for checking in with yourself, as well as taking care of you... even for just five minutes!

Transcript

Hey, friends, welcome back to another episode of this podcast. My name is Anna McGuire. And I'm so excited to have a conversation with you today about sowing intentionally into our lives so that we can reap abundantly in the days, weeks, months, and even years to come. We hear it talked about a lot in society, whether it is on social media or conversations that are being had at the coffee shop, we're hearing about this idea of self care. And here's the deal, I love self care, it is good to practice self care. You might say, Okay, what is self care? Well, to break it down to its simplest form, it's taking care of yourself. In this culture we live in it is so easy to take care of other people and to take care of tasks and work stuff. And in the meantime, we completely disregard taking care of us, ourselves, having self care, caring for self. And I love that the conversation is changing that. It's like, Hey, we've got to take care of ourselves. Like if we're going to take care of people, and we're going to take care of work, and we're going to be successful and whole beans. We've got to have self care. Like you can see this in Yes, science and psychology. But you also see this all throughout Scripture, Jesus, who is the king and the Savior of the world, he's in different moments of time throughout his story in the gospels, where he's tired, where he's been doing tons of ministry. And you see, what does he do? He retreats, he goes and finds a quiet place to pray to rest. Then you look also in the Old Testament, and one of the most famous prophets, he is in this place where he is tired and weary. And what does the angel the Lord, tell him to do? He tells him, go ahead and rest and have a snack. Take care of yourself. Not only that, but you see from the creation of the world when God created all of humanity. In six days on the seventh day, what is it say that he did he rested because of the work. And then when God gives the 10 commandments to Moses, what is one of those 10 commandments is to honor the Sabbath, which Sabbath is meant to be a day of rest self care, like it is not ungodly or unholy to take care of yourself. Actually, it is holy and godly, to have space to take care of you. And so I'd love to camp out on Sabbath right now. However, I'm not going to do that. I want this to be a really simple and short conversation on how you can take care of yourself in the midst of really full and busy days. Yes, I believe in having a Sabbath. Andrew and I we practice our Sabbath's from Friday evening, through Saturdays. And we love that that is our family time. Friday nights are like untouchable for our family. And if something does come up, we switch that because we have found just how important that time off is for us. With that being said, not talking about Sabbath. I'm talking about in the midst of full days. How do you take care of you? Well, this is one thing that I have found helpful for me. I like to call it my five minute vacation. Yes, that is what I call it. You might say Anna, where did you come up with that title? I don't know. And I don't know if I subconsciously learned this from somebody that I heard somebody mentioned it before. But honestly, I haven't learned this from anyone. I nobody taught me this. But this is something that I have found effective in my own life. And I call it my five minute vacation. So in the midst of really full days, I and I'm getting tired or weary, or I'm just sensing like I am out of rhythm with myself like I'm, I'm kind of becoming mindless instead of mindful, I begin to slow down I say Okay, it's time for a five minute vacation. Now this I don't see it as a form of escapism. Rather I see it as a place to check in with me, I don't check out I check in. So the five minute vacation. And this is how I do it in that moment. Whether it's I'm working on something like a project wise or real talk, I'm running around with a toddler and he is going you know, everywhere. 100 different directions. His energy is at 1000. I asked myself, if I had a five minute vacation, what would I do right now? And I answer that question. Sometimes it's as simple as Okay, brushing my teeth, like you know, it would just feel really good to brush my teeth right now. It's the middle of the day. Maybe that peppermint toothpaste will wake me up like, I'm going to get myself out and what I'm going to do during that five minute vacation is check in with myself Anna,
how are you doing? Like a good friend. You know, it's It feels so good when a good friend reaches out to you. And they're like, how are you doing Anna? It's like, oh my goodness, this person cares. And that's what I want to do for me is going little five minute vacations, do something that refreshes me and ask myself how I'm really doing. So, again, a lot of times, I'm brushing my teeth in the afternoons, you can ask Andrew, there are times he comes upstairs, he's like, and I'm brushing my teeth. He's like you going anywhere. And I'm like, Nope, just want a little break to brush my teeth. I love doing it. Another five minute vacation for me, is a quick walk around the block. Now that takes more like eight minutes, but you get the point, finding a time just to rest in the midst of a full day. And you might say, you know, I'm really busy. Well, that's why I call it a five minute vacation. I didn't say 50 or 55 or 105 minute vacation, a five minute vacation. Everyone can have five minutes in their day where they are doing something that is nourishing to themselves and checking in to see how am I really doing for you, maybe it's you're going to file your nails or paint your nails. Or it's going to be making a smoothie or making a really good cup of coffee. I don't know what that's like to make a good cup of coffee, never done it before my life because I don't drink coffee, but maybe for you is that you drink a really good cup of coffee. And it's not that you just do an action is that you're checking in with you. This is one of the downfalls of like social media culture, self care. It's like oh, like make a bubble bath and eat a bar of chocolate, which that's wonderful. However, part of caring for yourself is also checking in with you like having a conversation with yourself. So yes, take the bubble bath. If you want to eat the bar of chocolate with it, go right ahead. But it's asking yourself, How are you really doing? Let me check in I don't want to check out. I don't want to like escape from my reality. Instead, I want to check in with me and take care of me. And then as I answer that question of Anna, how are you really doing? Whatever answer I give to myself, I would respond to the answer just like a good friend would. Okay, Anna, you're tired. Okay, what needs to be adjusted today? Do you need to go to bed earlier? Do you need to put your phone down at an earlier time so that your eyes aren't as exhausted from looking at the screen? Like what? When you hear the answer yourself gives yourself gives you you give you maybe that's a better way to say it. You're going to respond like a good friend would. So today's conversation, really simple. How can you practice self care in a practical way? Today? The Five Minute vacation, doing something that you enjoy that's brief, and checking in with yourself. How am I doing? How are you really doing you can ask it in third person sometimes I like doing in third person. And uh, how are you really doing? Sometimes it feels good like to hear it come from like a third person in my mind. Five Minute vacations. So simple, so small, but has great, great, great benefits of, you're taking care of you. You're listening to you, you're checking in with you and you're doing something refreshing that complements that friend, know that I am always in your corner and forever cheering you on. And I really do believe that as you choose to so intentionally of taking care of you of practicing self care that you will reap abundantly in the areas of mindfulness and feeling rested, recharged and clear on your purpose. I love you so much friend, then I can't wait to talk to you next week.