Ep 44 Is Self-Care Just a Buzzword

Our culture is always talking about self-care, and so today we ask: Can the contemplative life help me with this?

Many of us are so easily plagued with self-doubt: Am I doing enough? Am I doing it right? Is this the meaningful life I was hoping for? And so today we take a moment to talk about the tell-tale signs of needing a little self-love. We talk about how to practically engage without dysregulating the rest of our lives. And we land on some really good news: We don’t have to practice self-care perfectly in order to get the benefits from it. So take a deep breath…we’ll wait…and join us for the conversation. 

Additional Resources

Book: A House with Four Rooms by Rumer Godden
Song: Weaving Our Lives by Alexa Sunshine Rose
Song: Long Time Sun by Snatam Kuar
Song: Meditation on Breathing by Sarah Dan Jones

#RumerGodden
#Self-Care
#HeadSpace
#Contemplative

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Transcript

Ep 44  Is Self Care Just A Buzzword

SUMMARY KEYWORDS
self care, headspace, Rumer Godden

Dominic Kaiser  00:06

Welcome to The Contemplative Life: Three pastors, friends and spiritual companions help us explore spirituality through a contemplative lens.

I'm Christina Roberts.
I'm Chris Roberts.
I'm Kristina Kaiser. We're glad you joined us. 

Christina Roberts  00:23

Hello, it's great to be with you. Today we are going to be talking about self-care. Is self-care, just a buzzword?  I think it's all over the place, right, that we need to take care of ourselves. Self-care is not the same as selfishness. There's the classic, "When you're on the airplane, put the oxygen mask on you first so that you can put the oxygen mask on the others".  So I think our culture really talks a lot about self-care. But in what ways is the contemplative life and contemplative practice really helped to foster this idea of self-care? So today, we're going to be talking about self-care. Who wants to start us off?

Kristina Kaiser  01:01

I am thankful that we are talking about self-care, because this has been a lifelong journey.  I think, at this point, and trying to figure out, Okay, what does it look like to really invest in all of this?  Even recently, I was talking to someone about how I've been trying to settle more quickly, emotionally, right. To be able to say, Oh, this is hard, and that's okay. And breathe through it and watch the emotion fall away. And the woman I was talking to is like, And what about like taking a bath? And I have frequently, just stared longingly at the bath and thought, Wouldn't that be nice?  And then I just keep going, I don't actually do it. And so as much as I have spent time thinking about self-care and trying to do self-care, it is still this ongoing process of, if you have an urge to take a bath, maybe there's something meaningful there.

Christina Roberts  02:00

Kristina, I appreciate what you are saying.  It actually reminds me of a quote by Rumor Godden.  He wrote a book called ``House with Four Rooms, which I have not read. But this quote is really meaningful. He says, “Everyone is a house with four rooms, a physical, a mental, and emotional, and spiritual. Most of us tend to live in one room most of the time. But unless we go into every room every day, even if only to keep it aired, we are not a complete person.” And I just find such wisdom in that.  There are these different components of our self-care, right? The physical, the mental, the emotional, the spiritual. And I think he's right, we do tend to camp out in one or two of the rooms. And even if only to air the rooms out, it's necessary to visit every day. So I appreciate what you're saying about what you're walking through in your journey.

Chris Roberts  02:49

Yeah, I like that image of the four rooms. I think for me, whenever I think about personal self-care, I think, you know, how do I get in a good headspace? For me, being in a good headspace is very important to self-care, I can tell whenever things are getting out of control. Particularly at nighttime, whenever I do the “wind down” with the kids, you know, get your lunch ready for tomorrow, get your outfits…Whenever they're not listening and I find that they're just, not listening to me, I’m not in a good headspace. Whenever I start barking orders at them, I see this tension rise up in me. And so, I noticed that I need to take a breath, take a minute, maybe a pause from my situation to get in a good headspace. So I can then go back to functioning within the family dynamics. But I like what you're saying about physical, emotional and spiritual as well. And so I'd like to give more thought to that as we as we think about self care.

Christina Roberts  04:01

Yeah. And I think you're bringing up another good point, Chris.  I think each of us have signs in our lives that we are lacking in self-care, right? Whether it's irritability, or distractibility at work, or maybe we have physical ailments, and our body is telling us that we need to pay more attention. Maybe it's lack of joy, boredom, whatever it is, I think sometimes there's these signs saying, hey, we need to pay attention. And there's some rooms that have been neglected here. And it's an invitation to us and we can continue to ignore and keep pressing on. 

You know, I do think that there is a misconception that self-care is selfishness or that somehow we have to press through to be noble and in service to God and others. We have to just keep going. And certainly, there are times when we do maybe have to set some things aside but only if we're returning back and tending to them. Otherwise, you know, it's not sustainable. We can't keep going on and I think we all intuitively know that and sometimes our bodies, mind & spirits are loudly speaking that to us in various ways.

Kristina Kaiser  04:57

And maybe you guys have heard this or not, but I feel like someone once said something to me around these physical, mental, emotional, spiritual things. Sometimes even if one of those is in deficit, giving credence to another side of that will actually fill the tank all the way around. So, you know, maybe I need to just laugh, right? Find something. Or if it's like relational tension in the house, maybe we all just need to laugh together, we always need to be together, or not, right?  But somehow this was huge in my spirit, a little bit. Maybe even I don't have to do it perfectly. I don't have to figure out which one of these four is the emptiest and then fill it. But just giving attention at all, was going to be a meaningful experience, which I just found to be a sigh of relief.

Christina Roberts  05:47

Yeah, I like that too. And especially the part about even if only to keep it aired. And so maybe my physical condition today is that I'm choosing a salad, I don't have time to go work out. I'm not going on a bike ride or something. But I'm nourishing my body with a good salad today. And that's enough, or I took a vitamin. Or maybe I'm listening to a podcast and I'm stretching my mind mentally, I'm feeding myself. So it doesn't have to be, sometimes to your point Kristina, we think that we have to have these grandiose things and what room is empty? And how do I like completely furnishing that room, as opposed to just cracking the window open a little bit to acknowledge you are there. And this is all that I have for right now.

Chris Roberts  06:22

Yeah. I find I'm drawn to, you know, self-care around spirituality, or, you know, the spiritual realm. And one of the things that I have run up against lately is people finding the need to do more as a way to feel fulfilled in their spiritual lives. And, in talking with these individuals, it's like, no, I don't, you don't need to do more, you actually need to do less. And so I think people think working for God or serving in this capacity is going to fill their spiritual tank. And one of the things that I want to challenge them with is, why don't you just take a step back instead of feeling like you have to do more? Why don't you just take time to just read a book or go on a walk or do something that isn't about serving other people?  It’s more about taking time to connect with God, yourself. I think pastors fall into this category of: if I just do more, that I'll be fulfilled spiritually. And I think pastors probably pray less than most people in the world. They don't spend as much time praying, and I know that's not true for every pastor or every priest. What does it look like to fill that room? The spiritual room with self-care is something that I've been giving a lot of thought to.

 Christina Roberts  07:50

Yeah, I was actually in a seminar recently and we were talking about ethics around spiritual guidance. And it was sort of broad with, you know, spiritual directors, counselors, etc. And actually, self-care was one of the ethics. So we're talking about things like confidentiality, mandated reporting and self-care. They were saying, this is an ethical responsibility to care for ourselves, if we're in the helping professions, I think medical professions as well. Because otherwise, not only are we not showing up, well, we could actually potentially do harm to people, although we are not intending that. And so I think that that was just a real shift for me of yes, definitely not about selfishness, but even sort of the ethics principle around that was really striking to me.

Kristina Kaiser  08:33

I think while that has been such a huge focus, so just to pause on that for a second say, Yes, really spending time here. And I'm harkening back, even to a moment where we're talking about like, maybe I just have a salad or, like, I just have time to read a little bit. This notion of a few pauses throughout the day seems useful, as opposed to oh, I have one day once a month, and I just, like, take it as much as I possibly can. And then I try to ride it. It seems like the general wisdom is a few pauses for something meaningful. So if that looks like oh, I've got this, I have a daily meditation that I get via email. I love reading that it means a lot to me. I try to get to it first thing in the morning.  If I can't, I try to get to it at lunch, you know, but these little moments to pause and I'm not so good at it. I've even considered putting on a timer but I've even wondered if that will work because I think I'll just blow right through it for the sake of work. Like I'm such a results-driven individual, that it takes a lot.  So it's really helpful when I have people say to me directly, This is part of your responsibility.  So it grabs me and keeps me.  It’s not just about serving everybody else all the time, because I do go to that space so easily. As I've even reflected more on self-compassion, I realized I really burned through, May I be well. Yes, of course, and then I try to get to everybody else as quickly as I can. There's always so much that I'm thinking about and I want to make sure that I do well for those people. So this business of several pauses a day is inspiring to me.

Christina Roberts  10:18

I think sometimes a barrier to self-care is maybe a feeling of guilt, like we're not doing enough.  Chris, to your point and Kristina, just what you're mentioning here as well. And I think, Gosh, what a false narrative that I think our culture has fed us, of not doing enough, as opposed to the “being” space. And, you know, there's so many invitations within Jesus's life.  I just think of that simple, Consider the lilies of the field, Look at the birds of the air.  That's very simple. Considering a flower or a bird is a very simple thing that Jesus is inviting us to do. But I think somehow, if you're sitting on a bench looking at a bird, that doesn't feel enough, right?  We should be reading Philippians, or praying for Afghanistan refugees, or whatever it is.  But Jesus invites us to these very simple acts that I'm hoping that we can continue to grow in moving past some of those guilty feelings into.  That there's something beautiful and sacred about this.

Chris Roberts  11:16

Yeah, and I think one of the things that seems to be highlighted here is the, you know, the utilitarianism that our country is.  That's our creed, that's what we live by: Work more, do more. And if a person is working hard, doing a lot in life, that's a happier life.  They're going to get more financially, they're going to get more done building careers, they're going to get done building a legacy, all that type of stuff.  There's not a whole lot of emphasis placed on just taking strolls or doing nothing. I think doing nothing actually is doing something. It's nurturing this part of ourselves that is unseen, right. And so, because we're so results oriented, you know, like, we want to check off the list, we want to see these accomplishments happen. And there's nothing wrong with that in balance. But I think we diminish the value of just being, of just doing nothing. And it has a very low value in our society. And so I like talking about this, because I think if we could talk about just doing nothing, that's a good thing.  To do nothing, it is actually doing something that is unseen in us.

Christina Roberts  12:33

That reminds me of a spiritual mentor years ago who had this teaching around some of these spiritual rhythms. And he used to work in a factory. And they somehow had to assemble these different boxes. And so he was younger, and it was like, how many boxes can we do?  And so they had a lunch buzzer that rang to indicate, Okay, it's time for the lunch break.  Everybody would stop the assembly line to go to the break room. And so one day, the bell rang, and he's like, Oh, I can squeeze in one more box. And he just felt this nudge from God: That’s enough, put the box down, go take your lunch break. And it was this moment for him of I could squeeze in one more box, but it's time for lunch right now and so I'm going to stop. That kind of took him on this whole journey of what does it mean to have those boundaries and to do the self care and to stop the productivity to go be relational with his co-worker and have a sandwich? So yeah, I agree with what you're saying, Chris. I think that's super important. 

Well, thanks for such a generative conversation today.

Now we are going to transition to the part of our podcast where we talk about what we are into this week.

Kristina Kaiser  13:42

So I have been into songs of blessing, which is a funny thing. But I've run into a few of these “may the” type songs and they're really just sung prayers that are offering a blessing. I find myself humming them everywhere I go and turning them on in the car and teaching them to my children. They've kind of got a folk song feel to them. And I think that helps everybody be able to sing a little bit, so the kids have been able to get into it. And it just fills my spirits. That is what I'm into lately.

Christina Roberts  14:17

Nice. We'll have to share some of those, Kristina.

Chris Roberts  14:20

I found our pumpkin carving kits in our garage and I am mentally thinking about carving pumpkins. I want to physically be into carving pumpkins and thinking about templates that the kids can print out to sort of stencil out these pumpkins.  So I am into pumpkin carving.

Christina Roberts  14:45

Well, I am into something that I feel almost embarrassed to admit because the bandwagon of this was a year and a half ago. But I'm into sourdough whole wheat bread.  I know all during the beginning of the pandemic there was all the rage about sourdough and I was not into it. Then I found like this yummy, delicious sourdough whole wheat bread at the co op. I think one of the episodes I talked about whole grains that I was into and just loving it. So I get excited when it's time for my toast and tea. So that is what I am into this week. 

Well, thanks so much for joining us today. If you are looking to go deeper in your spiritual journey, we invite you to check out the spiritual direction page on our website, which includes even more practical information about spiritual direction and companioning. And also while you're there, feel free to subscribe to our newsletter that comes out twice a month with little helpful tips and nuggets about contemplative life. Until then make it a great week.