Saturday 7 February 2009

secret No. 5 - committing to self-focus


i am participating in the next chapter group, reading 12 secrets of highly creative women

a yoga practice is something that is important to my self care and i give it priority. my family know that it is my time to re-charge my body & mind and nourish myself spiritually and they respect this. i respect myself by taking this time every day. i once 'crashed & burned' after a period of putting everything/everyone else first and i can't let it happen again. if i care for myself first, everything is better. to make it happen, i need to manage my time well.

i am inspired by people such as scientist & plastic surgeon dr fiona wood, who was our 'australian of the year' a few years back. not an artist, but highly creative. she has six wonderful children, goes to the gym every day (fiona says she would not be able to do what she does without maintaining a degree of fitness), makes her children’s lunches, takes them to swimming practice before breakfast, takes them to & from school, later drops into the hospital to perform a couple of surgical operations and amongst all this managed to invent ‘spray on skin’ for burns victims (developed post bali bombings). yes, she is brilliant, talented & focused, but success would not be possible unless she organised time to nurture herself first.
it IS possible for each of us to somehow find blocks of time, no matter how small, to focus on listening to our own body, mind & soul and no-one should feel guilty for doing it.

8 comments:

  1. finding blocks of time to listen to our bodies - this is beautifully worded - just yesterday I joined a gym, I hate working out in gyms but I need to get this body moving more and the discipline was just not coming on it's own. and as I walked on the treadmill and lifted those weights, I felt the energy and power in my body coming back - I also will do some yoga classes. It's so hard to make our bodies part of the to do list with so many other things to take care of (3 kids, work, house, etc.) but it is so necessary! thanks for your insight.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I envy her energy, Patti. I know what your yoga practice means to you...I look forward to getting back into yoga (to complement gyrotonics) when I'm feeling better (I'm looking at late spring/ early summer). My yoga teacher will be on school break from nursing school and will be teaching again then.

    Self-focus looks different for each person. I agree with you that no one should feel guilty. To do this, we must be very counter-cultural, and in many cases, break years of conditioning, but it is worth it.

    Namaste,

    O

    ReplyDelete
  3. Thank you for this affirming message. I am so glad I listened to my little voice inside and guarded my ME time, though not without a period of feeling guilty about it.

    ReplyDelete
  4. I totally agree with you. If we take care of ourselves and our needs first, we will have more energy to take care of others.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Ohhh, I like this. I needed to read this.
    Dr. Fiona Wood completely and totally ROCKS!!
    It's true...I think we can be so much more efficient with a bit of attention paid to ourselves.

    Great post! (and of course you rock too!)
    xo

    ReplyDelete
  6. Wow, that surgeon sounds amazing. How does she do it all? Seriously that's some crazy organization skill.

    I love Aristotle's quote at the top that says, "excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit."

    Nice post.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Great post. I always say that it is when we give to ourselves first that we can give more to others.

    We are the No. 1 on our lists!

    Have to check out Dr Fiona Wood.

    ReplyDelete
  8. I so agree. If we cannot take care of ourselves, how can we enjoy life and take care of others? Lovely post!

    ReplyDelete

please share a thought......