Your Most Important Investment Is…
Hello there.
It’s been a while since my last visit here. The demands of my new career have kept me pretty busy the last few months. I’ve never had a career make, break, and shake me like this one has. Granted it’s only my second career, but wowza. Real Estate is a whole new beast.
I am not the same person that posted back in May. No. Every day, I am being pulled into a new paradigm. I am forming into a new way of being. I am learning how to truly integrate the holistic and self care practices I learned from my previous 10 year career into this new one. My former beliefs about myself have been challenged and tested to the highest degree and it’s just getting started.
Here’s 3 things I’ve learned the last three months that’s helped me through some of my biggest hurdles:
#1. SELF CARE before anything else.
We’ve heard this a thousand times, but there’s mega truth in it. There were several times with this new career that I was responding to emails and text messages minutes after waking up. When I started, I felt like I was behind on everything. I would wake up in a panic every morning (still do, but it’s getting better) and the first thing I’d do is get to work. I would not have even had my first sip of water yet. Then I’d continue in my day, feeling pulled/pushed/and jolted every where I went. My days felt highjacked and by the evening time I was so fried and overwhelmed that I’d shut down and complete my day feeling burnt out and defeated. This was not my norm, I knew it wasn’t supporting me, but I was in survival mode and when we are in survival mode, we don’t see it until we take a step back.
Now, I wake a little earlier. I drink my water first thing, avoid my phone for at least 15-30 minutes after waking, and talk soothingly to my anxious nervous system as I start the day. I move my body daily, I strength train at 2-3x a week and prioritize healthy nutrition.
It’s easy to lose track of our self care regimens when we’re embarking on something new. It’s important to give ourselves grace during the process.
#2. MOVEMENT IS LIFE
Have you ever caught yourself spending the entire day at your computer or sitting/standing in the exact same place for extended hours of the day/night? Then you get up to move and you’re whole body has to oil it’s self like the tin man to get yourself going? Or You’ve spent hours being crammed with information and by the end of it all your brain is so fried that you feel lifeless? If you haven’t, you’re probably lying, but if you’re not… good for you!
However, I found myself in those scenarios a lot when I started this career and movement brought me back to life every time! As we know, exercise encourages stronger blood flow, increases the heart rate (depending on the exercise) and inspires the body to take deeper/ fuller breaths to push all of that blood flow and keep up with that beating heart. It doesn’t matter if it is the beginning of my day or the ending, movement is gonna happen. It helps me get out of my head and let’s me focus on something other than work. Although I like challenging myself and testing my strengths, these workouts are simply to get back into my body and can be as easy as I want them to be. If I don’t have time to go somewhere to exercise, maybe I’ll put on a song I like to dance to at home or go on a walk in my neighborhood, ANYTHING, to get of my work brain and into my fun body.
#3. PRIORITIZE SOCIAL & REST TIME ON YOUR CALENDAR
Why on earth would someone need to schedule time with their friends, or time to sleep on their calendar? Isn’t that something we all want to do? DUH, but something I was prone to doing was filling my calendar with so much work that I had no time to rest or mingle! I am naturally an introverted person, and can EASILY talk myself out of meeting my friends somewhere. However, we humans are biologically social and NEED time with other humans to survive. All work and no play makes me a dull girl… and it surely does. I had to break out of my old routine. So often at the end of my work day do I want to go home and retreat to my bed. What kind of life is that? Retreating to my bed wasn’t resting either. When I starting setting time aside for a night time wind down routine, that changed the game for me.
When we don’t prioritize our social time and sleep then we will find ourselves filling it with responsibilities, work, and routine. Then we wonder why we feel so burnt out and lonely. We’re depressed because we aren’t meeting our biological needs, and only meeting societal needs… without our health we have nothing else.
Without my health, I have nothing else. No job, relationship or friendships can sustain me if I don’t put myself and my health care needs first.
So that’s my most recent update. I’m incredibly grateful to have this page and to share my inner thoughts with those willing to read them. I hope this post is resourceful for those that read it, and may it serve as your reminder that you’re number one and your most important investment is YOU.
Have a beautiful day!
Love,
Kala
