How to create your own self care sanctuary
Turn overwhelm into calm with a safe space to call your own
What is self care? Self care includes all the things you need to do for yourself to stay well; physically, mentally and emotionally. Research shows that when we take care of ourselves, we are more resilient to life challenges and stressful situations.
When you’re feeling more overwhelmed and stressed than calm and peaceful, it’s time to take better care of yourself.
Self care isn’t selfish or indulgent; it’s absolutely essential for good mental health.
What is a self care sanctuary? It’s really just a place filled with an energy that helps you feel comfortable and at ease. This can include some of your favourite things, scents, colours, and textures.
One of the very first crucial steps in caring for yourself, including feeling calmer and less overwhelmed, is to feel safe in your surroundings, in your relationships, and with yourself.
How does a safe self care sanctuary support the feelings you are trying to create (i.e., more peace and calm, less stress and overwhelm)?
Self care in your surroundings includes living in a place that feels safe and secure. You can take this even further and create a space within your home that is just for you. It can be an entire room, or just a corner of a room.
Some people like to call this a sanctuary or a sacred space. It may be where you have your yoga mat ready for a practice or a reading nook. It could be a comfy chair with a t.v./computer or an entire room with everything you love.
It’s entirely up to you; there are no rules and we’re all different. The key is that you feel safe and comfortable there.
While I’m fortunate to feel safe in all the rooms in my home, my personal safe space and self care sanctuary, and the place where I feel the calmest, is a room in our home where I have all my favourite books, candles, my yoga mat, a comfortable couch and a writing/computer desk. I spend a lot of time there. It’s where I work, exercise, read, and completely relax. It’s decorated in soft colours and I feel soothed as soon as I walk through the doorway.
We are nourished when we enter environments that feel safe and feel like home. Our environment can affect our nervous system, and a calm, soothing and safe environment will vastly improve mental health and wellbeing. It’s from here where we most often connect with our true selves and we feel safe to create our goals and dreams.
I invite you to think of a place in your home that you already consider to be a self care sanctuary, or one that has the potential to become that place. Look around you and notice everything that’s in the space. (If you don’t currently have such a space, then this is your opportunity to create one!). Look at the colours, shapes, and actual items that are there. Take note of your entire surroundings and then ask yourself the following questions:
Is it crowded or spacious?
How do you feel when you look around your space ( i.e., Do you feel calm and relaxed or overwhelmed and restless?)
Identify exactly what is calming and what is stressful about your space.
How comfortable are you in this space?
What objects in this space call out to you?
Are there any changes you’d like to make?
Is there anything you’d like to add or remove?
Write a description of your ideal self care sanctuary in your journal. What do you love about it? What do you not love about it? Use this information to make any changes or adjustments.
If you want to make changes, then my suggestion is to make a self care sanctuary dream board by cutting out pictures from magazines or going online to find some to print. Get colour swatches or draw some pictures. Let your imagination go free.
Your self care sanctuary doesn’t have to be a big space, just as long as it’s your space.
Our safe self care spaces create a feeling of abundance and balance. That doesn’t mean there are lots of “things”, it simply means we feel like we have everything we need when we’re there. These spaces allow us to dream of possibilities and create fertile ground for our imaginations and plans for the future.
It’s the space where your true self is expressed, and it’s the space where you’ll find peace.
When you start caring for yourself by creating safe surroundings, including a self care sanctuary where you can be who you really are, you’ll set the foundations for creating stronger, more positive relationships in the rest of your life as well.
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I’d love to hear from you so please send any comments or questions to me at sharon@sharonashtoncoaching.com. Feel free to share this email with anyone else who may be interested.
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