“Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, it is an act of political warfare.”
-Audre Lorde
As a student at Ryerson who is also employed at the University, I have the opportunity to not only have a steady source of income and a reliable job, but also learn how to live life more effectively as well. Every summer, students employed at by university student services take part in S2S (Students to Staff) training to meet one another and to form a sense of community on campus, as well as to benefit from the wealth of knowledge that student services staff have at their disposal.
On Friday, July 13, Ruth Koleszar-Green, the Academic Support for Aboriginal Student Services at Ryerson, facilitated an excellent training on the subject of self-care. Self-care is exactly what you might think it is- the act of personally maintaining or restoring yourself. The act of self-care can be as simple as carrying out a deep-breathing exercise (a practice proven time and time again to slow the body’s systems down) or it might be something more ongoing- something that you do for you, to ensure that you can be your best self.
Ruth compared the practice of self-care to the Cree medicine wheel (displayed below). The medicine wheel is a circle separated into four quadrants, with each quarter representing a different and vital part of being human. The white segment represents spirituality, the yellow, physical health, the red, mental health, and the black, our emotions. The medicine wheel is meant to display that, in order to maintain proper self-care, one must care for their whole self and ensure that each piece of the medicine wheel is well cared for. If you lack in one segment, the other segments will suffer as well. For example, if I lack in the physical quadrant by depriving myself of sleep, my mental health will suffer as well because I will be less able to deal with the anxiety and workload of my school.
Following the guidelines of the medicine wheel for the maintenance of proper self-care is straightforward and makes perfect sense. It becomes important, even in our hectic schedules, to make sure you have time to be healthy, decompress, and generally do something that you find enjoyable. At our Student to Staff training most of the student staff present had something that they did in order to maintain good mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual health. Some people performed simple tasks, like ensuring that they never checked their emails on weekends, while others preferred to channel their energy into physical activities such as running. I make time to do art, whether it is painting or drawing, art is something I have always enjoyed and the act is extremely therapeutic for me and promotes my own self-care. Others still, found that cooking up a storm in the kitchen or losing themselves in a book or taking their dog for a walk was what promoted their own health in some aspect, therefore making sure that all aspects of their own personal medicine wheel were well cared for. Self-care is something we can’t take for granted, after all, we’re the only self we’ve got, and how are we to lend helping hands to others if we don’t lend one to ourselves. So evaluate your self-care today, find out what’s lacking, take a walk, create, do anything that will improve your outlook on life and improve your physical, spiritual, emotional, and mental health! Remember, self-care isn’t indulgent, it’s necessary and it just makes sense!
What are some things that you could do to improve on YOUR self-care?
What are some things you already do?
