Self Care, an anytime and everyday commitment to yourself.

Today I am sitting at a cute little Coffee place in the Davenport/Junction neighbourhood, the place is called M, yes it is a simple name. Sitting here is such a treat for me, an hour of childless responsibilities, an hour only for Me! and indeed feels like an special event! LOL.  It seems like these days it can get very tricky to find space to sit quietly just enjoying a nice cup of tea, listening to jazzy music and doing .... well something I like just for me, so I'm very appreciative right now of the fact that I'm taking some time away from home for what I call well deserved Self Care.  Lately I've been attending a group of Moms where we casually talk about all things children and motherhood, and I realize that one of the common topics around our conversations has been self care and how to create space for it in our busy lives with one or more children under our full or part time care. I have reflected on this and I feel that even though the days go by so fast and my schedule remains quite busy and keeps adding up, I do my best to keep myself on track and perform some self care rituals here and there everyday. From taking care of my body through healthy eating habits, resting the most I can and grooming myself to keep my self love up to date, to keeping my mind, soul and emotions in balance thought staying consciously in touch with them, listening to empowering podcasts, nurturing gratitude, compassion and appreciation in all my interactions, especially with myself; I find that self care could be a practice that can be done at anytime and everyday. It just takes a committed attitude to actually make it happen. 

I have recently found between a pile of documents a nice sheet of paper that says "50 ways to take a break", yes it has been a great reminder that taking a break is taking care of yourself and it can be as simple as taking a deep, slow breath, never mind giving yourself permission to find a babysitter to go out and take an actually childless break. Tricky for most moms I get that. 

Here is a picture of the most welcomed reminder.

Now this is the invitation, pick one and do it today....

Well, going back to my moms group on Wednesdays, I just recently had the opportunity to facilitate a workshop on Aromatherapy and its benefits for self care, it was such an event for me since I don't get many chances to do professional work lately outside of being a full time mom, so it was such a great break for me, from getting everything ready for it to delivering it and getting so much positive feedback about it from my fellow mom friends. 

Aromatherapy can be a great tool for quick, practical, everyday self care for everybody in the family, I love it! It can be used in an aromatic salts bath, in an indoors aromatic diffuser to change the atmosphere of your home, workplace or otherwise, in a nurturing and pampering body oil, body lotion or body mist. There are so many ways we can benefit from the botanical gifts of nature which are aromatherapy essential oils. Having said that I most share that I'm very excited because I will be facilitating another aromatherapy workshop and self care talk to moms on a different group on Friday December 4th. I have been invited to do so by my good friend Pilar Gonzalez, Project Coordinator at Teach2Learn, a non for profit organization that supports parents with academic tutoring for youth and school aged children. She has done such a great job working with the Toronto Hispanic community helping parents keep their children at school, preventing them from dropping off and improving their grades by getting parents involved in homework at the home level. I'm so happy she has approached me for this because she understands that in order for parents to be a good help to their children and youth in the challenging job of school commitments, they also have to address their own personal needs of good self care. 

Pilar and myself have worked together in the past in the realization of the Holistic Health Fair Second Edition in 2013 at Metro Hall here in Toronto. We created a community oriented event where many Holistic Health Professionals, Therapists and vendors got together to show and share their services, products and support to the general public. Many families enjoyed a really nice evening of talks, demos, performance, market place and lots of fun. Pilar and I have also collaborated in other projects were arts, self knowledge and awareness and community development were the main objective. I have always enjoyed her company as a friend and professional partner. I trust that more of these opportunities to share our ideas, tools and expertise will be opening in the future for other professionals, other moms and myself; and yes indeed I'm so looking forward to it! 

For more information on how to use Aromatherapy for self care please refer to your local public library, use the internet and google Aromatherapy benefits and methods or simply send me a line, I'll be happy to share in a casual talk what I know about it. And please don't forget to Take a Break!

Love and Namaste,

Tania Borja

borjatania@yahoo.ca

lunaehealingarts@gmail.com