Self-care doesn't have to be expensive
This is more of a reminder for myself. I used to think self-care meant spa days, luxurious vacations, and expensive indulgences. Truth be told, these still sound like delicious ways to treat myself.
But in recent years, I’ve noticed that many of the practices I’ve integrated into my life are simple, low-cost forms of self-care. Rather than relying on an exclamation point of pleasure, these practices are more subtle, providing me with a consistent level of groundedness that’s been so good for my physical, mental, and emotional health.
Here are my favourite low-cost self-care practices.
Sleep. The foundation of my self-care routine is getting enough sleep. I try to go to bed and wake up at around the same time every day. If all goes as planned, I get around 7 hours of sleep, even after taking into consideration the amount of time it takes me to fall asleep. I currently feel at my best when I get 7.5 hours of sleep so I take a power nap of 20–30 minutes on most afternoons.
Sleep not only improves my physical health by allowing my body to rest and restore, it’s also so beneficial for my mental and emotional health. I feel more inspired, motivated, optimistic, and resilient when I get enough sleep.
Taking care of my body. There are many ways to do this, and my focus is mainly on skincare and oral hygiene.
I have a self-compassionate evening skincare routine that helps me to simply witness my aging skin without feeling like I should change it (my Now page has more about my facial skincare routine and the products I use).
In terms of my oral hygiene routine, I upleveled this when I had Invisalign and the new habits stuck. I’ll do a separate blog post or video on that soon.
Hydration. There’s some debate about whether tea and coffee count toward overall hydration, but I enjoy multiple 16-oz mugs of tea or herbal infusions throughout the day and I usually feel very well hydrated.
When I have a hot drink beside me, I can also feel myself relaxing into what I’m doing, whether that be working, reading, or watching TV.
Moving my body. While I’m not a fan of going to the gym, I looove my daily walks — 10K steps is the number that works for me, even though recent research indicates that similar benefits can be achieved with 7–8K steps.
In addition to my daily walk, I try to move my body regularly throughout the day — getting up to stretch, dance, or do a little weight training when I have more energy.
Listening to my body in terms of food. I used to carry a lot of “shoulds” around food, which meant I tried to cut out snacks I loved, like chips, cookies, and chocolate bars. I realized I didn’t want to feel guilt and shame around food, and I started loosening my restrictions.
Now, I listen to my body and trust her to tell me what would be most nourishing in each moment. Sometimes I want pizza, fries, or cereal. Sometimes I want a salad, an apple, or soup. It’s all food, it’s all delicious, and it’s all fine.
Morning pages. I’ve written a lot about this so I’ll just leave a couple links here and here.
Daily reflection practice. I started a daily reflection practice in 2020, and it’s been an effective way to shift my perspective. I switch up the question every year (and sometimes in the middle of the year), but the prompt is usually rooted in gratitude and compassion.
This year, I’m asking myself this question: “What does your inner best friend want to say to you today?”
Moon planning. My moon planning practice happens every two weeks or so, on each new moon and full moon. I’ve written about this a few times, and you can read more about my practice here.
Balancing connection time and alone time. This is something that everyone does naturally — and for me, the balance tips heavily toward alone time. The part that makes it self-care is understanding how much alone time I need and setting boundaries to make sure I have enough.
While I love connecting with the people around me, I try to schedule things far enough apart so I have plenty of alone time in between.
Relaxation in the form of entertainment. I try to relax with some form of entertainment every day, even if it’s only for 10–20 minutes. What I do varies depending on my mood, but the part that makes it self-care is that I get to choose an activity that I truly want to do.
Recently, I’ve been drawn to reading sci-fi novels, but sometimes relaxation looks like playing games on my phone, watching hockey, or listening to music.
There’s a lot on this list, but I’ve slowly integrated these practices into my life over the past 8–10 years. If you’d like to share some of the things that you do to care for yourself, I’d love to hear from you! The best way to reach me is via my YouTube comments.
