September is Self-Care Awareness Month, which means it’s a time dedicated to nourishing your mind and body. Although the month is coming to an end, self-care is important all year round. That’s especially true as the seasons change and many people begin experiencing the cold weather blues.
Keep the self-care ball rolling during the end of September and beyond! Here’s how to continue celebrating self-care month.
1. Spend Time in Nature
A dip in temperatures is ideal for spending more time in nature. The overpowering summer heat will no longer cause discomfort, while snow and ice haven’t yet made outdoor activities treacherous.
An overwhelming amount of studies have shown being outdoors has restorative effects on physical and mental health. For instance, having contact with nature boosts happiness, encourages more upbeat interactions and creates a sense of purpose in life.
Even just 10 minutes sitting on a park bench surrounded by trees can significantly impact your mind and body — and autumn provides plenty of beautiful foliage to feast your eyes upon.
2. Overhaul Your Diet
Maybe stress causes you to overeat, or perhaps you have a habit of snacking on junk food. Self-Care Awareness Month is a great time to overhaul your diet.
Transitioning to a clean, plant-based diet has excellent benefits for your health. For instance, it can help reduce your body’s inflammation markers, leading to greater weight loss, improved insulin sensitivity, and diabetes and cardiovascular disease prevention.
Studies have also indicated that plant-based eating helps lower your cancer risk by 8%-10% — possibly by 35% for prostate cancer.
Start eliminating meat from your diet to reap the physical health benefits of veganism this September.
3. Start Walking
Any exercise is excellent for building muscle, lowering body fat and decreasing your risk of various conditions. Walkers even reduce their mortality risk by 20% when they regularly take brisk walks.
Researchers recommend aiming for 100 steps per minute or about three miles per hour, depending on the terrain, which will get the heart pumping and increase your breathing rate.
Brisk walking improves mental health and stress levels in older adults and is an effective pain management technique.
Get in the habit of taking daily walks as you adopt a self-care regimen — it could potentially save your life in the long run.
4. Take a Day Off
Overworking takes up the precious time we could be spending on things we genuinely enjoy. Making a living is important, but so is stepping away from our daily tasks and projects. This is particularly true in an era where remote work makes it especially hard to strike a balance between career and personal life.
When was the last time you called out sick or took a vacation day? Allow Self-Care Awareness Month to be your season for taking time off for yourself.
Stay in, watch a movie, clean out your closet, take a day trip or finish redecorating your living room to make your home exactly how you want it to be. The idea for taking a day off or an extended weekend is to do things that reinvigorate you and leave you satisfied.
5. Get Creative
Individuals with creative tendencies find that feeding the imaginative part of their brains leaves them with newfound energy and vigor. If it’s been a long time since you were immersed in creative activities, spend time doing so this month.
Some things you might want to try include:
- Try a new recipe
- Paint a picture
- Fill in a coloring book for grown-ups
- Write poetry
- Practice your photography skills
- Knit a blanket
- Grow indoor plants
- Create TikTok dances
Indulge in your passions to practice better self-care — spending time with your favorite creative hobby will help improve your mental health.
6. Learn Something New
In addition to diving headfirst into creative hobbies, you might want to learn something new. For example, did you ever think about speaking a second language? Maybe you want to try yoga or take another type of class.
Cultivating talents and interests is essential for lifelong brain health. Recent clinical studies show that continuous learning might be an effective preventive measure against cognitive decline like Alzheimer’s disease or dementia.
Learning new things can be a fun and beneficial way to practice self-care this month and for the rest of your life.
7. Relax and Unwind
Sometimes the best way to relax is to lay back and kick your feet up. Doing nothing can be the best form of self-care you can practice. Some ideas for unwinding might include:
- Reading a good book
- Listening to soft music
- Sipping hot tea
- Wrapping yourself in a blanket
- Taking a warm bath
- Meditating
Whatever quiet activities allow you to decompress should become a regular part of your self-care routine.
8. Sleep Better
Sleep is perhaps the most critical component of self-care. Those with insomnia or other sleep disorders may be at a higher risk of developing cardiovascular disease, Type 2 diabetes, obesity and depression.
The key to better mental health could be a restful night’s sleep. One study has found that depressive symptoms are prevalent in 25.9% of insomnia patients, compared to 1.7% of non-insomnia patients.
According to the Sleep Foundation, most adults need seven to nine hours of sleep every night. Likewise, people 65 and older should get seven to eight hours of shuteye.
Embrace Yourself During Self-Care Awareness Month
September is the perfect time to get into a long-term self-care routine that you can continue all year long. Whether you want to feed your creative soul or hope to make more of an effort to get cozy and unwind, there are plenty of ways to treat yourself. You will reap the many physical and mental health benefits of taking time for yourself.
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Cora’s passion is to inspire others to live a happy, healthful, and mindful life through her words on Revivalist – wholeheartedly convincing them that everyday moments are worth celebrating. Cora has spent 5+ years writing for numerous lifestyle sites – hence her sincere love for both life and the beauty of style in all things. Keep up with Cora on Twitter, Pinterest and Facebook.
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