The First Pillar: Body

As a holistic nutritionist, I’m super grateful right now that mainstream self-care is really focused on taking care of ourselves physically. It’s a wonderful place to start!

In this lesson I outline the four most important aspects to the first pillar of self-care, body: nourishing your body with food, moving in a way that moves you, sleeping tight every night, and getting outside to connect to the larger world around you.

In each of the four sections below, you’ll also find hints of items that can, and should, be considered for your self-care plan, which you’ll have an opportunity to create in the second last lesson of this Thinkbook. As you read through these next few sections, make note of which items pique your interest, so you don’t forget anything when it comes to building your self-care plan.

Let’s get started!

Nourish Your Body

Eating healthy is like Self-Care 101. In this section, we’ll discuss what a generally healthy diet looks like, and a few practical tips you can use to ensure you’re eating well.

First of all, there’s no such thing as a one-size-fits-all dietary approach. We’re all biologically unique, which means that the diet that helps your best friend to feel most vibrant and energetic, might not work for you. That’s okay.

In a nutshell, all healthy diets (whether plant-based, keto, paleo, etc.) are built on a foundation of natural, alive, good-quality foods. This means limiting packaged and processed foods, and reducing or eliminating refined sugars and vegetable oils.

A healthy diet is full of a wide variety of fresh, colourful, whole foods, healthy fats, and good-quality protein—which can be plant-based or not.

You may also want to include a few supplements in your daily routine, to replenish any nutrient deficiencies in your diet. A great starting place for supplements, would be the following:

• Multivitamin or Prenatal (if you’re planning on getting pregnant in the future or are pregnant)

• A B complex that contains methylated B9 and B12 (to increase absorption and boost energy levels)

• An omega 3 fish oil or cod liver oil (a rich source of anti-inflammatory fatty acids and, in the case of the cod oil, important fat-soluble vitamins like A and E.)

How is food related to self-care? Because self-care is all about feeling your best, and diet is one of the biggest factors in how you feel. When you’re eating healthy, your body is energized, stronger, and better protected against getting sick. Your mind greatly benefits from a healthy diet as well—when you eat well, you’ll feel less tired, more clear-minded, and able to perform better at work and school.

One of my favourite ways to take care of myself is to eat the “brainbow!” and eat at least one whole food from each colour of the rainbow per day. This is a simple way to keep your brain healthy, your immune system strong, your gut population diverse, and your hormones happy and balanced.

A healthy diet extends far beyond the foods you eat. It’s also about the way you eat and with whom! To ensure proper digestion (and maximal absorption of nutrients) make sure to always eat in a relaxed state and never on the go or when you’re feeling stressed out. In fact, it’s as easy as taking ten deep breaths after sitting down to enjoy your meal, before digging in.

It’s a great idea to also eat with friends, family, or coworkers as often as possible! It helps you to be more present and enjoy the experience of eating, which reduces the likelihood of overeating.

Another concept that I love is that of intuitive eating.

This is an “anti-diet” that allows all foods. It involves grounding yourself and getting in touch with your intuition to assess what you’re hungry for and what your body needs for nourishment. This is a great technique for anyone who feels they use food as a coping mechanism when bored, lonely, happy, or sad.

By constantly checking in with your body, you’ll become more aware of it’s subtle ques and enjoy a healthy, low-stress relationship with food 😊

Movement that Moves You

Exercise is another must-have in your self-care plan, because of it’s amazing mental and physical health benefits.

Just 100 minutes a week of exercise (along with a healthy diet) has been shown in studies to decrease brain age by 10 years! Exercise also helps to keep your body young and strong, improve circulation, balance hormones, reduce stress, help eliminate toxins, prevent bone loss, and much more.

My personal favourite reason to exercise regularly is it’s profound effect on mental health. Regular physical exercise…

• Improves memory

• Stimulates the generation of new neurons (which is why it is the number 1 most important thing to add to your self-care plan if you’re in school or learning)

• Lowers the risk of developing depression

• Improves mood and anxiety

• Improves the quality of sleep and reduces insomnia

Exercise rocks!! That is—if you like to do it. The problem with a lot of workout regimes is that they involve a lot of difficult, no-fun exercises (like burpees, ew) that require a lot of willpower to actually do.

The trick is to find whatever you like and do. it. For 150 minutes per week. That can be 30 minutes, five days a week, or 50 minutes 3 times per week. It might be dancing to an upbeat playlist you put together, hiking, roller blading, yoga (which is especially good for reducing stress, by the way), running, walking, swimming, jumping on a trampoline, spin class, barre class, kick-boxing, lifting weights at the gym, hiking, doing short HIIT workouts at home, or sprinting up hills.

Whatever you like, do that and do it often. And don’t forget to stretch 😊

Sleep Tight Every Night

If you add one thing to your self-care plan, let it be this: getting a good quality sleep, every single night.

Sleep is just as, if not more, important than diet and exercise for overall health and wellbeing. The reason you don’t hear too much about it is simply because sleep isn’t sexy, and it’s a lot harder to make money off teaching people how to sleep well, than it is to sell a diet plan or workout protocol, for example.

But we’ve all experienced the power of a good night’s sleep (and the damage of a not-so-good night’s sleep, ugh.) When you get 7 to 9 hours of quality sleep per night, you’re better at life, period. You feel more alert mentally, stronger physically, and better equipped to face the challenges of day-to-day life.

So how can one improve their sleep to improve their life? I’m glad you asked. Here are my favourite tips for a superb slumber, every night (and this is coming from someone who had insomnia for over a year):

• Get your Sleep Hygiene on Point

  • This involves making sure your sleeping environment is optimized for a deep, restful sleep. Your room should be pitch black, a few degrees cooler than the rest of your house, and free of electronics that shine annoying lights and make annoying noises. Don’t think lights have anything to do with your sleep quality? Think again: studies have shown that targeted light exposure on parts of the body like the backs of the knees and inside the ears have the ability to disrupt deep sleep.

• Power Down Hour

  • Making sure your inner environment is primed for sleep is just as important as preparing your outer environment, which is where the “power down hour” comes in handy. A power down hour is a period of time (at least one hour, maybe two if you’re highly sensitive) in which you prime your body for sleep by cutting off electronic use, reduce exposure to bright lights, and engage in relaxing activities that help the body to release tension and naturally drift off to sleep. My bedtime is around 10:30 p.m., so I always start a power down hour at 9 p.m., which typically involves an Epsom salt bath and about an hour of reading or relaxing yoga.

• Beware of Social Jet Lag

  • So you’ve heard of actual jet lag, but how about social jet lag? Social jet lag is way more common than actual jet lag (unless you’re a flight attendant or pilot), so it deserves some attention here. When you stay up later on Friday and Saturday nights, to hang with friends, party, and just enjoy the weekend, you actually end up creating a jet lag effect come Monday morning. Which explains why Mondays can be so difficult, right? Social jet lag can disrupt your circadian rhythm just as much as flying over seas, so it’s important to try to sleep on a schedule as much as possible. No, waking up at 7 a.m. and going to bed at 11 p.m. every night- even on weekends- isn’t fun, but it’s essential especially if you’re someone who suffers from poor sleep or insomnia.

• Supplements for Sleep

  • Sometimes we need a little extra help priming our bodies for a long, deep sleep. That’s where supplements come in. There are many natural sleep aids out there- from melatonin (no, you wont “become dependent”), to herbs like passionflower and valerian, to good ole vitamins and minerals. My number one favourite supplement for sleep is Magnesium. 200-400mg of magnesium bisglycenate about 30 minutes before bed is a wonderful way to help your body relax, especially if you always have racing thoughts at night. (Make sure you by magnesium bisglycenate, and not magnesium oxide, for example, as the former will not cause loose bowels like many of the other forms.) My second favourite sleep “supplement” is vitamin D… from early morning sunlight! Getting some sun first thing in the morning is one of the best ways to reset your circadian rhythm and improve your nightly Zzz’s.

Nature: Connecting Deeper

Speaking of sunshine, which is the best possible source of vitamin D, by the way, this takes us to our final section of this self-care pillar: Connecting Deeper through spending time in nature.

There are many physical and mental benefits to spending time outdoors. Of course, receiving and assimilating vitamin D from the sun (which is crucial for immune, brain, skin, and hormone health) is one of the obvious ones. Getting outside for at least 30 minutes a day is a great practice to add to your self-care plan.

Unless you are extremely fair skinned, you should try to expose some of your skin to the sunlight without the barrier of sunscreen (which blocks vitamin D absorption)—of course, SPF on the face should be a must every single day to prevent aging, but your thicker, tougher skin on your arms, legs, back, and chest can stand a few minutes outside without protection.

Another benefit of spending time in nature is grounding.

There are many different types of grounding, but the most effective and easiest type is by far natural grounding, by simply putting your bare feet on the earth. Grounding has been shown to reduce inflammation in the body. It also has a wonderful effect on the mind—it helps to reduce mental chatter and reduce distraction and worrying.

To me, being grounded is becoming aware of the present moment and shifting the spotlight of your awareness from everything that is going on in your mind to what’s going on in your body and in the moment. Being grounded connects you to the earth and helps you see reality more from the perspective of the curious observer, rather than the judger or an actor in the drama of your life. Placing your bare feet on the earth and taking a few deep breaths, is a great way to achieve this.

To ground yourself in the winter time, you can place your bare hands on a tree trunk and take a few deep breaths. But simply spending time in nature (and especially if you do so while also disconnecting from your phone and other electronics) you’ll start to feel the calming, grounding, balancing effect in no time.

That’s it for body, the first pillar of self-care! In the next section you’ll learn all about ways to support the second pillar of self-care, mind.