Daily Excerpt: A Woman's Guide to Self-Nurturing (Romer) - What is self-nurturing?

 


Today's excerpt comes from A Woman's Guide to Self-Nurturing by Joanna Romer.

What is Self-Nurturing?

On a tray in the middle of your bed sits a pretty teapot, milk and sugar, a flowered teacup and, the piece de resistance, a frothy cream puff on a matching flowered plate. No, you’re not sick, and there is no one invited to this little tea party but you. You have gone out of your way to create a tempting display of yummy food and fine china solely for the purpose of pleasing yourself.

“A waste of time,” I can hear you saying—but is it? Gazing at the tea tray and the cream puff, some inner part of your being is unaccountably soothed. It is the side of you that is, undeniably, female. Yes, men and women are equal, but sometimes their needs differ. Even Sheryl Sandberg, author of Lean In, the most feminist book in decades, declares, “…there are differences between men and women both in their behavior and the way their behavior is perceived” (Sandberg, p. 145). Sometimes women need… something extra.

“Yes, I know all that, but I have to stay strong,” you say, eyeing that cream puff in your mind—is your mouth actually watering just reading about it? Yes? Taking care of yourself does not mean you are weak. We all need self-nurturing at times, giving-in to that desire to be pleased, praised and pampered.

The problem is, perhaps due to circumstances we can’t control, we may not get that needed pampering from loved ones. Maybe you’re a single woman in a strange city, about to start a new job, and you don’t know a soul. Or perhaps you’ve just gone through a nasty divorce, and you really want to be alone to recover right now. Maybe, like me, you’re a widow of a year, or two, or three, and you haven’t found anyone to take his place, nor are you even sure you want to.

For whatever reason, you find yourself alone on this Sunday afternoon, perhaps with some paperwork that requires attention, but you’ve decided you need a special treat first to build up your spirits. That’s called “self-nurturing,” and though it may seem like a little thing in the greater scheme of life, it could be a big thing to you right now because it makes you feel better about yourself. You’ve done something to please yourself and it works; with that first bite of the scrumptious cream puff, the inner tension we all carry with us is dissipated, just a bit. You realize, happily, that you don’t need anyone else around right now; you’re quite content by yourself, thank you.

Maybe you’re a married woman whose husband is out of town for a while, and you’re taking advantage of the time alone to get organized. Part of getting organized is renewing your faith in yourself and your capabilities—when was the last time you paid yourself a compliment? Maybe you and your significant other had an argument and some hurtful words were said—you know he didn’t mean it, but you still need a pick-me-up. Perhaps there’s been a death in the family, or your son has lost his job—maybe a child is sick and there’s nothing you can do about it.

These are all reasons to undertake something extraordinarily nice for yourself. You spend your days taking care of other people—most women do: you’re a wife, a sister, a girlfriend, a mother, a grandmother, a teacher, a nurse, a problem solver, a business woman (paid or unpaid, running a complex organization and keeping it all together). You think you’re devoting time to your needs, but are you? Getting your hair done once a month isn’t really enough; you need to do some special thing to make yourself feel cherished as often as possible.

The Bible tells us to love our neighbor as ourselves, but most of us focus on the neighbor part, ignoring the fact that if we don’t know how to give love to ourselves, we probably won’t be too good at bestowing it on our neighbor either. But to love ourselves effectively, we need to know what it is that makes us happy. In the same way that giving your son a train set when he really wants a video game won’t bring him joy, buying yourself cotton pajamas when you really want a nylon nightie won’t do the trick. It all depends on our individual soul’s craving—and only we know what that is. Or, if we don’t know, it is our duty to ourselves to find out—any way we can.

And so, our first task in learning the art of self-nurturing is to admit to ourselves that we need it—not only need it, but are simply dying for some pampering, praising, pleasing and all that other good stuff that’s so nice to indulge in. The second step is to find out what actually pleases us—not our mother or our best friend—just us. No two women are alike, and we need to dig deep to tackle each of these challenges. So let’s start with Number One.

GUIDELINES FOR DECIDING TO SELF-NURTURE

1.  Make a list of little ways you could add pleasure to your life, i.e.—“I could buy myself some flowers on the way home from work.”  If you’ve got more than three items on your list, it’s time to self-nurture.

2. Take a walk in the park, by the ocean or even on a city street, stopping to look at store windows as much as you like. If you say to yourself, “I should do this more often,” then you need to self-nurture.

3. Go out to lunch someplace you feel comfortable, but don’t bring a book. (You can take a journal and write down how you feel, however.) If you find this experience surprisingly exhilarating, you can probably benefit from self-nurturing.

4. Give yourself the afternoon off from your job or regular activities and go shopping. You don’t have to buy much—just some little thing that pleases you. If it makes you feel good about yourself, you’re ready for self-nurturing.

5. Make a list of everything you are grateful for on this particular day. If the activity brings a glow of well-being to your psyche, then you will enjoy self-nurturing.

If you answered “yes” to any one of the above, go on to the next chapter. If not—repeat the process!


For more posts on Joanna and her books, click HERE.


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