Self care is a form of self love, and we could all use more of that! Self care is tangible action we can take—often something physical we can do for ourselves. Taking care of the self means our attention is shifted to us—to our inner self, our bodies, our mind, our spirit, our soul. Self care is us “hitting pause” to pay attention to ourselves. Often these choices involve stillness and rest. This pause is how we reset, replenish, and restore ourselves.
The “lower case s” self, our ego based “human self” might want, need, and deserve a day of pampering, the bubble bath, or a pedicure, or maybe a day on the golf course. These are all great things, but what about our capital S-Self? When we can align our self care with our spiritual practice, that’s when our capital S-self gets the care it needs—the awareness of our God-presence. I’m talking about things like meditation, sitting in silence, prayer, reading spiritual wisdom books, journaling, etc. Self care is about self awareness. Self awareness is God-awareness — our Capital S-Self.
When we use spiritual practice as our self care, (our capital S-Self care) we honor our true nature, the fact that we are each expressions of the Divine. Self care, having compassion for our Divine Self, resting in the Presence, nourishes the roots of our spiritual essence. Self care is a retreat from the turmoil—the human muck—of our lives. Self care is a way to check in with our soul. We let go of our outer selves, coming closer to who we really are, to our truth.
The master teacher Jesus demonstrated this for us. He modeled this behavior of retreating, resting, returning to the Source all the time. The bible is full of scriptures that say things like Jesus, “found a deserted place,” or he “departed to the mountain,” or he “went to a solitary place.” Over and over again, Jesus went off to be alone, to pray, to meditate, to be still, to connect and be with his deepest, highest self—which he called his father. He used this practice to realize his Unity with Source, and there is something to this self care habit of Jesus! The New Testament shows that Jesus had a pattern of going off and practicing stillness and solitude by himself and then returning to inspire others, to heal them, and to perform miracles.
He was demonstrating the importance of self care and spiritual practice for us. He was instructing us how to take time to rest, be still, and cultivate a relationship with our Divine Source. Taking the time to do this is necessary for us as humans. Ernest Holmes agreed because he told us in the Science of Mind®, "We long for and need a conscious union with the Infinite. This is as necessary to the nature and intellect of man as food is to the well-being of a physical body” (SOM 153).
The interesting thing is, the places we go, the type of self care we practice can be different for each one of us. What we do doesn’t matter as much as our intention and what our attention is focused on, which is our communion with the Spirit—our ultimate Self care! I really believe these quiet, meditative self-care practices make us better, higher functioning human beings.
