The year of softness, rest and ease.
This is a great time in the year to explore your relationship with your well-being by experimenting with finding and following your own pace and
rhythm of life.
About this time 7 years ago I was in the middle of burnout and depression. I wasn’t quite sure what was going on, but I intuitively knew that something was majorly off with my wellbeing. That was hands down one of the most confusing, toughest and loneliest periods of my life. I luckily got out of that period and that life experience set me off on a curious journey to heal and better understand my mental and emotional health. It helped me understand and value that my wellbeing needed to come first in my life. I’ve been on this journey of increasing my commitment to myself and my health ever since. Every year it feels like I’m tapping into a new level of that commitment and a deepened understanding of what it actually means practically to put myself first. This year I’m being called to invite softness, ease and rest, to move slower and to follow my own pace and rhythm.
“Explore what it means to set and follow your own rhythm”
How do you set your own pace and follow your own rhythm? For me, this means being fully present in my daily life, enjoying the little moments, daily miracles and opportunities for inward connection. It means being present in my body, it means romanticising my daily life, protecting my mornings and it means moving a lot slower. It means valuing myself, my wellbeing and how I feel in my body more than I value being “productive’. It means challenging my conditioning, perfectionism and toxic productivity with compassion through nurturing myself and not judging. It means doing what intuitively feels good and healthy to me in this period of my life like working less, working smarter not harder, having lots of gaps in my schedule, sleeping in more, planning less, spacing out socialising, reading more, almond milk lattes, gazing at sunsets and lounging around in my robe just because. Life can be beautiful when you start to challenge and unravel the pressure that you put on yourself to be and do all the time.
“Softness is a portal to increased self-compassion”
Although most of us know that investing in our wellbeing is important we still struggle with giving ourselves permission because of conditioning, upbringing, external demands, our inner critic, our responsibilities to others, toxic resilience and so on. We struggle with being compassionate with ourselves, and that’s where the opportunity lies for transformation. Self-compassion is a fundamental aspect of a better relationship with yourself and softness is the portal that can help you get there. If you struggle with seeing your own needs, wants and emotions as important try inviting more softness and ease into your life so that you can have a direct experience with how good it feels to nourish yourself and meet your own needs! You can’t get there from here intellectually you need to experience your heart-beat slowing down, your nervous system attuning to ease and truly feel how that increases a sense of safety and wellbeing in your body.
I love this season of my life, because I’m truly in it, setting my own pace and rhythm moving according to the beat of my own drum. It’s a huge transformation for this type-A, daughter of immigrants that from birth has been on a high-speed train of constantly achieving, being productive, being perfect, helping, fixing, reaching for the next thing and moving incredibly fast. I love this for me and I wish that for you also. It’s possible to increase your capacity for soft living, ease and rest if you’re willing to explore who you are beyond who you know yourself to be.
Here are some journaling questions to help you unblock any resistance that you might have to following your own pace and slowing down:
Where do your ideas about rest and productivity come from?
What are the signals in your body that indicate that you need more rest?
What are some activities that you enjoy that feel restful?
What would be different in your life if you were well-rested and more present in your life?
How do you feel in your body when you are rested?
Who would you be if you decided to follow your own pace more? How would you feel?
What does inviting more softness mean to you?
What areas of your life need more softness?
If you struggle with the idea of resting, following your own pace and moving slower, please know that it’s not you. What you’re likely coming up against is a lifetime of conditioning and harmful messaging from a system and structure that has most of us feeling like we’re not doing or being enough. The game is rigged! It’s time to take your power back in the most important arena of your life where you have the most influence to make powerful and impactful changes; your wellness and wellbeing. Make this the year that you familiarise yourself with your own pace of life from the inside out.
Leave me a comment below or on IG, I’d love to hear from you.
In gratitude,
Ruthie