Welcome to our 30-day self-care challenge! Now, I know you’ve seen a few before, and, if you’re anything like me, you’re probably thinking you don’t need one. I agree. You don’t need one. So I suggest you only go ahead if you WANT to do one. And before you can make this decision, let me tell you what it is and what it isn’t.

It’s a way to challenge yourself a little

I never really gave self-care a lot of importance. In my mind, self-care meant taking a bubble bath once in a while, going for ‘treat’ (like a massage or a spa day), or going to the gym for a class. Well, it turns out that for years I wasn’t a big fan of taking bubble baths. Plus, I’m pretty much allergic to the gym, and ONCE I had an unfortunate experience with a bad massage, which somehow triggered my lower-back pain, and I started avoiding ‘beauty treatments’ like the plague!

So it won’t surprise you to know that for many years I did very little in terms of self-care, and especially since becoming a mum.

But self-care is a lot more than just those things. Looking after yourself takes many many shapes, and there’s no one-size-fits-all solution. So in my 30-day challenge, you have 30 different things that you can try out. Some fall quite naturally under the self-care umbrella. Others might make you wonder what something’s got to do with self-care.

Trust me, they do. Because self-care is about looking after your body, mind, and soul. And that’s where the challenge comes in – try these ideas out. As many as you can. And see how they make you feel.

It’s a way to help you identify changes you want to make

Hopefully, by the time you’ve tried a few, you will have found a few new things that you like doing. Or just things that you hadn’t done in ages and now know you want to do more of. Take the short mindful meditation sessions, for example (based on the book Mindfulness for Mothers from Rebecca Ryan). You may have wanted to introduce more formal mindfulness meditation practice for a while but either never found the time or didn’t know how to get started. Now you hopefully know that you can find that time if you want to. The challenge guides you through 4 different types of meditations you can try. One or two will appeal to you more than the others. So stick to those.

It’s a way to help you create new habits

We know that habits are quite hard to create. If you struggle to make yourself do something (even if it’s something that you want to do for yourself), things like a 30-day challenge can help massively. It’s a short-term commitment that you make to yourself. Or you can share with your friends for more fun and added accountability. The challenge almost has an ‘end date to it’, and it helps you get started because it makes the process seem less overwhelming and daunting.

And at the end, you never know – you may have realised that you really really like getting up half an hour earlier and walk to the station/school/work. And you may decide that these are things you want to be doing in the long term.

A few ‘rules’

• I’ve laid the challenge out this way, so you can ideally print it off and keep it somewhere where you can refer to often. On the fridge maybe? But of course, you don’t have to.
• Tick off the activities you’ve done (tick box provided), so you can keep track of them. (This is a way to put you on the path for successful habit creation!)
• You don’t need to try the ideas in that order – do them in any order you like! While some take only a few seconds, others may need some planning and might take a little longer (like going out for dinner, for example), so they may be best left for the weekend, for example.
• You can start anytime – it doesn’t have to be on the 1st of the month or on a Monday! Literally, any day will do, and if it takes you longer than 30 days to try them all, that will also do!
• No one will come after you if you haven’t done them, but do spend a couple of minutes asking yourself why you chose NOT to do something. Was it too hard? Is it that it just didn’t appeal to you? Weren’t you in the mood on that day?
• But also, think about the things that you enjoyed doing. Did anything surprise you there? Is there anything you’d like to do more of?

How to get started?

If you want to get started with the 30-day self-care challenge, all you have to do to grab your beautiful copy is to sign up for my mailing list. You can find the sign-up form right at the bottom of this blog post or any of my previous posts.

When you sign up, you’ll receive the 30-day self-care challenge by email (do check your spam folder if you haven’t received it). You’ll find some links in the pdf that will point you to additional information to support you and assist you through the activities suggested (the meditations, for example).

Oh, and don’t worry about giving me your email address – I don’t share it with anyone, and I don’t spam you either! At the moment, I’m sending one newsletter per month on the first Sunday of every month, packed with useful and exclusive content. 

And finally…

Massive thanks to my friend Carin Thakrar, who is the amazing graphic designer behind the 30-day self-care challenge. She’s also a super-talented family photographer and takes amazing unscripted shots that capture your everyday life with your children and family. So if you’re in the West London area (or need some professional graphic design work) check Carin out! You can find her on her website or connect with her on Facebook and Instagram.