A Little Recap and Favorite Past Posts

My posting schedule may be a little lighter this week... or at least lighter content wise. I had a fantastic Thanksgiving (more or less) with family & friends, with a few difficult situations thrown into it. I'm safely back home and have a busy week at work, mixed in with a few other commitments and trying to catch up on the week that I was visiting family. Last December I didn't have many readers yet, as my blog was brand new. Because of that, I wanted to post a few posts from last winter that stand out in my mind, and relate to this holiday season!

Warming Up With A Cup of Tea <- There are some mental health/emotional benefits to tea as well!
I Heard The Bells On Christmas Day <- This is one of my favorite Christmas songs. I didn't love it growing up, but a few years ago I learned the history of the song, and it's really interesting! Make sure to check this one out!
Tips For Surviving The Holidays With Family <- Let's be honest. Sometimes family can almost ruin the holiday season. Here are a few tips to stay healthy and happy while being around your family over the holidays!
My Little Lifesaver <- TOTALLY worth it!
Serenity, Courage, Wisdom
When There's A Winter Storm <- Tips for staying safe in the winter months!

Now it's your turn:
Feel free to share one of your OWN favorite winter posts here! I'd love to see them.

Friday Favorites

Favorite Tiny Delight of the Week:
Greek Food. I love it and could eat it every meal and be OK with it. I was in Greece once for a month and felt so sad when I left and didn't have easy access to it anymore. This weekend I made a various of this souvlaki salad and every bite of it was delicious! I love the extra challenge and fun that various cultures provide in terms of food, and it's my goal to add as much variety of these foods and cultures into my life!

Favorite Quote of the Week:

“Balance is not better time management, but better boundary management.  Balance means making choices and enjoying those choices.”   – Betsy Jacobson

Favorite Post by Someone Else:
Are You An Addict by Emily at Perfection Isn't Happy - This post is a great look into working out and exercise as a balance in life, and the process of it becoming an addiction. Working out is healthy, but being addicted to it is not. I loved some of the thoughts she had on the issue!

Favorite search terms:

• scared to try spinning (to whoever searched for this- don't be too scared! The classes are a lot of fun and you can go at your own pace!)
• spring will come (but not for a LONG time!)
• ways towards healthy body image
• Dear Stress
• family food counselor (hmmm- this could be a good title for a blog!)

Now it's your turn!

What are some of your "favorites" for the week? What are your thoughts on exercise addiction? What does balance mean to you?

Wellness Wednesday: {Nutrition Part 2}

Welcome back to Wellness Wednesday, a weekly "holiday" on my blog that focuses on an aspect of wellness. Wellness isn't usually the easy or most convenient choice in life, but then again, most things that are good in life are a little more work, aren't they?

Remember that I'm using the Wheel of Wellness to help visualize health in life:

Source

Last week I began a discussion on Nutrition. If you've missed Part 1 of Nutrition, you can read it here. 

Last week I said I would share some of my own tips on how I try to maintain balance in the nutrition component of my health and wellness. Again, I'd like to emphasize that I am not a nutritionist, but am simply sharing some of the things I do to try to be healthy. 

1. Remember that nutrition doesn't always have to be all or nothing: I said this in my post last week, but wanted to highlight it again. I think sometimes people get intimated about trying to eat healthy because there's so much to know, do, understand, or change in their life. It's ok to do this in baby steps. Something is ALWAYS better then nothing in this area of wellness, so don't make it all-or-nothing! Give yourself the freedom to grow and experiment. 
2. Don't label food as "good" or "bad": This tends to only lead to shame, and we start to engage in guilt beatings. When we beat ourselves up for eating "bad food", it is actually counterproductive. Especially if food is a coping skill, the guilt beating will only drive us back into eating the food we wish to enjoy.
3. Eat dessert: Dessert is a wonderful and beautiful thing in my life, and I would definitely not give it up. Eating dessert doesn't mean you need to consume 500 calories. Eat a little dessert, enjoy the flavor, and use a little self control! You'll feel good about yourself, plus you'll get a little bit of sweet too:)
4. Menu Planning! To some extent, plan out meals for the week before grocery shopping. Wandering aimlessly around the grocery store can be stressful, and tends to not lead to healthy and delicious meals during the week. Menu planning helps decrease stress in this domain of wellness, and leaves you feeling prepared!
5. Keep Healthy Snacks On Hand: We often feel the need to eat between meals, and it gives us the extra boost and energy we need to keep going throughout the day. We snack on what's convenient and nearby, so surround yourself with healthy and nutritious snacks. Some of my favorites include: almond, fruit salad, crackers with almond butter, protein bars (especially Luna Bars), chips or pita bread and hummus, and cut up veggies. I try to keep veggies cut up in my refrigerator for convenience. 
6. Make extra servings of food and freeze it: It's nice to have meals pre-made for those nights that we're too busy or stressed to make a full meal. It's easy to make extras and saves time and energy later.
7. Drink enough water: Hydration is incredibly important in our health and functioning. Furthermore, sometimes our craving for food is simply just thirst. Drinking water may be all we need in the moment.
8. Don't use food for coping: Life is messy and because of that, we need to develop healthy coping skills. People can easily go to food for comfort, which isn't healthy. Become aware of why you want food. Are you really hungry or are you trying to use it to cope with something in life?
9. Cut up fruit & veggies and store them in the refrigerator: Convenience!  It's easy to grab chips when we're hungry because it's easy. If we have veggies cut up already, it's easy to snack on them or add them to a dinner with no extra effort. 
10. Supplement a healthy diet with vitamins and calcium pills: Sometimes we don't get a perfectly balanced meal in the day. To help balance out what our body needs, vitamins and calcium can be helpful. I leave them on the counter by my sink so that they are within reach and I actually remember to take them!

Of course I do more things then just this to live a healthy life, but these are a few of the things to help bring balance to my nutrition.

Now it's your turn:

What are your healthy nutrition tips? What snack is a must have for you? What is one aspect of nutrition that you would like to change? 

Guest Post: A Journey Towards Balance & Self Care

I've been a follower of Sarah's blog since October of last year- before I had even started this little blog! I've enjoyed reading about her process of finding and starting her job, and trying to maintain a healthy lifestyle amidst a lot of life changes. Make sure to check out her blog (and participate in her Wear a Dress Tuesdays)! Thank you so much for sharing Sarah!

Hello Musings of a Counselor readers!  My name is Sarah and I blog at The Strength of Faith.  I am an ordained minister in the United Church of Christ and serve a medium-sized church in southeastern Massachusetts.  I am passionate about community development, mission and outreach and individual growth and spirituality.  Every day I seek to find balance in my life – and I encourage others to do the same.

 When Karolina asked me to put together a guest post, I knew immediately what part of the Wellness Wheel I wanted to focus on:  Self Care.

Last summer I was doing my clinical training at a Level 1 trauma hospital in Atlanta.  My first week there I had my first one-on-one supervision with my supervisor.  I walked into the room expecting to talk about being a chaplain, how to navigate the hospital and my goals for this unit. 

I was wrong.

My supervisor BLEW me away and talked about the importance of self-care.  In fact, she threw away the goals I had prepared and said, “I want you to focus on self-care”.

Up until that point, I thought self-care was a card that people pulled when they didn’t feel like doing their work.  But what I learned while I was working at the hospital was that if you do not take the time out of your work to take care of yourself, eventually you will not be capable of doing your work!  I was not an effective chaplain if I wasn’t taking care of myself – and these days I am not an effective minister if I am not taking care of myself.

I am a perfectionist.  It is hard for me to admit that I need help – and it is hard for me to admit that I am having a hard time.  But one day I was reading a book by one of my favorite authors, Anne Lamott, and she said the following: 

“Good therapy helps.  Good friends help.  Pretending we are doing better than we are doesn’t.  Shame doesn’t.  Being heard does.”

I was blown away yet again – this quote basically gives us all permission to not have it all together all the time.  It shows a raw honesty that allows us to feel overwhelmed and underprepared (and to not feel badly about it!).

The first step to self-care is to intellectually understand that you are allowed to be a mess.  The second step to self-care is to emotionally understand that you are allowed to be a mess.  The third step to self-care is to actually allow yourself to be a mess.

The biggest shock to me in my journey to find balance in my life is that so many of my friends, acquaintances and colleagues are struggling to find the same things in their own lives.  Silly me – I thought they all had it together!  Trust me when I say this:  If you think that everyone else around has the perfect life, they do not.  Everyone struggles.  Everyone has moments where they do not know what they are doing.  Everyone falls apart every now and then.  The first step in finding balance is to stop comparing yourselves to others, stop expecting perfection from others (and yourself) and start opening yourself up to the support of others.

Balance is not a destination – it is a journey.  One that has been full of ups, downs, tears, smiles, whispers and screams.  Ohh, but it’s been wonderful.

Will you journey with me?