Self care hacks mini series post #2

 

"If you think everyone is angry at you, take a nap. If you are angry at everyone, eat something. If you are angry at yourself, take a shower."

Everyone has had a day where it feels like the world and all the people in it are against you. We have all been there. Someone at work was mean, or something you said was taken the wrong way. Your spouse or parent said something that felt like a personal attack. Nothing is going right and you feel like none of it is your fault. 

Sometimes, we are just all out of energy to give. Maybe we didn't sleep well the night before. Maybe, something happened earlier in the day that just zapped all our spoons for the day right away. (Spoon Theory) A nap or an early bedtime can really help us to refocus and reset ourselves. 

Mental exhaustion needs to be recognized just as much as physical exhaustion. If your brain can't process what it needs to then it needs a rest. Just like your body. When toddlers or babies are overwhelmed and get easily triggered by their surroundings, we put them down for a nap, why does it stop once they hit school age? Humans still need to get some sleep breaks during the day, regardless of age.

I personally, don't care for full on naps. I end up feeling groggy and not able to fall asleep later that night. I am, however, a HUGE fan of rest breaks! Twenty minutes in my bed with my sleeping eye mask on to block out all the light and a timer or alarm set for me to just re-center myself in a cool dark environment without any technology or distractions. I consider it akin to mediation. And that is just right next door to a nap. All three of the kids love naps. I think between the three of them, someone takes a nap every day. 

In full transparency I googled this phrase when I first started working on this series. Originally to see if I could find the original source. I could not, however it came up with one of those AI generated explanations where for each response it said the idea was to take a step back and take a break. While that may be true, that you do need to take a break and take a step back form many different situations, sometimes there is something more going on than the need to 'step back'. 

Our prefrontal cortex, the decision making part of our brain that helps control logic and reasoning, becomes suppressed and cannot function properly if we haven't gotten enough sleep. In this case, the amygdala (our fear center that triggers the fight or flight response) goes hyper and leads us to become emotionally dysregulated and impairs our judgement. (I am not a doctor, and this is just research I have done over the years to be able to help out myself and family.)

So, the next time you find that you are feeling attacked by everyone in your life, give yourself some grace and go lay down for a little while.