Laura Kåmark [00:00:01]:

Hey everyone. Welcome to the Be Bold, Make Waves podcast, a show bringing you inspiring stories of women who are growing and scaling their business. I’m your host, Laura Kåmark, a website and tech integration specialist who works with online business owners who love their work and not their website. Join me as we have incredible conversations about business mindset, productivity, and of course, the website and tech behind the business. Let’s go ahead and dive in to this week’s episode. Hello and welcome to today’s show. For those of you who don’t already know me, I’m Laura Kåmark, website and tech automation specialist, works with women who love their work, but not their website. I have another really fun solo episode for you today.

Laura Kåmark [00:00:50]:

And today we’re going to talk about self care. Now hear me out before you turn this off because I know, I know, can this be a little more buzzy? And I feel like everyone talks about self care, but I have something really fun that I want to talk to you about today. And so let’s back up a little bit. I feel like we already are hearing why is it important to have self care? And why as women and mothers, a lot of the time we don’t put ourselves first. And I know this is something that I’ve always struggled with as a mom, as someone who’s been growing my business while having two young children at home, while going through the pandemic and all the things. And so today I just want to talk to you about some of the things that I have on my self care list that have become a very high priority in my life. And then also a really fun exercise that a coach I worked with a couple of years ago had us all do everyone in the coaching program. And it was really fun and just one of those exercises that stayed with me and I refer back to it often and I want to talk to you about it today.

Laura Kåmark [00:01:57]:

So without further ado, let’s dive into this week’s episode. So first of all, why is self care important? I feel like I’m not going to talk a whole lot about this. We all know why it’s important. No one can pour from an empty cup. And for me, what that looks like is my morning shower. So to me, more important than that cup of coffee, more important than having something to eat first thing in the morning, I need to get in my daily shower. It’s just something that’s been a habit, a routine of mine and it just signals to my body and my mind the day is starting, take my shower, wash my hair, it refreshes me. It’s very rare that I have a day where I don’t get that morning shower in.

Laura Kåmark [00:02:43]:

And again, I’m just saying that’s for me, that’s what lights me up and makes me feel complete. And so that’s one of those things and my husband knows how important it is to me. If we’re catching an early flight to go somewhere, we’re leaving town and we need to hit the road by four. You know, I’m going to be up at three, so I can just take that quick shower. I don’t use like a hairdryer or anything, I just let my hair air dry unless we’re somewhere very, very cold. So for me, that shower, 1520 minutes. Hot water, I’m good. I’m good after that.

Laura Kåmark [00:03:14]:

So that is something. And my mom was here visiting recently and I was running a little behind to go pick her up to take her to the train station. And I was like, I didn’t get a chance to have coffee this morning. I didn’t have anything to eat. I just grabbed a banana on my way out the door. I said, But I got my shower in. And she was saying, she’s like, that shower is so important to you. She’s like, you need to really be intentional about making sure you do get that, because it is something that is so important in my routine.

Laura Kåmark [00:03:43]:

So I would ask you, as my listener, what is something that it’s like your number one thing each day that helps you feel complete and helps you feel like your morning’s going right and everything is just working out, whether it’s morning meditation, morning journaling, going for a walk, any of those things. So that’s like my top thing that helps me feel that I’m taking good care of myself. So the next thing I want to talk about is just kind of identifying the things that we need. And so, again, it’s really looking at yourself and what lights you up. And now this is where we’re going to talk about this exercise. That one of the coaches I’d worked with, Bevin Farron, she has been on the podcast. I can link that up in the show notes. When I was working, when I was doing coaching with Bevin’s Mastermind, she had us create a self care feel good list.

Laura Kåmark [00:04:51]:

And so what this is, is where you just write down all the things that help again, light you up, make you feel complete, make you feel good, and put that along the list. So for me, that is my morning shower. It’s going out and getting a pedicure. It’s going out and getting a massage. It doesn’t always have to be things that cost money. It’s going for a walk on the beach, going out into nature, like taking the dog for a walk. I love taking my dog for a walk. Just getting outside, listening to nature around me, lights me up.

Laura Kåmark [00:05:25]:

Having a chai latte. I love a good dirty chai latte. I actually for Christmas asked for a Frother and now can make them at home, which makes me super happy. A cheese plate. If you follow me on Instagram, you’ve definitely seen the cheese plates that I create when I’m celebrating or just because I can. Also for me, I love burning a yummy smelling candle. And so a couple of things that I’ve done that also can help support this self care list is I’ve signed up for a quarterly Cheese club subscription. So that means I get cheese delivered every quarter.

Laura Kåmark [00:06:06]:

And it’s amazing and it feels very luxurious and I love that. Recently on my vision board last year, I made an intention to get a massage more regularly once I had my children. I just that wasn’t something that was a priority. It was an added expense and took a lot of time and it wasn’t something I made a priority. And last year, I started making that a priority and now go every other week, of course, assuming my kids aren’t homesick, and we’ll go get a massage. And it feels amazing. And my back doesn’t hurt as much. And it’s something that feels good for me.

Laura Kåmark [00:06:45]:

Also, my walk on the beach. I mean, that is something. I take the dog out every morning. We don’t have a yard. We live at the beach, but in the house where most of the houses here don’t really have yards, we’re just kind of the houses are on top of each other. We have to walk the dog out on a leash so that he can go do his business. And so for me, going out in the morning, walking on the beach when it’s still nice and early and it’s kind of quiet out there, I look forward to that so much. And then I also take him out again in the evening and go get our little evening walk in.

Laura Kåmark [00:07:20]:

We put a couple of miles in. For me, I can feel the difference. I had a day earlier this week where I didn’t get my walks in. They weren’t the lengths that I would have normally liked them to be. My husband was out of town for work, so I had the kids and my little one was just not wanting to walk in the morning. She didn’t want to go out on the sand. So we just kind of did a short loop and came home so I could take her to preschool. And then in the afternoon, I had my older daughter and I was trying to get her rallied to go somewhere over in the harbor so we could walk the dog and she just wasn’t feeling it and we ran out of time before it was time to go get her sister from preschool.

Laura Kåmark [00:07:58]:

So very short walks earlier this week and I could feel the difference of how my body just felt very different when I didn’t get that exercise that my body has grown accustomed to having. So what’s the point of all this? The point of all this is I would again challenge you create a list really similar, like really look at, like what’s something that just lights you up? Is it going and taking a bubble bath, sitting and reading a book that makes me super happy too. And just again, as an introvert, that fills me up to sit quietly in my thoughts. And not really in my thoughts, but reading a book. So it’s someone else’s thoughts, a story. They wrote out a nice fiction book and just sitting and relaxing that I love sitting in the sunshine on a warm day. We’ve had a lot of fog recently here, so I haven’t had a lot of warm days, but those are the things that just can make me feel really complete. I know some people like sitting and being able to binge watch a Netflix show or I mean, I love watching friends reruns.

Laura Kåmark [00:09:03]:

I don’t typically sit and watch them, I usually just have it playing in the background if I’m cooking something, and that always brings that kind of warm, fuzzy feeling inside. So I would love to challenge you to create your list and just write get a piece of paper or Google Doc where you can just write down ten things more if you like that just if you’re feeling a little down, what helps lift you up? I’ve gotten also very intentional in the last couple of years about using things like that really yummy smelling candle. Instead of just letting it sit there forever, I light the candle and let it fill the house with yummy smells. I also signed up for a candle subscription. This goes back to my self care. So every month I get a candle from this candle company that I really enjoy. And just those little added things can help just make us feel so well taken care of. When we’re able to take care of ourself and feel that we’re in a more complete, rested, whole, well being place, we’re able to show up better for our family, in our businesses and just everywhere.

Laura Kåmark [00:10:23]:

So that today is what I want to talk to you about. So I would love for you to send me a message on Instagram. Let me know what’s some of the ways you do some self care for you. What is it? Is it doing some yoga? Making sure you get that daily walk in? Is it going and getting a pedicure or manicure? I’d love to hear what it is. Thanks so much. I’ll see you next week. Bye now. Thanks so much for listening to this week’s episode.

Laura Kåmark [00:10:56]:

Be sure to check out the Show Notes laurakamark.com/podcast. And if you’re ready to turn your website into a marketing machine, get more sales, save time, and simplify the back end of your business, grab my free resource Power Integrations for your website. Head on over to laurakamark.com/power. If you enjoyed today’s episode, make sure to subscribe. And also I’ll just love you forever if you leave me a review. It helps get this podcast in front of other people that can help inspire. Thanks so much for listening. I’ll see you next week.

Laura Kåmark [00:11:33]:

Bye now.