During the great pause of the pandemic, did you feel the shift? The shift from being over-scheduled to not scheduled at all. I will let you in on a bit of a secret. I enjoyed it. It was probably one of the best things that happened in my adult life.

Before you lose your mind at my last comment, let me explain. The pandemic brought a lot of devastation, but it also brought a lot of stillness that I hadn’t felt for so long. I was someone who thought that I had the self-care/wellness part of my life down to an art, or I should have, right? Seeing how I have been ranting about its importance for years. What I learned was I didn’t. Yes, I superficially did the things, but until the world pushed paused and I truly had to stop. That is when I saw that my wellness routine needed some work.

I took that forced downtime and did a lot of re-evaluating how I wanted to live my life. What blew my mind the most was how much time I got back, no work, no commuting, no extracurriculars for the kids, no feeling like I had to fill every second of every day to be productive.

We have been told technology will “make” our lives easier, and don’t get me wrong, there are aspects that do, but when I removed the technology from the majority of my day and spent more time doing things that brought me joy, I started to feel the shift inside me.

Beauty rituals & cooking are my two biggest loves in life, and I started immersing myself in both of them. Some days I spent the entire day in my kitchen, and others finding new ways to up my wellness game. If you watched any of my videos during the shutdowns, I shared some things I had been doing and then started prioritizing them in my day-to-day life.

Now that the world is opening back, I hope you don’t go back to “normal” because normal was eating our souls and sending us towards burnout; we only took time to ourselves if we were on vacation. After the first lockdown (you know when it was only going to be two weeks), we went to a four-day workweek, and all I can say about that is why the hell didn’t I do that sooner? That extra day made a difference in creating space to breathe and not be rushed trying to fit everything in.

Now I know everyone doesn’t have the luxury of making their schedule, but do you control how much of yourself you share with the world. Learning to say no and brushing up on your wellness routines will be the best thing you do for your mental health.

I guess what I am trying to say is that is no trophy for being busy all the time; we have been wearing that around like a badge of honor for way too long. I used to think that is what success looked like; people hustling. Now, my version of success is having time to connect with nature, people, and things that bring me peace.

Use what we have learned from the pandemic to reset & reconnect with what is important to you.