TCOY Meet 365 Days of Decluttering Challenge

On February 18th, I completed my 365 Days of Decluttering Challenge. What an amazing journey that was, I'll tell you. If you've never heard of it, here is the basic premise of it from my blog:

Clutter comes in many forms--sometimes obvious and sometimes not. Physical clutter is obvious, although defining it is a personal opinion. Mental clutter manifests itself into visual clutter. When you purge the physical clutter, the mental clutter will follow it out the door!

We have challenged ourselves to declutter at least one item from our lives per day for the next year. We have accepted the 365 Days of Decluttering Challenge...Want to join us?

I didn't have much clutter in the grand scheme of things when deciding to commit myself to decluttering one item each day for 365 days. What I needed in my life was building the routine of doing something each day, so I chose decluttering. Decluttering is easy for me, because I have already done the major decluttering that has led me to FLY, and because I employ the "Do It Now" principle in my life. With the exception of paper clutter (my nemesis), I deal with much of my clutter in the moment.

But, decluttering doesn't end. We all consume. We all buy. And we all have the potential of letting clutter in the door or keeping it here when we get more stuff.

What Does This Have to Do With Taking Care of You, You Ask?
Simply put, any area of our life where we focus our awareness will grow us from the inside out. To that end, decluttering is a form of taking care of ourselves, believe it or not.

As decluttering topics come up that I think should be blogged, I'll add them to the 365 Days of Decluttering Challenge blog. They will be linked here, as well. If you feel this area of your life could use attention, please check out the posts.

Recent Post: Decluttering: A How-To

Quality Relationships (you + me)

Humans need quality relationships. Typically, we think of a mate, companion or spouse when we think of relationships. However, I believe it to be true that we need quality relationships in all areas of our life--a mate, our family, friends, teachers, mentors, etc.

I believe there is someone out there for everyone. My purpose for this blog is to be someone for you; to fulfill an area of your life with a quality relationship. Perhaps, I can be a source of inspiration or an enlightened acquaintance. Regardless of the relationship "title" you give me, my intent is to contribute to living your life FORWARD.

To live your life FORWARD, one can acknowledge and appreciate the past. However, the past is not allowed to overwhelm our present and future. Today and beyond is all that requires our concern.

Now, I am not a trained mental health professional nor am I a writer. So why do I feel that it is important to share myself and my thoughts with you? Quite simply, I want to contribute to the growth in awareness of our inner selves. Coming from that awareness is the important action of taking care of ourselves. Something that I feel many of us do poorly; each of us in our own way, of course.

Even I Have Forgotten to Take Care of Me
The beginning of my focus on taking care of myself happened when life lost its flavor. Each day didn't feel important -- just wake up, go to work, take care of others, go to sleep and repeat. Pretty much, it was manifested in the desire to focus on others first, and for me to receive the leftover scraps of attention, love and care.
I realized that the most important quality relationship in my life is with myself and that life is way too short to go through it on auto-pilot!

With this realization, life became very unsatisfying. For a time, that was depressing I'll tell you. However, I'm a very self-aware person so it didn't stay this way for long. I realized that I had been waiting for others to take care of me and, no matter how long I waited or how much I tried to let them know what I needed, I wasn't getting it.

Step by step, I developed a stronger sense of inner awareness. I began bringing myself up higher in the line of priority. First, I did this by just becoming more aware of it all. Then, by measurably changing, adding or subtracting whatever in my life did not align with this endeavor. Eventually, I began sharing who I have become with others, while still continuing to grow.

Why Use Your Time to Read What I Write?
If you believe that you are too-overwhelmed, too-tired, too-stressed, too-something to attend to the need of a quality relationship with yourself, then this is for you. If you didn't even know that you had an inner self, I would be glad to introduce it to you. If you are always willing to learn more than you know right this minute, I'll be here, posting on topics that focus on taking care of you and growing your inner awareness.

By inviting you to come along, I plan to strengthen the inner awareness of us both. Are you ready to focus on Taking Care Of You? I know I am.

Taking Care Of You (TCOY)

Developing an enhanced awareness of yourself is what this blog is all about. Putting yourself in the line of priority, and right in front, is not selfish thinking but rather just thinking proactively. There is no better person to know, understand or believe in than you.

Doesn't it make sense to spend time deepening the relationship with your inner self? Depending on who you are, there may be a lot you didn't know!

Believe Me, It Needs Reinforcement
I chose my blog's title to emphasize a concept I hold to be vital. Unfortunately, taking care of yourself isn’t something that is likely to come naturally. Much like the flight safety announcement telling you that in the event of a crash you must first put on your own oxygen mask and then help others, the concept of taking care of us first needs reminding, as it is most important.

Think about it.

How can we show a deep level of love, attention and care to others if we haven't practiced it on ourselves? If we do not provide nourishment to our own mind/body/soul, we are not able to give as much as we could to everyone else and it will take more effort to do so as well. Isn't it hypocritical to not "start at home" as it were?

Don’t Be A Teacher
Besides showing a great example to others in our sphere of influence, TCOY sets up a stable foundation for authentic happiness and life fulfillment. Knowing yourself and having your needs met by you, rather than relying on an outside source, brings a healthier you into every relationship as well.

Hand in hand with these concepts is the belief that Taking Care Of You is important because you can do it better than anyone else.

As the saying goes, “Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach”. My purpose here in all of this is to remind you that you “can” and empower you to “do”, rather than you spending a lifetime attempting to teach others how to take care of you (with less than optimal results most times, I might add).

It's TCOY Time
We read blogs about taking care of our home, our finances, our pets, our children, our marriage (or significant other relationships)…and on and on.

Worthwhile reading, I agree. It’s time to focus on taking care of ourselves now; it’s TCOY time.

Taking Care Of You

...because you can do it better than anyone else!