Nurturing Ourselves
The Key To
Healthy
Motherhood &
Healing
By Lia Menna Gross
This post contains affiliate links.
As mothers, it's easy to forget about our own self-care and self-nurturing while tending to our families.
Let’s get serious for a moment. How have you been nurturing yourself lately?
It’s easy for moms to forget about our own self-care, self-love and self-nurturing. With Mother’s Day right around the corner, it seems like a perfect topic for discussion!
Tending to Family
My greatest joy in life has always been family.
As mothers and women, we sometimes give so much of ourselves to others that we neglect our own well-being. This becomes a depleting and ever vicious cycle.
You’ve heard it a million times: “You can’t pour from an empty cup.”
As a mom, there needs to be a constant stream of deposits into the “nurturing of the self” cup first and foremost.
Yes, it can be a struggle to put into practice. You may even feel selfish for doing this and be met with resistance from others.
But with practice, patience and a dab of Feng Shui, it’s easy to form healthier habits and a nurturing relationship with ourselves. That’s the key to having healthier relationships with others.
The Ego and the Inner Child
Dr. Shefali Tsabary, in her book Radical Awakening, discusses what she calls “imprints” - those conditioned factors of the self. These are learned behaviors stemming from our ancestral, social, religious, cultural and overall environmental factors.
These imprints create “the many faces of the ego” as she calls them. The ego is a compilation of our defense mechanisms, past hurts and traumas - those subconscious parts of yourself created in childhood that can be triggered at any time.
Your ego is what kept you feeling safe as a child. It’s creation served to protect you in childhood. And that childlike aspect of yourself still exists today subconsciously as your inner child.
The Connection between Nurturing Ourselves and Motherhood
Our lives are a reflection of how well we treat ourselves (that includes the thoughts we think). How well we treat ourselves is something that first develops in childhood.
The Children gua (or area) connects you to your inner child. This gua represents joy and creativity. Activate its potency through play or artsy crafts with your own children in this area of your home. Don’t know where it’s located? Grab your free, printable Bagua map here.
The Relationship gua, while more popularly known to represent the love of you and your partner, also symbolizes your relationship with yourself (the mother) and establishes partnership with others.
The Health gua focuses on all areas of health: mental, physical and emotional.
You may activate both the Relationship and Health guas with the element of earth. Think crystals (like this one), my favorite ginger jar or fresh blooms. If your primary bedroom falls in your Relationship gua, use one of the other alternatives instead of flowers.
Place the objects with intention. What desired shift are you wishing to bring into your life?
Then, create the small shift through action. What can you do to fill your own cup?
Remember, it’s only through loving ourselves first that we can connect and be receptive to loving others.
Finding Nurturing Love in Your Home
By enhancing your home, you’re setting an intention to heal and nurture the self:
Start by decluttering. Join my One Week Decluttering Challenge to set this habit in motion!
Then, clean! Clean intentionally and envision love and light enveloping you as you do.
Strengthen this nurturing energy by giving yourself something beautiful to admire. Flowers, with their delicate aroma, colorful petals and soft energy, are a perfect choice.
Take intentional action. What’s one small thing you can do for yourself every day to make a deposit into your “self-nurturing cup”?