Give Yourself Grace: Self-Care for Stressful Times

Let the Verse Flow: Personal Growth Thru a Creative Lens

Having grace and compassion for ourselves, especially as we make mistakes and take missteps along our life's journey, frees us to learn from those mistakes. It also helps us embrace one of the basic tenets of a growth mindset: recasting mistakes as opportunities for personal growth.

In this episode, I share how stress and my inability to cope with my caregiving duties can sometimes make me say regretful things, or feel uncomfortable emotions. When that happens, I'm often faced with guilt. I'll make a case for reframing caregiver guilt (and other types of guilt) as opportunities to reflect and learn and explain the value of a growth mindset for reducing shame. I explore:

• What grace is and why it’s so important for caregivers in particular to hold grace for themselves.
• How our lack of grace for ourselves usually stems from the shitty twin feelings of perfectionism and fear of failure.
• How embracing a growth mindset can help reduce self-criticism and help empower us to learn from mistakes.
• How humor or developing more compassionate self-talk (through affirmations or mantras) can help us be kinder to ourselves.

Welcome to my reflections from the bright side of the beat.

Want to reengage with yourself and put creative self-care back on your to-do list? Head over to my website: lettheverseflow.com and sign up for my free newsletter, the Me-Time Mixtape. Three times per month, I’ll send you 3 essential, hand-curated links/resources on creative self-care tips, tools, and strategies.

Poem: Grace

Music: (My thanks to all the musicians who make incredible music and share it with the world. All music for my podcast is sourced and licensed for use via Soundstripe.)

Songs in this episode: Movement Like Water by Nu Alkemi$t; Slide by GEMM; Samson's Buzzcut by GRIDKIDS; Pyaar Kee Seemaen by Cast of Characters

Related Episodes:

Sitting with Shitty Feelings (episode 4)
Resources:
Being Kinder to Yourself (Greater Good Science Center animation)

LTVF Season 2 Music Playlist: Check out the songs that inspire me, and connect with artists from many genres who add to our collective, human soundtrack.

Journal Prompts:

1. What does holding grace look like to you? How can you cultivate grace for yourself when you make mistakes?
2. Write about a mistake that made you feel guilt or shame, and then reflect on what you can learn from that experience.
3. Write about one area in your life where you want to develop forgiveness and self-compassion.

Prefer to read this episode? Read the complete episode in blog format here: https://www.lettheverseflow.com

After today's episode, I'll be taking a short break from the podcast over the holidays. I'll be back in the new year, on January 1, with the first episode of season three, and I have some surprises in store for you. It's time to mix things up with some famous and timeless verses. We'll start with a Khalil Gibran quote and the topic of overthinking in the first season three episode. Look for it on January 1st!

Until then, I hope you share the holidays with the people y