a woman’s guide to self-love and survival during hard seasons

We all experience “survival only” times of our lives; a pandemic is for sure one for them, especially when you add whatever hard thing you were already walking through.

You know you are in such a season when your heart hurts, your brain is melting, and you want to crawl under the covers for a while or move dimensions.

‘This too shall pass,’ and when it does, you can ramp up again and live your best life according to that circumstance.

For now, it’s essential to give yourself a break as much as you can.  Perhaps you have already let some things go – good for you!

I hope that you have also released the guilt of not keeping up with your regular life.

 Letting go of some of the things that seemed important before will create the space you need to heal your emotions – but only if you fully embrace having no guilt at all about doing so.

You get to choose how you survive this period.

Your core values, when boiled down, most likely don’t include many “to-dos” to execute. They are typically ways of being (loving, kindness, etc.).

So be kind to yourself and cross some more things off that to-do list, have fun doing it!

 You are divinely supported and loved. You are worthy regardless of how you handle this challenging time, so what do you want and need this next week to look like?

There are no rules here, and this is a truly personal thing. Here are some examples, though:

For the next week, I will:

• Accept less work effort from my kids. They are struggling/adapting too.
• Close doors on rooms, I release myself from cleaning during this time.
• Request help from someone.
• Reach out to support others, seek connection.
• Hide the vacuum
• Only cook and do dishes.
• Stick your hair together with dry shampoo and put it up.
• Declare kitchen as ‘self-serve’; help yourselves!

 Within each of us, we have many rules in our heads about how we would ideally prefer to live and what daily success means. Our partner has another version of those rules. Our parents had theirs, and society has many “shoulds” sprinkled on top just for fun.

 Here’s the thing, though, my love, this is your life. You can do whatever you want –for real.

 Discern what taking it down a level might look like for you in an area of your life, evaluate if it adds or decreases stress to you in making that change.

 If maintaining a higher standard is coming from pleasing others, notice that and evaluate accordingly. (Loving reminder: YOU matter).

Since you have not added the typical layer of guilt or “I am failing/I am a mess” self-talk that would be making you feel worse, you will have created the needed space for healing.

Here are some ideas to process your emotions and heal:

• Pray/meditate
• Journal out your thoughts freely about all the things.
• Take walks in nature to gain perspective and ask for spiritual support.
• Do one thing that makes you happy every day, even if it makes no sense.

And finally, please love yourself so fiercely that once you have a vision of what this could look like, speak up for it and say, “and so it is.”

You deserve to make whatever that is, happen for yourself.

 I am sending so much love to you during this time!

Joanna Peters, Coach & Author: Guiding soul weary women to heal from their painful pasts, shed shame and finally live with the peace and self-love they deserve.