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Who’s looking after you?

Evening all! 🙂 I’m in quite a blissful haze tonight… All around me I can smell the awesome scent of my new Glasshouse Fragrances candle (scent – Tahaa). 🙂 These are available at Peter Alexander stores around Australia, in a variety of scents…

The cute bag it came in... Hope you like this photo I took it on my new DSLR camera (still learning how to use it!). From now on all pix from me will be courtesy of a Canon EOS 600D.

… For those of you unfamiliar with Peter Alexander click HERE, he’s an Aussie pajama and lingerie designer who has some really awesome stuff! His stores are really different and styled like a classy walk in wardrobe, I’ll have to sneak some pix next time I’m there!

I’d intended to use this post to review the candle, but I stopped to think about why I’d bought the candle and decided to talk about something different with you.

I set aside “relaxation time” in my week to help me unwind and help maintain a sense of wellbeing. Sitting back and listening to chill out music, painting my nails, or doing a DIY facial or hair treatment are some of my top R&R activities at home. I bought the candle so I can burn it and have its lovely fragrance throughout my home when I’m doing these things, or for any time that I feel like it! 🙂

Such activities, along with maintaining hobbies, social contacts, and exercise and healthy eating (I try but perhaps am not sticking to my resolutions as well as I should! oopsie!) are all ways I try to take care of myself.

Why do I do this?

The reasons for the exercise, diet, hobbies and social stuff are pretty straightforward but the time for relaxation may not be for some. However, when we think about it, every day we are exposed to a range of stressors. Yes, a stress response is linked to our perceptions of events, situations, others, and ourselves but inevitably (pardon my French) shit happens in life. It is normal to experience what we may call “daily hassles” – missing your bus or train, not receiving a reply to an important email, or having to deal with a cheeky toddler. These days anyone can easily rack up many of these in a 24 hour period.

Stress has physiological as well as psychological impacts. You can read more about this here (by the way the site I’ve linked to has some really interesting and useful stuff – worth checking out if you are interested in mental health and wellbeing and all FREE :)). As such it can have cumulative effects on our bodies and minds which can increase your risk of developing chronic stress and commonly associated ailments. These include but are not limited to gastrointestinal upsets, teeth grinding, and insomnia. My little “relaxation time” sessions are therefore my safety valve, an opportunity for release of stress both physically and mentally. The activities I choose relax my body as well as my mind.

Yes, making time for such activities is an effort. However, if you don’t take the time to care for yourself, who will? If you don’t make your wellbeing a priority, you cannot give 100% to your partner, friends, family, coworkers, clients… the list goes on. Of course, we all have lots of responsibilities to juggle, particularly those of you who are parents or carers. Some people may have the luxury of an hour a day to themselves to spend on such activities, but most of us have to settle for 15 minutes or less. But 5 minutes is better than none. The key is to make sure you incorporate such activities into your life on a regular basis. Going for a massage once a year will not cut it!

If you are still not convinced by what I am saying, think about this… how much time will you actually save, by being more productive and efficent, if you take 5-10 minutes or even more time (if you can spare it) out of your day for some “me” time? I’m confident it will be way more than the small amount of relaxation time you engaged in.

Pick an activity that gives you pleasure and is not detrimental to your health (i.e. going for a cigarette is not an example of a relaxation activity or truly healthy “me” time – sorry to those who smoke but I am strongly anti smoking). For example, take a bubble bath, paint your nails, spend 5 minutes watching your goldfish exploring their tank… Heck just stop and literally smell the roses! The possibilities are endless and don’t have to cost money.

You might be thinking “Where the hell did this come from? Why is Sarah talking about this?” I’m not sure; I just wanted to share it with you and as many of you know I want to include wellness posts as well as beauty reviews on this blog. 🙂

Take good care of yourselves. I would love to hear about what you do to relax and what helps you manage stress! 🙂

I’ll leave you with some photos of the delicious candle I picked up – it smells so good, even when not burning, that you literally just want to eat it! 🙂 (My Beautiful Rating for this product is, of course, 5/5 for both quality and value.) Pix include more details about the product. It retails for $39.90 AUD but is worth every penny and burns for 80 hours… you can recycle the glass canister too!