Take Care of Yourself First
by Cara Price of The Nourished Body & Soul
Later that day, after it grew dark, Jesus said to His disciples, “Let’s cross over to the other side of the lake.” After they sent the crowd away, they shoved off from the shore with Him as He has been teaching from the boat…suddenly, as they were crossing the lake a ferocious tempest arose, with violent winds & waves that were crashing into the boat until it was all but swamped. But Jesus was calmly sleeping in the stern, resting on a cushion. So they shook Him awake, saying “Teacher, don’t you even care that we are all about to die!” Fully awake, He rebuked the storm & shouted to the sea, “Hush! Calm down!” All at once the wind stopped howling & the water became perfectly calm. {Mark 4:35-40 TPT}
You are a teacher.
And, most likely, you are also a spouse, a parent, a child and a friend. You have a natural bent in your personality to care for others.
You take care of others, all day long, every day. All of this care taking leaves you utterly exhausted. In the process of taking care of others you somehow end up neglecting yourself.
Exercise gets forgotten, those eating changes you vowed to make go out the window, your sleep suffers (either because you go to bed too late or you can’t sleep because of the anxiety you feel about life), & should we even consider how your emotional & spiritual life are like casualties after a war.
Instead of the great plans you started with last fall, you have ended up with disappointment in unmet expectations. And simply put, you are exhausted. You are thrilled at the thought of summer because you know you can renew & refresh yourself.
Thankfully, summer is coming. Summer for teachers is like January New Year’s resolutions for the rest of the world. It’s the time you look forward to. You are in hopeful expectation that you will be able to regain some sense of self-care & get back on track of eating healthy & exercising. Your hope you will finally be able to get some sleep & binge on your Bible devo book, is all that is keeping you going until the day the school doors close.
And this time, you know you are going to find a way to keep it going when school starts back next fall.
Of course you had those same expectations last summer, the summer before that & the summer before that one.
But wait…
What if there is actually a way to figure this self-care thing out & not fall off the “wagon” come the beginning of next school year? What if there are practical ways to achieve sustainable self-care that will lead you to spiritual, physical & emotional health for years to come.
But for some reason self-care somehow feels selfish. You feel you don’t have time in your day for self-care. If you take any time at all to take care of your own needs beyond what is necessary to survive, you won’t be able to take care of everything else you have to get done.
If all of these thoughts flood your life, then I have some great new for you.
The very best version of yourself is the greatest gift you could give to all those other people you need to take care of. And knowing this releases you from living the cycle of putting off self-care, which simply looks like serve, serve, serve, crash & burn.
Jesus knew a better way. He knew if He would rest & refuel well, then He could serve well.
Just as the passage from Mark, above tells us, Jesus knew there was work to be done. He knew the crowd was urgently calling to Him to heal them, cast out demons & teach them lessons, but He still told His disciples to push the boat away from the shore & He straightaway fell asleep!
Jesus knew the importance of stopping to rest in the middle of chaos.
Yet we are so prideful to believe that we are capable of pushing through the work we do for others without first caring for ourselves!
Jesus knew it wasn’t doing all the things He was meant to do that would cause “burn out” in His life. Rather, He knew that not caring for His body (the body that was fully God & fully man) would be what would cause His “burn out”.
It’s true that you are called to be a teacher, spouse, parent, etc. All those things are good things. But without resting, we can work & work & never actually accomplish what we are called to.
See our calling & our reason are two completely different things. They go hand-in-hand but they are not the same.
In the middle of the work we are called to, is the reason for why we are called. Ultimately for a believer the reason always comes down to furthering the love of Christ. That is true no matter what work we are called to do.
Jesus knew He could not further the work of God {love} without taking care of Himself first.
He knew that the world would beat Him down. The stress & cares of the people He was sent to serve were heavy.
There are numerous times the gospels tell us that Jesus went away from the crowd or got away by Himself. There are multiple times we see where He refueled His body with physical sustenance. And then after these things, He served. And His serving was impactful.
So how is the way Jesus lived going to help you live a sustainable life of self-care?
First, it’s important to realize that in order to care for others, you must care for yourself.
You know when you get on an airplane & the flight attendant gives the safety briefing that says “put your own oxygen mask on before assisting others with their mask”?
This is because self-care is a necessity, not a luxury.
If you are not fully taken care of then you cannot be fully capable of taking care of others. Just as not having enough oxygen to breath would keep you from helping someone put on their mask, ignoring proper food intake, adequate sleep & that deep desire in you to connect to God, will keep you from fulfilling your ability to take care of your students & family.
There is a direct correlation between choosing whole foods, sleep & quiet time with the mental fortitude to accomplish all of the work set before you.
Self-care is not selfish. Making sure you get quality food, quality rest & quality God time is actually a sacrificial act of love for others.
Second, start small.
These things don’t have to be difficult. We must put aside the notion that unless we spend an hour working out, an hour in quiet time & hours meal prepping it’s not worth it.
Get an app on your phone that gives you 5-minute devotionals each day.
Go to bed 10 minutes earlier each week until you reach the optimal amount of sleep you need.
Find a video on You Tube that gives you a quick, free, at home workout. Pick one that is short enough to do before you go to work or when you get home. There are thousands of them that range anywhere from 10-20 minutes.
Keep meals very simple. Prep a bunch of protein on the weekends, pre-chop veggies or buy frozen to save yourself time during the week. Use lots of really good seasoning to make meals scrumptious.
Lastly, give yourself permission to hit reset.
If things get off track, don’t make it worse by beating yourself up over it. Just go back to your reasons & goals for living a healthy life of self-care & start over.
Keeping a journal of feelings, sleep patterns, thoughts on your quiet time for the day & eating habits, will not only help you recognize what things throw you off track but will also give you guardrails to know when you are off track.
By checking in with yourself often, this way of life becomes a new norm for you & not a once a year event.
The unforced rhythm of living a life of rest in Christ, takes grace. We have already fully received God’s grace for eternal security but we have to actively walk in His grace to live fully in it.
This means when we look up & realize we are falling back into the trap of being busy & ignoring self-care, we extend the same grace to ourselves that Jesus gives us on a daily basis.
Jesus wants you to live an abundant life. Doing so starts with recognizing that He gave you a perfect example of how to live well, fully caring for the body He has given you.
Teacher, you have an important job. Perform your best by being your best physically, mentally & spiritually. Honor those you love by taking care of yourself.
Cara Price was a featured speaker for the 2019 Teacher, Be Still Conference! She is the recipe creator and Jesus loving blogger of The Nourished Body & Soul. After 3 years of debilitating pain, she found healing through a foundation of whole food and began to write recipes which she shares with readers of her blog. As a follower of Jesus, Cara believes that the only way to live an abundant nourished life is based in Him. On the blog her 2 passions, Jesus & food, come together.
