Be Your Own Valentine!

Experiencing winter in the Northern California mountains for the first time in 24 years has been exciting! It’s also been very challenging. The storms keep coming and coming. We snow blow the driveway, shovel walkways, clear the snow off the steps and the deck, dig out the windows (yes, the snow has piled up higher than the ground floor windows), and tunnel out to our woodpile and then, the next storm arrives!

It’s exciting, challenging, beautiful, frustrating, rewarding, relentless and definitely a ton of work.

Sounds a lot like parenting, doesn’t it?

If you are like most parents, you are bombarded with continuous “storms” and are very likely in the habit of putting everyone else’s needs above your own.

You may often feel exhausted, frustrated, unfulfilled, angry or even find yourself getting sick. Chances are, if you are not feeling your best, you are neglecting one (or more) of your own needs as you take care of your family.

In last month’s newsletter, we talked about New Year’s resolutions in light of Glasser’s 5 Basic Needs:

Power/Success

Freedom

Love and Belonging

Safety/Survival

Fun

These needs can provide a roadmap to health and wellbeing. We can think about each need as a having its own bucket. Each bucket may be a different size, but we ALL have all 5 buckets! When our buckets (whatever sizes they happen to be) are full, we feel content and satisfied with our lives. But if one of our buckets is low or near empty, we feel unwell.

So, in the spirit of being your own Valentine, which bucket(s) of your own can you lovingly refill?

Starting a new business has been stressful for me. Over the holidays, I spent some time with my 2½-year-old grandson. I laughed and laughed (and played more hours of “Coo coo crane” than I can count), enjoying his silly, creative, imagination-filled behavior. And the realization hit me: I need more laughter, play and fun in my life!

Recognizing that my Fun bucket needed a “top up”, I have made it a priority to bring more enjoyment into my life. Whether it’s taking a walk with a friend, going for a quick ski with a playful dog, watching a silly video clip or grabbing a game off the shelf and finding someone to play it with me, I am prioritizing making time to have fun. And I’m feeling much less overwhelmed with the stress of work.

Our children can learn about meeting their needs with the bucket analogy. There are some wonderful children’s books about filling buckets:

Have You Filled a Bucket Today? By Carol McCloud (read aloud version)

How Full is Your Bucket? For Kids By Tom Rath and Mary Reckmeyer (read aloud version)

Both of these books explore the ways we can fill (and empty) our own buckets and the buckets of people around us. If you have younger children, sharing these picture books may be a wonderful way to begin talking about needs! If your children are older, they may enjoy completing Diane Gossen’s Needs Inventory to explore their needs profile. When we help our children start recognizing their own needs, we are empowering them to understand and take care of themselves in a deep way.

My daughter, a nurse (with a high freedom need), went through four different jobs in her first two years, never quite finding the right fit. When she had an opportunity to become a home health nurse, she said to me, “Mom, I think this job is going to be great for me, because it gives me a lot of freedom. I get to make my own schedule everyday and I don’t have to go into the office unless I want to!” She recognized her own unmet need in her previous jobs and found a way to fill it. She has been a home health nurse now for over 5 years!

If you have been feeling challenged lately, take a look at your needs. Treat yourself with some extra love and kindness and choose the “bucket” you want to prioritize filling in the coming weeks!