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Make a List: 100 Ways to Be Kind to Myself

Last week, I wrote about self-kindness and how to write a list of “100 ways to be kind to myself”. Kindness spreads like a ripple, so it must start from within us. I hope that by now, you have a basic list, but if you do not, please stop reading, make your own list and only then continue to read my list below.

Why?

The process of making up the list sends a message to your subconscious that you are important. However, if you copy someone else’s list, this does not happen.

Here is a list of things you can do to be kind to yourself. Only take those that suit your personality and adjust them to your preferences and to what makes you happy.

This post is part 41 of 44 in the series Make a List

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Make a List: Self-Kindness

I have written a lot about kindness. I think that it makes the world go around and I like to think about it as a ripple. One act of kindness ripples and touches the lives of those who are far away from us.

The movie Pay it Forward showed the power of kindness in making the world a better place. I remember at the age of 16, I was a school captain and we had a teacher, named Reuben, who helped us a lot to change the lives of the students in our school. One day, a girl in the group asked him why he was dedicating so much time to us. He said, “If I make a difference in the lives of six of you, and each of you makes a difference in the lives of six other people, eventually, this world will be a better place”. I was 16 years old and this gave me a perfect understanding of the ripple effect of kindness.

For the last 32 years, I have been teaching emotional intelligence and kindness. used to be the part in EQ that we relate to others. In the last 10 years, it has changed for me as I became the state director of a not-for-profit organization, called “Together for Humanity”, which delivers diversity education.

Why?

This post is part 40 of 44 in the series Make a List

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Singing Family Full of Joy

On my happy list, I wrote, “It makes me happy to listen to my kids singing”. This was true even when they were babies. I remember my youngest daughter Noff joining us in Alicia Keys’ song Fallin’ when she was one year old. She always joined on time and it made us all very happy.

Singing is a very sensitive thing for me. Well, it was very sensitive. Today, when I run workshops or stand in front of a big crowd during my presentations, no one can guess that years ago, when I was young, I sometimes had no voice. Speaking was difficult for me and singing was not even an option.

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Body Piercing: Laws Without Teeth

My eldest daughter Eden wanted a body piercing in her belly button when she as 15. She was already in 11th Grade and some of her friends had them. When she said that it would be beautiful, I could not disagree. It would be beautiful, but the thought of her damaging her body was very unattractive to me.

At first, I felt a bit hypocritical. I had my ears pierced when I was young. In my neighborhood, kids had their ears pierced when they were one to two years old. I was “old” (6 or 7) and did it at my neighbor’s house. At the time, it was not a choice but a social obligation. Back then, this defined me as a girl.

I got my second piercing when I was 21. This was my choice. It was a compromise, because having seven earrings in one ear was the norm at the time. Still, I did it due to peer pressure. It was accepted, it was common, it was cool and it was pretty.

How could I blame my daughter for wanting to do the same 25 years later?

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What to Do if Your Child is Overweight and You Worry about Diabetes

When there are so many overweight people in the world and diabetes is a common problem, many parents are concerned about their kids’ weight and developing diabetes. Statistics from around the world is not very encouraging. It is estimated that 600 million people will be living with diabetes by 2035. Whether you like or not, you and your children are part of this statistics.

In 2015, the International Diabetes Federation (IDF) published their Diabetes Atlas, which estimates that:

– One in 11 adults has diabetes (422 million)
– One in two (46.5%) adults with diabetes is undiagnosed
– 12% of global health expenditure is spent on diabetes (USD673 billion)
– One in seven births is affected by gestational diabetes
– Three-quarters (75%) of people with diabetes live in low- and middle-income countries
– 542,000 children have type 1 diabetes
– Every six seconds, a person dies from diabetes (5 million deaths a year)
– China with over 100 million people with diabetes (ranked highest number of people with diabetes)
– Cambodia is the lowest in the world

Being overweight is just one possible cause of diabetes and it can be prevented. When children grow up with no health awareness, they become adults with no health awareness and their life can be harder, more expensive and shorter than average.

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How to Feel Good: Get Enough Sleep

Let’s continue with our tips on how to be happy and feel good in life. In the first post, I shared the science of endorphins – the “feel good” hormones. Chapter two was about the science of smiling. In the third chapter, I explained how taking time off can help us improve our mood, feelings and functioning. In this fourth chapter, I will explain how a good night’s sleep can improve our health and well-being and make us feel good.

Sleep is essential to our health. According to the National Sleep Foundation, many people do not get enough sleep or do not sleep well. A survey conducted in the years 1999 and 2004 found that 40 million Americans suffer from over 70 different sleep disorders. When we are asleep, the brain goes through our impressions of the day in a process vital to memory formation.

Good sleep impacts our nervous system, cardiovascular system, metabolism and immune system. Imagine what impact bad sleep has!

This post is part 4 of 4 in the series How to Feel Good

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The Beauty Inside

It is a fact that we cannot see ourselves the same way others can see us. Firstly because we usually see ourselves in the mirror which is not the same position others see us in. Secondly, because we see ourselves from the inside and the inside is cluttered by thoughts and feelings we have towards ourselves.

The beauty inside is developed by what others, who are very close or important to us, say about us. I have met many grownups who carry negative beliefs from childhood. For example, people who are critical of a facial feature like a long nose or big eyes that mom or dad mocked at the age of 6. They simply cannot shake this feeling in adulthood. I myself grew up in a culture that thought straight hair was an advantage and curly hair was not. As kids, we spent year looking for ways to straighten our hair. It was only when I grew up and met others who spent a fortune on curling their hair that I learned to appreciate what I have. This is a natural process.

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Anorexia: Fix the Broken Body Image Created by the Media

Media is one of the major contributors to the damaged body images we have in our society. Once, it was only girls, but now we have more and more boys suffering from low body image.

Movies and magazines show celebrities who look tall and slim, with smooth skin at every pose. It is no wonder people spend money on products to try to “fix” themselves. What they do not know is that the photos they see are heavily photo-shopped and that the person they see in the magazine never looked like that.

It seems fitting that we should use the media to fix the damage done by the media. That way, our daughters and sons can see it. Yes, the photo-shopped images are beautiful, but they are not normal.

This post is part 8 of 8 in the series Anorexia

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I’m OK, You’re OK Parenting: Shame

It is not easy to parent when our young kids just do not do what we want them to do. It was once popular to physically punish children for not doing what they are told. It was believed that if pain was associated with not doing what you are told, children would immediately obey.

This strategy was only useful for figures in authority (like parents and teachers). Unfortunately, it did not provide the desired outcome. Children simply learned not to get caught. If an authority figure disappeared or lost their power, the subject would revenge, big time.

After parents, there are authority figures like teachers, bosses, and managers who used shame as an alternative to physical punishment. It was a way to punish through emotional pain, without the physical pain. This seemed to work but the side effects can be severe.

This post is part 2 of 7 in the series I'm OK - You're OK Parenting

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Body Image

The image of the ideal woman’s body has changed over the years. The change becomes obvious when you compare pictures today to pictures taken around the 17th century. The woman in the photo on the right was considered a symbol of the ultimate beauty back then. Today, she would be considered obese. She would not dare pose for any person trying to sketch her and most definitely not naked.

You might be thinking that the 17th century was a long time ago and this photo is quite old. To this I would say that there is a woman who has been considered beautiful much more recently, and by today’s standards, she too would be considered fat: Merlyn Monroe. Regardless of how pretty she was, she still was not completely satisfied with her looks and figure. There are many people like that today. I often have clients whose beauty I admire, and I realize they have absolutely no idea how beautiful they are.

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