Family MattersPractical Parenting Blog

Mastering Self-Care: Your A-to-Z Guide

Self-care slogans

Self-care has a very simple definition. It is the things we do, or avoid doing, in order to look after ourselves, physically and/or mentally. If you have a car, you need to maintain smooth operation with regular servicing and gasoline/electricity. If you want to travel safely in this life, you also need to care for your mind and body.

Self-care maintains our health and wellbeing so we can function and enjoy our life.

Many people confuse self-care with selfishness and roget that we never say our car is selfish when it needs service. We accept it and are even willing to pay for it.

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I Didn’t Know I Was Already an Artist!

Artist's hands moulding clay

A very common question I ask all my clients is, “What would you do if you had no money constraints and didn’t have to work?” It is a good question because it allows the mind to free itself from the constraints of life and allows itself to want, simply want.

In life, instead of learning to want and go for our dreams, we learn to comply, to suppress our wants and do what is expected of us. We are born dreamers. Research says that this is at its peak when we are about 5 years old, starts to decline around 8 and reaches total devastation around 16 years old. By that stage, what seems hard is a “sign” we are not capable of achieving our dreams.

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How to Be a Winner in Life

Balloons raining on a happy woman

Most people these days rush around, trying to get somewhere. They see life as a competition or a game they need to win. They keep wondering how to be a winner in life.

As we evolve and can rise above the survival mode in our life, we all ask the big question “What are we here for?” Looking for reasons for our existence is probably a good sign. Some call it an identity crisis.

I call it an awakening. It’s a point in time when we realize life is a game we play, and we suddenly want to understand it.

Much like any game, we play to win. Losing is no fun and we try to avoid it like the plague. When we’re happy, it feels like we’re winning, and when we’re unhappy, we feel like we’re losing.

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How to Inspire Your Kids’ Natural Kindness

Toddles showing natural kindness to baby

Humans are kind in nature. Just watch young children. They are born with natural kindness. This is the main reason it’s so wonderful to be around children. They constantly give and engage in a way that makes you want to give in return.

Research has found that kindness is contagious. If you want to see it in action, try smiling at people as you pass them on the street. Smiling is an act of kindness! And when you smile, people smile back.

When babies see a puppet show with kind and affectionate characters, followed by rude and mean ones, they prefer the kind puppets. Yes, they were just babies. But they have an innate ability to mirror their surroundings. They can notice the tone of the voice and actions.

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How to Vaporize Psychological Pain with Psychological Painkillers

Bronze sculpture of man holding his head

Everyone understands what physical pain is. And the medical world is full of treatments and painkillers to eliminate this pain. But psychological pain is not that well-known and treating it is a bit more challenging.

Physical pain comes from damage to the tissues of the body. Psychological pain is a suffering with no apparent physical origin. You can even say that all the feelings we don’t like – sadness, grief, anger, contempt, frustration, rage, depression, etc. – are forms psychological pain.

Physical pain is often localized, temporary and associated with some harmful or damaging physical trigger. Psychological pain is a more generalized, lasting, unpleasant feeling resulting from an inability of to cope with emotional challenges. But sometimes, it manifests just like physical pain does.

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Seize the Day: Are You Using or Losing Your Time?

Watch in sand

Time is precious. Some say that time is the only thing we really have. Most people know the expressions “Carpe diem”, “Seize the day” and “Seize the present”, but only few actually live by them.

Time keeps moving forward. Often, we feel like it’s just flown past us and are out of time. So, we need to learn to appreciate the time we have and use it wisely. We all have the same 24 hours every day. We should make the most of them.

We say that children have no concept of time. My 3-year-old granddaughter has reached the stage of recognizing past and present. For her, the past is “yesterday”, and the future is “tomorrow”. That’s advanced for her age, but limited compared to an adult’s understanding of time.

But I wonder about this view.

Read Seize the Day: Are You Using or Losing Your Time? »

100 Great Insights I Got from the Coronavirus

A game of Scrabble with COVID-19 pandemic words

We are going through a very tough period. The challenge we all face with the COVID-19 which touched every aspect of our life, is big. It feels like the Coronavirus took over the world and every person, without discrimination, is impacted whether directly or not.

The virus connected us somehow and we are aware of what is happening to our families, our neighborhood, our communities, our countries and the planet.

But challenges can kill us or heal us, depending on our attitude. The challenge can be the same, but the outcome will be different depending on whether we consider it as an opportunity or as a curse.

Read 100 Great Insights I Got from the Coronavirus »

100 Things to Make on Your Perfect Day

Tree and bench at the peak of a hill

Have you ever tried to dream of a perfect day? It can be a challenge doing it while you’re in the middle of everything going on in your life. This post should help.

Every person has a story. People say that the quality of our life depends on the quality of our story. With that in mind, it is easy to decide whether you have had a good life or not. All you have to do is tell your story.

If the story you tell includes a lot of good thoughts, feelings, actions, behaviors, laughter, love and joy, give yourself a pat on the back. You’ve had a great life.

If you tell a story with a lot of negative thoughts, feelings, actions, resentment, sadness, fear, hate and depression, no one envies you. Your life sucks!

In this post, I would like to suggest a ‘moving forward’ activity. In this activity, you will take yourself forward, to the perfect day and try to imagine, what would happen there that would make you put it into the “perfect” category.

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Home Alone: How Not to Have a Boring Time

The two enemies of human happiness are pain and boredom - Arthur Schopenhauer

Recently, I had the opportunity to experience being by myself for a whole month. My son and my husband went to Africa for a drumming camp and I stayed home with my youngest daughter. She is 17 years old, independent and enjoying her time off between finishing high school and starting acting school, so I was mostly by myself, but I did not have a boring moment.

The last time Gal was away was over 12 years ago, when he went to be with his mother on her last hours and I stayed home with 3 kids. My youngest was 5 years old and I was not by myself at all.

Surprisingly, most of the people who knew Gal was away asked me how I managed being by myself. I didn’t really understand the question.

They asked me if it wasn’t boring to be on my own.

Read Home Alone: How Not to Have a Boring Time »

Success vs. Talent: How I almost made the Olympic team

Gymnast jumping high in the air

Some people think that talent is the only thing we need to succeed in life. I thought so too when I was young. I was very talented in gymnastics and I thought that talent was the only thing I needed. It was very hard for me to realize that talent was just a baseline and guaranteed nothing.

I’m all for helping our children find their talent, but finding it, and even pursuing it, is not enough for success. They need something more.

Not long ago, I had the honor of working with two amazing young athletes on the Australian Olympic team. They were both equally talented and had all the physical skills, but one of them had what it takes to succeed, and the other didn’t.

Working with them reminded me of my Olympic team adventure as a child and why talent is not enough for success.

Read Success vs. Talent: How I almost made the Olympic team »

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