Growing up, I had an insatiable desire to accomplish things. When I was one year old, I sat on my kitchen floor and placed hair clips up and down my legs, one clip at a time. Then I patiently took the clips off, one at a time, and put them back in the tin. My mom said I did this for hours at a time.
When I got a bit older, reading became my passion. I checked out 20+ books at a time from the library and devour them in a few days. Then I entered them into my “Book List, where I organized every book by author, title, number of pages, and my critical Four Star” review method.
I was one of those kids who went over to my friends” houses and organized their rooms, instead of playing with them. By the time I was done with their rooms my friends” shelves would be clean, their Legos organized into piles, and their books arranged by color and publisher.
Let”s just say that the moms loved me, and the kids thought I was really, really weird. Looking back, I”m amazed I had any friends at all!
In high school and college, a 4.0 GPA became my goal. After graduating from college, I decided to run a marathon, even though I”d never run more than 1.5 miles in my life.
You get the picture! I”ve always been a hard worker. According to my mom, I came out of the womb like that. I like to achieve, accomplish, keep lists, and see progress. Work has always come easy to me.
So, when I started my health counseling business a few years ago, it was a match made in heaven. My business was an entity that could keep growing and growing. There were plenty of projects to undertake, clients to find, websites to write, and books to write. The sky was the limit!
In the first few months, I achieved a lot. But I was exhausted, wiped out, drained, and having NO fun at all. I realized that, while I was very good at working, I had NO idea how to play. I quickly learned that a health counselor who”s all work and no play is not a very good health counselor at all.
Oh, I tried to play! I forced myself to turn off my laptop by 8:00, and then I would sit and stare at the blank screen, trying to come up with an idea of something I could do for fun. Just for me. Just for pleasure.
And I”d continue to stare at the screen, totally perplexed. I could not – for the life of me – come up with anything fun to do. I just didn”t know what that would be. The only “fun” I knew came from crossing things off my to-do list.
Since I couldn”t think of anything fun to do, I”d just turn the computer back on and continue my work. Work was comfortable. Work was familiar. Work was easy.
This went on for weeks. It was obvious that I needed help.
Then something happened.
I went back through some assignments that the Institute of Integrative Nutrition gave those of us who were in the advanced “Immersion Program.” In those notes, I found my answer.
My answer was “The Self Nourishment Menu, the brainchild of Karen Witzig of WildWomanWellness.com.
Karens notes said, “Sometimes it”s hard to find a reward, when we aren”t used to doing this. Create a Menu of things to choose from to reward yourself.”
Ah ha! This menu idea made sense to an overachiever like me! That night, I started creating my Nourishment Menu, and before long, I was hooked. I went home to CA to visit my family, and I asked everyone there for ideas of rewards that I could add to my Menu. When I returned to Boston, I asked my clients to contribute their ideas.
My initial 10-item list grew to 8+ pages of pure nourishment and pleasure! Every day, I scanned the list to find the one thing I wanted to do for pure pleasure and fun.
Think of the Nourishment Menu like a menu you receive when you sit down at a restaurant. Sometimes, when you sit down at a restaurant, you don”t know what you want to order. You just know you”re hungry. As soon as you scan the menu, one or two dishes stand out. Pretty soon, there”s one dish that”s calling your name. You finish scanning the menu and declare, “Yes, that”s EXACTLY what I want to eat right now.”
Now, imagine that we”re talking about pleasure… instead of restaurant food. Sometimes, you know you need some intense pleasure and fun to help you recover from a rough workday or workweek. But you”re having trouble coming up with the perfect thing to do.
So, you turn on the TV or check email. But at the end of the day, you don”t feel fulfilled because TV or email did not feed your soul. You settled for a half-pleasure, when your soul need full pleasure!
In those instances, let the Nourishment Menu serve as your guide. It contains a list of the things that are pure pleasure for you. Pure fun. Pure bliss. Some of the things on your Nourishment Menu will take 30 seconds, others will take 3 hours. Some cost money, others don”t. The list contains all of the things, events, people, and experiences that nourish your soul and make you feel really good!
Everything on the list should be fun enough to tempt you away from mindless TV and distract you from post-work emails. Everything on the list should be blissful enough to make you sigh with delight when you read it. It”s best if you have lots of variety in your list, so you can meet all of your moods and desires.
The Menu that will help you think up rewards for yourself, even if it”s been a long time since you”ve done anything for yourself.
This month, your experiment is to create your own Nourishment Menu. Fill it with lots of ways to reward yourself, pleasure yourself, and tempt yourself. When you”re done with the list, don”t bury it in the back of your file cabinet. Display it proudly wherever you will see it everyday. Color it, put stickers on it, make it look gorgeous.
Every day this week, pick something from your Menu and make it happen. Don”t worry about picking the “right” thing. There”s no such thing as perfectionism when it comes to the Nourishment Menu. The goal is not to pick the perfect item. The goal is to create space in your daily schedule for intentional self-care and pleasure. Let the Menu be your guide!
I know that this can be hard to do… most of my clients have a tough time with this at first. “It”s been such a long time since I thought about things that would give me pleasure, they say.
If youre having a hard time coming up with ideas… just ask other people for suggestions. Every time I give a seminar on self-care, I ask my participants to email me their 10-item Nourishment Menu. That way, my Menu is always growing! And those who email me new ideas receive access to my master Nourishment Menu.
You can do the same. Email me your Nourishment Menu items! The more rewards/pleasures you send my way, the longer the Nourishment Menu will be! Don”t be shy… let me know what your pleasure is!
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