What Wellness Looks Like After survival Mode
Each time I scrolled through social media, I saw countless videos preaching this thing called "wellness”. Suffering from burnout? Wellness. Stressed to the max? Wellness. Heartbroken? Wellness. Gaining weight? Wellness.
Always a recovery plan, never the preventative care.
But when you’ve lived your entire life operating in survival mode, you become the ultimate grand supreme in functioning while overwhelmed. Little did I know, I was exhausting my body because it felt familiar. I didn’t recognize it as stress because it was my norm. Walking around carrying this heavy load, thinking it was featherweight because it’s been on your shoulders for so long.
Now, I’ve reached a point where my body speaks back to me, and I hear her–through anxiety, insomnia, chronic fatigue, brain fog, and emotional numbness. And I fear it may be time to learn what preventative wellness is all about, because I am dog-tired of trying to recover from moving in a way that’s no longer sustainable. Really, it was never sustainable.
How Survival Mode Becomes an Identity
People tell you all the time that you need to rest. Take better care of yourself. Practice self-care. For someone living in survival mode, you quite literally need to be taught how to do those things. Like sat on a couch, someone’s hands wrapped over yours, constant eye contact, told: “If you keep moving this way, you won’t have much time left.”
And because my analytical brain craves answers and direction, I needed a system I could function within while I learned these skills. An SOP–standard operating procedure–that would allow me to breathe from deep within. For me, it was six areas that would allow me to live the life I’ve only dreamed about.
1. Rest
I don’t want to wait until I’m tired before resting. Instead, I want to learn how to incorporate it into the essence of my life. I even got a Brick for my phone to take away the distractions preventing me from doing so.
Earlier bedtimes
Reading before sleep
Quiet mornings
Evenings with nothing planned
Taking PTO without guilt
Protecting my weekends
The question: “What would my life look like if rest were preventative instead of reactive?”
2. Movement
Movement has to become a support for my life, not a path to fix it. I move because it feels good and can stay consistent through the heat of summer and the cold of winter.
Walking
Pilates
Strength Training
The question: “What can I realistically maintain during the school year?”
3. Nourishment
Nourished bodies are able to recover before there’s something to recover from.
Protein
Fruits
Fiber
Vegetables
Supplements
Hydration
The question: “What helps me feel my best?”
4. Creativity
Something I’ve learned since becoming a self-published author is that creating stories regulates me. Writing is a part of my wellness, but during this season of transition, it’s the part most likely to get left behind, receiving whatever energy was left behind. Not anymore. For someone else, creativity could be :
Painting
Gardening
Music
Photography
Crafting
The question: “What do I create when I let ideas flow freely?”
5. Relationships
Healing requires community, one that feels safe, supportive, and reciprocal. Including the relationship with yourself.
The question: “Who leaves me feeling more like myself?”
6. Purpose
Purpose is the reason we keep progressing forward. For me, purposes look like writing books, building Sweet Freckled Olives, creating stories, and helping people feel seen.
The question: “Does this support the life I’m building, or the one I’m trying to leave?”
The 4-Week Reset
Since I’m writing this during my summer break, I’ve decided to experiment with this guide on myself.
Week One: Regulate – focus on sleep, water, walking, and writing
Week Two: Rebuild – add strength training, nourishing meals
Week Three: Reconnect – focus on self-dates, community, nature, and joy
Week Four: Revisit – refine so that it lasts through the busyness of the school year
The Takeway
As I said before, I viewed wellness as a means to fix myself. Now, I see it as support, because I view myself as someone worthy of care. I have a lot of goals we’ll get into another day, but I fully believe I’ll never be able to enjoy them if I’m not fully in a place to do so. So stay tuned. For the next four weeks, I’m putting this guide into practice, then spilling what worked, what didn’t, and what I’m taking with me into the next season.
