Taking care of yourself in 2025
My therapist said: "it's not you, it's grind culture," and I don't think I've ever felt something more deeply in my soul.
It's 2025 and it feels like the world keeps spinning faster.
Hop on social media and it seems like everyone is doing something - getting a big promotion, starting their own company, getting married, having kids, running a marathon, going to Australia, so on so forth. FOMO (the fear of missing out, if you weren't already familiar) has never been more real.
At the same time, everyone who is achieving is struggling. There's never enough time in the day - we're limited by the planetary constraints of 24/7/365. Between demanding careers and personal commitments, how do we pull it all off?
List it
Don't let yourself get crazy in your head - plot it down on a piece of paper (frazzled thoughts completely fine). Once you have it all down, start planning and prioritising or deprioritising what needs to be done. Prioritise things that are important to you, but also deprioritise things that have no specific due date.
Self care
Schedule time to take care of yourself - and make sure to do both the necessary things (like meal prepping, or working out) as well as the things you enjoy (getting a coffee with friends or a massage, or that weekly sauna trip, etc.). Figure out what time of the day you prefer taking to yourself. Do you feel more zen in the early mornings, or are you someone who wants 15 minutes to wind down in the evenings? Prioritise yourself, because if you break down, all those priorities are going out the door anyway - and no one wants to be un-necessarily sick in bed.
Listen to yourself
If your body is exhausted and you had a workout planned - skip it! That's not to say you should be skipping things like workouts or meals because you're feeling lazy, but you shouldn't be forcing yourself to push through a strenous workout when your body's telling you that it desperately needs a break.
Boundaries, boundaries, boundaries
Having such easy connections to our phones can be both a blessing and a curse - it's often too easy to cross boundaries and saying yes to things that can overwhelm us. Start by figuring out what boundaries you'd like to set - whether that be you're not contactable between certain hours to keep a consistent bedtime routine, or leave your phone at home or in your gym locker when you're having a workout.
Conclusion
Creating a routine that takes care of you will take discipline, but is an essential for sustaining long-term success and well-being. Caring for yourself is something you'll need to do for your entire lifetime, and its key to nourish the things that make you feel alive - work is not the point! If you are still finding it hard to cope with your stress and life demands, it may be time to seek outside help from a licenced mental health professional.