Host: Heather Volchko
Guest: Chirs Zielinski and Claire Kijewski
So, this month, we are talking all about self-care, and not because any of us are experts, but because we are all in the middle of trying to figure it out and learn it as we go. So, with me this month, I'm super excited to have Chris as well as Claire, and we all come at this from completely different angles in completely different seasons of life. So I'm super excited to see where this month goes. Thanks for joining me, Chris and Claire.
Chris:Thanks for having me.
Claire:Yeah, thank you.
All right, so I'm going to kick us off with just what is self-care. Right? Like, we're talking about this whole blueprint, this concept that there's sort of, like, a planful aspect to, you know, we're choosing to care for ourselves while we're caring for other people. But with this concept of a blueprint, it's like there's some intentionality around it. So, what is this that we are prioritizing?
Chris:So you hit the nail on the head with self-care. There is some intentionality, right? When we're looking at how we care for ourselves, how we build ourselves to be resilient individuals, and come at it from different ways. Honestly, there's no one set plan that works for everybody in this. And it will be at different phases, different stages, different approaches. Some things that work for me might not work for either of you, but it's all about taking care of ourselves and keeping ourselves in a balanced place, in my opinion, that we are able to function appropriately and able to meet the obligations that we have around us. It's something that I think is understated, and it's more important than I think we give credit to.
Interesting. What do you think, Claire?
Claire:Well, for me, self-care is kind of like making sure that you are… can recognize when things aren't going good in your life, and you can take that step back and put yourself first. So kind of like being selfish for yourself to be able to prosper and get better and do better for not only yourself, but then I guess others out there as well.
Well, and I love your… the way you're talking about that, too, is saying that there is an aspect of prioritization, but it's temporary. It's like I'm prioritizing this way in this moment so that I can prioritize in a different way in another moment.
Claire:Yeah, I feel like that's for me a lot. Like, because I'm still in school right now. I have to prioritize school before my work, which, even though that sounds like vice versa, that's not my priorities right now, because my priority is to graduate, then to be able to get into the job, and then succeed in those kinds of contexts. So it's literally different for every single person. And then my priorities will switch as soon as I'm out of school. Then my priority will be my job and my career, and so flex.
Chris:So it's like fluid adaptation, right? Where constantly as we're changing as individuals and our experiences are changing, and the obligations and expectations around us and the environment change, so is our self-care needs, right?
Claire:Yeah. There's a lot of other components with it as well, like your mental health and your physical health, and then your emotional health as well. Like those, even though mental and emotional sound more so similar like, they're all different. Like, mental is more like mindfulness and then emotional would be like self-reflection.
Chris: And regulation, right? Recognizing where you're at in that moment. And I agree. And it's, you know, as you look at those different areas, right? All those falling under a blueprint, you know, sometimes, and I've found that I will placate to my strengths oftentimes when I feel that I have to get back and help myself because I'm in a situation where I'm feeling either overwhelmed or I can feel anxiety starting to build.
And oftentimes I'll say, okay, well, I can hit this hard from the physical side, you know, this is what I know what to do. This is the old guard. It's the most common approach for me. And I might do it through jogging, or I might do it through weightlifting. And it's really easy to fall into that pattern of hitting the strengths and, not intentionally, but forgetting that mental or that emotional or even that social side of it, because if any one of those are left unchecked or even left to kind of wither on the vine, it still carries with it the same weight that it would otherwise.
And for me, this is… It's been a very interesting, and I know, Heather, you've known kind of my past and where I've been and what I've done. And it's funny, because I would focus so heavily on the physical side, and you forget the critical importance in all those other areas that you were mentioning in that blueprint. And that’s really important, Claire. I think you hit the nail on the head when you were saying you have all of those other areas that are encompassed in this.
And if you would have asked that question two years ago, I would have said, yeah, I got to do this physical, or I got to focus on these two things, and I'll get right back at it. And that can't be further from the truth.
Yeah, I love what you're saying, and I love that there's this aspect of reflection in here, too. But, I mean, that's Claire, that's exactly what Claire was just talking about, where she's like, well, there is this emotional aspect to it. And so for you, the emotional aspect was basically non-existent. It was brute force it, right? Like, I can stay up later. I can push my body harder. I can work out to compensate for whatever, and just kind of overlooking maybe the emotional aspect of it. And I think, like, there are kind of two camps when it comes to self-care.
One being, you know, if I'm pushing myself constantly in this way. So, like, for me, and a lot of my work is, like, I am mentally pushing myself on the daily. So for my self-care, then I would maybe choose something that's not in that domain. So then maybe for self-care, I'm going to work out or I'm going to spend time with friends, or, you know, I'm going to kind of leverage a different area to sort of balance out kind of my life experience.
The other camp, though, says to be intentional about the exact same area. So if in my work, I am really pushing myself mentally, well, then maybe for self-care, I choose to have moments in my schedule where I am actively not, you know, really pushing mentally and allowing that rest and allowing that pause. I think both, especially in my life, I've had different seasons where I've really needed a combination of a whole variety of different ones. I don't know that I have, like, a “this is the approach for me, and that other one is not for me.” It's definitely come and gone with different seasons of different things that are showing up in kind of the demands on my life and then how I'm both wanting to and able to, which are not always the same, being able to kind of navigate how do I keep myself sane in the midst of, you know, everything else that is going on?
Claire: If you start to neglect one area, you'll start to burn out. And burnout is the point to where you can no longer do anything or have the motivation to complete anything. Maybe that's just me, but burnout is what I never want to go to. So that's why I like to make sure I'm really considering myself and trying to put myself before so I don't burn out.
Chris:Yeah, that is very crucially important. I mean, and as somebody who played that burnout game for a long, long time, the weird part is… It's always… Everybody refers to it as self-care. But the thing that I've learned in this journey of going through this, right? And trying to continuously evolve, it ultimately just makes you a more well-rounded and accessible person to those around you in that process. And as much as people will say, Oh, you're working on yourself, and it's self-care, but the reality of it is, sure, you reap the benefits of what you're working through, but so does everybody else around you. And if you look at the most important things in the fabric of life, we're really here as social creatures. We are here for those around us, for the environments, and the experiences.
And so, yeah, sure, it's self-care, you're right, but it also puts you in a position to be more accessible to those experiences, to those people around you, in a well-regulated state where you're able to actually be present in the moment.
I mean, these are things that we teach to our students all the time, right? Why are we surprised when we don't turn them back around to our own selves?
Claire:I feel like I've heard that in the context of, like, you have to love yourself before you can give love to others. Like, that's exactly that. Like, how are you supposed to do anything for anyone else if, like, you- if your mental is not good, you can't, like, take care of yourself.
Yeah, I mean, another one of those things is the whole, like, you can't pour from an empty cup, right?
Chris:I thought you were gonna go with you gotta put your oxygen mask on first before you put the oxygen mask on everyone else.
See? There you go!
Chris:There you go. I love how the examples get significantly more crisis-related as we went through them, right? But the reality of it is, you cannot overstate the importance of taking care of yourself, really being in tune. And doing this, I mean, when you mentioned it before, Claire, that self-reflection, looking at yourself, constantly keeping it as that balance, not as if it would work, just kind of a litmus test of where you're at.
It's so spot on. And I think oftentimes, at least I can speak for myself that I would lose touch with that due to the obligations or the drive of the things that you have. And education, you know, nobody goes into this profession to be rich. We know that. It's a labor of love all day, every day, in the hopes that what we do will impact people beyond us. And you can get yourself into a situation where you're motivated and you're pushing so hard that you can, you know, you can hit some of these areas hard. You can say, well, I'm working out, so I'm okay, I've got time for this, I've got time for that.
But there can still be that void that pulls you back, and you can get burned out very quickly. And I think it was so wise for you to say constantly reflecting, constantly checking, constantly making sure that that litmus testing is there to make sure you're aware and that it's fluid. And most people we're creatures of habit. We're going to get in that pattern. And the thing is is what worked for me six months ago might not work for me in six months.
And it's easy to get stuck in that rung. And if you don't do those self check ins, if you're not looking at yourself, if you're not doing it from an objective perspective and being jaded by your responsibilities and where you're at in that moment, it's easy to miss things and just keep plugging along, keep chugging, and it can take you one step closer to burnout. Right to the precipice.
Well, I mean, like, I think I'm gonna challenge you for a second here, Chris. Cause, like, you and I both have been in moments where it's like, we see it, we're driving, we're getting there, we're going, right? And there's this “when I get to-”, “when I-”, there's this “somewhere in the future” moment that I then get to lean off the gas. I get to
Chris:“I’ve arrived.”
Right, exactly. Like now, all of a sudden, the push is worth it, and now I can choose self-care. But that's not exactly what you're saying right now. So I'm curious for you, like, connect those dots for me.
Chris:For sure. Absolutely. So the way I used to do it was all compartmentalized, right? And the saying I used to say to you is, I will squeeze every water out of this rock I call life. Right? And knowing me and working with me, that's what I did. And I still thought… In the past, I would think that that was a direct reflection on my abilities and my level of dedication, and what I can do. But the reality of it is, when I would compartmentalize it, and that's what I was: compartmentalizing completely. I would say, okay, this is time for work, and this is time for play, and this is time for self-care. But the reality of it is, if you compartmentalize it and chug and go along and get to a point where you're like, all right, I've made it. I'm going to plant my seed here.
Most of the time, you get to the point and you see something on the horizon and you're constantly chasing that and going. And you can get to a point where you haven't arrived at your destination because that destination is constantly changing. But if you have an ongoing process where you're checking in, I mean, no is one of the smallest words in the English language and one of the hardest to say, especially in education, because, you know, when you're saying no and negating something, maybe it's something that somebody truly, absolutely needed.
And so you confound yourself with all these yeses, and you can bury yourself with them, but it can absolutely wreck you mentally or emotionally, or socially in those things. And you've created this inadvertent barrier around you. And so the way I used to look at a lot of things is that destination, get to that point, get to here, get to there. But the reality of it is, I figured out, and you and I working together, I'll be honest with you, helped me realize it's never going to end, the race will never end. You're going to continue moving that flag further and further. It'll never be enough.
And you got to take care of yourself along the way. And I think if you can interject that incrementally throughout that journey, it's going to change not only your pacing, but it's going to change your outlook on things. It's going to make you more available. And let's be behavioral. It's going to reintroduce things that are strong reinforcers to you in this world that you may have neglected, overlooked, but you got to stop. And what’d you use to say, you gotta stop and take a look around you to see the field you're standing in, right?
Stop, pick your head up. Pick your head up and look around.
Chris:Because you can get so blindsided and so tunnel vision. We have to take care of ourselves to take care of others.
That's so true, though, in any human services, right? I know we're talking about it from the educator side or from the school side, but anyone in human services and behavior analyst, no matter what field we're in, nursing is just as big, right? Like, anybody who is in that over, like, my field is caring for humans. And that's where, Claire, I love your perspective on this because you're coming straight in hot out of school, being like, I am not gonna screw this up on day one.
And me and Chris are over here being like, dude, we screwed up.
Chris:Yeah. Like, we got caught in the mode of work and that push, but so wise beyond your years, you have no idea. I wish I was saying this ten years ago, 15 years ago.
Claire:I view my parents as well. I see them working so hard every single day, and they still, to this day, work nine-to-fives every single day. Working, getting up. And I look at them and I'm like, how are you doing this for 40 years? Like, I am tired after two years of it. I graduated my undergrad two years ago, so I've been working full-time since then, and I'm already tired. So, if I was recognizing that right off the bat, I was like, I need to take a step back for myself and start putting myself first, because it's not gonna be good for my future if I don't truly love what I'm going into. And I do because ABA, and ever since high school, I've been, this is the only thing that's ever clicked for me. So I want to make sure I have that passion.
Chris:You can change the world with ABA. I truly believe it. I truly believe it.
Claire:I loved it since the moment I learned about it. And I didn't even learn about it until my freshman year of college because I went in undecided.
Chris:Yeah. And I think as we're talking about that self-care going through this, there has to be a level of intentionality to it. This isn't something that you stumble into. You can't fake it till you make it, because the reality of it is sometimes you will take yourself down a path to a point where you stand up, you look around where you're at in the field, and you're lost as hell, let's be honest. And then you really have to figure out what you need to do to get out of that. You've backed yourself into a corner. So as you're doing it incrementally and going through that process, right?
Checking in with yourself, just like what you were saying before, making sure all those changes. And it's not a chore in the beginning, it's weird. For me. It was weird. I was like, I'm just going to plug through this. Eventually, like everything else, it will subside, right? But the thing that hit me, as crazy as it is, is that higher understanding of, even though the listing is self-care, it really has the larger impact on the world around you because of who you are, who you become and what you're able to be available for when you're doing it than it does for you. It just, it, well-rounds you as an individual, let's be honest. It gives you skills and coping strategies and stuff. But where that pay dirt is, is past you.
It really is. And I had a moment, and I've told this story to you, Heather, many times, where I was in the thick of a lot of stuff, working in education, a lot of hours. And my daughter said something to me about dinner time, and she turned to me and said, Hey, do you know that in the last month or so you've only eaten with the family maybe twice a week, maybe once a week because you're constantly working?
And it was in the conversation of, hey, what do you guys want to do when you get older? We were talking about pipe dreams, and my one daughter is ruthless and, as awesome as it was said, what do you do, Dad? I don't want to do that. And I was like, what? I love my job. But then the reality kicked in as like, man, I let myself go without taking care of myself to a point where I'm no longer as available to others around me.
I haven't checked in with myself. I haven't made sure that I'm taking all these other areas, like the emotional side, right? The social side of it. And even if I dipped hard on the physical side, you know what? When you work out, you kind of do it alone, right? And so you have to have that balance. And that was the moment where it was like, this is really not about me. It is about me. But it's really not. But it is.
I love that. It's like this little tiny behavior analyst being like, What do you do? Oh, that. Well, I've been doing that on you. I've been taking data, and your dinner frequency count is not okay.
Chris:Right, right, right. Exactly. We have dipped below the criteria for success, my friend.
Yes. Well, hey, I think I'm going to pause this conversation because that leads straight in where we're headed next week. So next week, this is not all just easy, right? It is full of pros and cons and hard choices, and trying to figure out how to have priorities when all of them seem like the priority. And truly, like, there's just a lot of things that get in the way of choosing to engage in self-care, and that's where we're at next week.
