In partnership with

Tuesday

Welcome to Tuesday! Today, we're diving into:

• Caring for ourselves with the hierarchy of needs

• How to decide what kind of self-care to prioritize

• Your free, unbiased news source

• The benefits of taking breaks for snacks and meals

• Restore your youthful glow

What to Know About the Hierarchy of Needs

If you’ve ever taken a psychology class, you may be familiar with the concept of the hierarchy of needs.

This concept was first introduced by Abraham Maslow, and is rooted in the belief that to reach our full potential and achieve what we want in life, we have to fulfill needs in a certain order.

These needs are often described in a pyramid of five sections, from bottom to top, with the most “basic” needs on the bottom.

As they’d appear from the bottom up in the pyramid, these needs include:

• Physiological: These are our most basic needs, including food, water, shelter, clothing, air, and more.

• Safety: This may include our health, financial stability, and overall safety from danger and harm.

• Social belonging: This includes love and a sense of belonging and acceptance among our family, friends, peers, communities, and more.

• Esteem: This is related to accomplishing things and feeling valued by others for our contributions.

• Self-actualization: This is when people are focused on personal fulfillment and growth.

While this is often referenced in psychology, it’s also a powerful and interesting tool to consider as we care for ourselves.

There are some basic self-care needs we need to meet before we can do others! After all, it may be extremely difficult trying to find the energy to hang out with friends when we aren’t adequately fueled or rested.

That’s not to say it’s all black-and-white, but it’s a great place to start, especially when you feel like you haven’t made self-care a priority for a while (more on that below).

How to Decide What Self-Care You Need When it’s Been Put on the Backburner

There are times when we all have likely put self-care on the back burner. For some of us, that may happen more often than we’d like.

When you feel like you’ve put it off for so long, where do you even begin? How do you know where to start?

First and foremost, taking inspiration from Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, it’s important to be sure that your basic self-care needs are met.

Fuel your body, take a shower, get some rest, and do whatever else you need to care for your physical self.

Then consider all the different pillars of self-care — emotional, physical, mental, social, environmental, financial, and spiritual — and ask yourself what you may need in each of those categories.

Next, it may be helpful to create a self-care checklist and rank things in order of how important they are to you, how pressing they are, or what would make you feel best.

For example, one person may prioritize having a little bit of time to themselves to unplug first, while another may want to dive deep into environmental self-care and get caught up on chores around the home. Another may want to recharge with some social self-care.

This is definitely where we can stray from that hierarchy of needs or even get two things done at once!

For example, you may decide to grab a meal with a loved one, which empowers you to fuel your body and get some needed social interaction at the same time.

Don’t expect that it’s all going to get done in one day. Just prioritize what would feel best for you.

For Those Who Seek Unbiased News.

Be informed with 1440! Join 3.5 million readers who enjoy our daily, factual news updates. We compile insights from over 100 sources, offering a comprehensive look at politics, global events, business, and culture in just 5 minutes. Free from bias and political spin, get your news straight.

Join for free today!

Thank you to 1440 for sponsoring Note To Self. 

The Benefits of Carving Out Times for Meals and Snacks

In our constantly busy world, it’s not uncommon to hear people say they’re doing a working lunch or skipping it altogether.

While it may be unavoidable at times, there are some very real benefits to carving out time dedicated just for meals and snacks when possible:

• Forces you to slow down and take a break — whether it's from work or other busy activities: Even if it’s just a few minutes, this gives us a chance to breathe and step away from other tasks.

• Engage in mindfulness: This helps us be present and stay engaged with our meals — especially on a busy day!

• Strengthen your mind-body connection: When we sit down and eat, undistracted, it helps us improve the relationship between our mental and physical selves, getting more in tune with our hunger and fullness cues, and more!

• Improve your relationship with food: This can help us develop a more positive relationship with food, as we dedicate time just to fuel our bodies.

Challenge yourself to carve out times for meals and snacks when possible instead of working through them!

Restore Your Youthful Glow

Parting Thoughts

• ✅ Did You Know: Maslow proposed his hierarchy of needs in 1943! This has had a large impact on psychology and continues to be referenced widely today!

• 🙋🏼‍♀️ Snapshot Of The Day: We'd love to see moments from our readers lives that they are proud of! If you recently accomplished an achievement, experienced a joyful moment, or are proud of a picture you have taken, be sure to capture it on camera and send it to us for a chance to be featured next week! 

• 💭 Final Self-Care Thoughts for Today: Before you sit down to journal, meditate, or do another mental self-care task, be sure your physical and basic needs are met!

Enjoying Note to Self?

Know of a great self-care tip or article you'd love to share with the community? Want to send us pictures of you completing one of your self-care rituals? Email us at [email protected]!