Environmental Self-Care to Improve Wellbeing

What is Environmental Self-Care

Environmental self-care is ensuring that the spaces you spend time in are nurturing and supportive of you. This includes everything from your home, to work, car and even your community.

It also includes your interaction with nature. Nature is healing on many levels and when we surround ourselves with it, we heal by simply being there.

Why is Environmental Self-Care Important

When we don’t love where we live or are stressed by the cluttered chaos of our home, we can’t do our best. If you come home from a long day of work and your living room is full of laundry that needs to be put away. You sit down on the couch and start scrolling social media with the TV on – your mind and body will not be able to relax.

In fact, it can prevent you from mental clarity. Research has shown that the extra visual distraction from clutter puts us into cognitive overload and can reduce working memory. Our systems can only handle so much at one time. And your items around you can impact how much this is.

I know for myself when I am struggling to focus if I do a quick cleanup of my space, it is easier to work and think clearly.

Where to Start with Environmental Self Care

How do you even know where to start? Do an environmental assessment to see what stresses you out.

Walk through your home and jot down everything the bothers you. Do the same with your workplace, car and the any other areas outside your home where you spend time. For example, if you go to your parents’ place a lot add it to the assessment.

Include on your list the stuff in your space, the air, the energy – everything that impacts you.

For example, you may live in a busy downtown area. When you step outside pay attention to how you feel. Is there something that instantly stresses you? Or do you love the art installation across from you? 

While you might not immediately be able to fix a situation, having an inventory of what doesn’t work for you allows you to address each one when you have time.

You can also approach this by picking an area you have been struggling with and checking to see if the environment is part of the problem.

For example, are you struggling to sleep? What is going on in your bedroom? Is it cluttered? Do you like the aesthetics? Is the air vent blocked and putting out dust and very little air? Is your bed uncomfortable? These can all be addressed with some environmental self-care!

Once you have your list you can start to solve the problems that impact you the most. Remember things do change over time, so you may need to do this assessment again. Even if you live in the same space.

Ideas for Environmental Self-Care

The following are some ideas to get you started on ​your environmental self-care.

Home Environment

De-clutter

This is one of the best things you can do for your space to feel better. While it can be difficult because it can be emotional and time consuming. Here are some tips to help you manage it.

• Start small – don’t try and de-clutter the entire house at one time. Start in one room with one closet. Or even just one drawer. This will help you make slow and steady progress while managing any emotions that come up.
• Recruit a friend that is good at releasing things. We all have varying levels of hording, if you like to keep everything but your best friend tosses everything, ask her to help.
• ​Have a Maybe Box – if you aren’t sure if you want to part with something have a maybe box. This box is put in the garage or attic with a date on it. If you don’t go for it by that time, you can get rid of it.
• Understand what your motivation is. When you have a motivating factor, it can be easier to clear the clutter. For example, if you want to clear the excess stuff from your guest room so you can set up a workspace. List out your reasons you want this and post them on the wall. Then when you are struggling to de-clutter the room you just look at the paper and remember why!

Organize

Along with de-cluttering you can organize your space. When you are organized it is easier to find things and it makes everything look nicer. And remember it will help you have better mental functioning.

Here are some of my favorite organizing tools.

Bring in Things You Love

Hate that old couch that shows the stains from your college days? Time to let it go! You want to fill your space with things that make you smile.

When you don’t even like what you spend hours a day with it is hard for any of your other self-care to even work!

Pick one room you don’t like and start to slowly replace what you don’t like with what you do.

Low on budget? Start small with artwork. Then, as you save for bigger items buy quality ones you love. This way you won’t feel the need to rush out and replace them next year. Also consider looking at Facebook marketplace to find things you like for lower costs.

Plants

Plants are great for freshening the air. This is a big benefit if you live in an older home that has poor ventilation. They add oxygen and can help with allergies. For more information on the benefits of plants.

The following plants are great for purifying the air (If you have pets, please check toxicity first. Some of these are poisonous to animals.)

• Bamboo Palm
• Ficus Alli
• Spider plant
• Pothos
• Peace Lilly
• Snake Plant

Work Environment

This one is more difficult to do if you don’t control space planning, air quality or even where you sit. But you can adjust your workspace. Keep it clean and organized. Bring in a small plant. Or add pictures and office supplies that you love.

Depending on your work situation you can ask your boss for adjustments to make it better for you. Or even ask if you can do some remote work (assuming your home has a good environment.)

As you are doing this, take into consideration how you work. Do you like to spread out and have lots of paper piles? Can you get boxes to store the papers in when not in use to make the less cluttered? Can you have a screen that you can pull to hide the papers?

You want the space to function to how you operate, not just look pretty. Pretty is good, but if it hinders how, you work it doesn’t really matter.

City Environment

I understand that it is hard to up and move. But if you strongly dislike where you live, it is hard to thrive. I have lived in places that I didn’t like; in fact, they down right drained me. Until I could move, I had to adapt to survive till then.

Here is how I did it:

• Travel – I know it is not always an option, but I did make it a point to go to places I did like and find nurturing. Travel can have a big emotional healing impact on you. So, even if for just a weekend try and get away.
• Find the places within the city you like. I once lived in a place that had very little pretty outdoor space. But I kept looking and found a handful of parks that I could go to for renewal. I did have to drive for about an hour, but it was worth it! It doesn’t have to be outside; it could be a beautiful theater you like going to, or a museum that brings you joy.

You could also consider moving to a town close by that wouldn’t require you to change work. But that better fits your personal needs. Decide if the town swap is worth the drive, because that can be its own type of draining.

Get Out in Nature

Nature is healing! Many studies have been done on the benefits of being in nature for mental health, physical health and more. So, get outside for a little nature self-care. This will also help you with grounding, so you are better off in all areas! Learn more about grounding.

Bonus points for helping the environment so we can all have a healthier environment when we do go outside.

Here are some ideas:

• Walk at a park
• Plant a garden
• Recycle
• Compost
• Go swimming – water adds an extra level of healing to nature. So, get out and swim – even if it is just standing in a pool staring at a tree! When you do this in an ocean or lake, you also get the benefits of grounding.

Space & Land Spiritual Tending

Beyond the aesthetics of a space, it is also impacted by your energy, those that live with you and spiritual issues. Just as you may encounter a curse, a possession or bad energy so does your home and land.

Beyond those you may also have portals, vortexes, dimensional impacts and more. Healing in a space with these issues becomes very difficult. Just as you heal something personal, you may pick up something new. Or you can’t make progress, because the energy of the space blocks you from seeing what you need.

I have had the unfortunate experience of living in a place that had these spiritual problems. I was constantly picking up beings, having health issues and more. It was so bad that I trained in space and land tending just to attempt to keep my place cleared.

So, how do you keep your environment spiritually clean? Here are some simple things that will help with the everyday build up and small issues. Bigger issues typically require professional clearing.

• Chimes near your entrances to keep the entries clear.
• Use Palo Santo in a mister to clear out negative energies. This is good to do once a week, or when the space feels negative.
• Reiki – you can play a recording from YouTube to tend your space while you are away. This will work for basic cleaning.
• Rattle – negative energies can accumulate in the corners of rooms. You can rattle and ask for the energy to clear out. It doesn’t have to be a specific rattle and can even be a container with something in it that makes the same sound. For example, a plastic Tupperware with some nails in it.

Making sure you like the environment you are in will help you not only function better but help your other self-care practices be more effective and your healing will go faster. If you don’t go home to a messy house after yoga, you can maintain that relaxed energy longer!

Environmental self-care helps all areas function better. So, go ahead and make your self-care plan now!