Do you experience moments of overwhelm, stress, anxiety?
Do you experience maybe burnout or of experience burnout before and you're trying to avoid it?
Well, I'll tell you this is exactly where I was at in my life when I had a stroke at the age of 39 caused by stress.
And I knew I had to change some things and now I take my self-care routine very, very seriously.
So today's episode is all about my personal two-hour burnout-busting self-care routine.
I know, two hours is a lot, but really what I want you to get out of this is really what you can do to set up the perfect stress burnout-busting routine for yourself.
It doesn't necessarily have to be two hours, but I'll get into why I do that.
So let's start talking about a perfect self-care routine for you.
[Music]
You're listening to the SoulAlign Self-Care Podcast.
I'm your host, Tina Stinson, and I had a stroke at the age of 39 from stress and burnout that shook my world.
Now I'm laying it all out, the deep-level self-care practices and mindset shifts that I needed that kept me healthy, balanced, and thriving.
Join me in this intimate space as we explore healing, resilience, and a soul's journey to alignment.
This is where real conversations about deep-level self-care happen.
Let's get into it.
[Music]
Hey guys, welcome back to the SoulAlign Self-Care Podcast.
This is your first time here, then welcome.
I am so excited and very honored that you're joining me today and spending time with me.
Today I'm talking about my personal burnout-busting self-care routine.
And I'm very excited to share this with you because I think it is so important to put your self-care first
to keep your stress levels at a minimum and to avoid burnout at all costs.
We don't really want to go there, right?
But I really want to start out by telling you and making a full disclosure, right?
I'm very serious about my self-care.
I almost died from a stroke when I was 39 years old, caused by just burnout, stress, anxiety, like years and years of intense stress.
So I feel like self-care for me is just survival, okay?
Not that I'm in survivor mode, but it's a necessity for me. It's not a luxury.
I do believe everyone should think of their own self-care this way before they end up in a state of dis-ease.
Somehow, I'm not saying everyone's going to have a stroke, but it shows up in people in different ways.
You know, when you're really stressed over long periods of time, it could show up as high blood pressure.
It could show up as insomnia, it could show up as migraines, it could show up as autoimmune disease.
It could show up as just any way dis-ease shows up in your body.
When you're in that state of, I don't know what you want to call it, well, stress, fight or flight, panic, I don't know, survival mode,
it's not good for your body.
So that's why I think this is really important.
I do believe that women have more trouble putting their self-care first, right?
We are taught, or I should say, program from a young age to be the caregivers of others, to take care of everybody else first
before, you know, ourselves.
Sometimes we never even care for ourselves.
And there's a lot of women that wear this as a badge of honor.
Like it's honorable to just serve everyone else and never take care of yourself
to the point of burnout, stress, and as I said, dis-ease in the body.
Putting yourself care first is often looked at a selfish in our society.
And I think that needs to change.
I do feel a shift in this coming.
I definitely see with the younger generations, they do a little bit better than the older generations, like myself.
We're beginning to realize that when we care for ourselves at the deepest, most loving level,
we get to share that healed, relaxed, happy, secure person with everybody else.
We get to share that version of ourselves with everybody else.
We get to show up better.
So I start this podcast by sharing this with you because I practice a lot of self-care most mornings.
And I've made this a norm in my life.
Some people might think it's a lot, but this podcast isn't about following my self-care routine
exactly to the tee.
It's meant to inspire you to find the perfect one for you.
Also, some days I have a lot going on.
And if I'm super excited about doing something, not stressed, but excited to get into something,
I have something planned, I'll just do a short routine so I could start sooner.
But if I'm stressed, even if I don't feel like I have the time,
I know that I need this routine.
And I will often create a better day for myself because I practice my morning self-care routine.
It's not always easy to do.
It doesn't feel,
sometimes it doesn't feel like the right direction to go in when you're stressed in your short-on time.
But overall, you end up saving time because you go into your day as a better version of yourself
and you handle things better.
So also, I want to add that I'm self-employed.
So I realize that I have more control over my time.
And so, when you're listening to this podcast,
keep that in mind, everybody has a different situation.
So not everybody can do the exact same self-care routine.
Some people work nights, some people work shifts, right?
And so you have to find what works for you.
So when I started this business, I was in my 50s, okay?
And the intention I had was to create something I loved that would be my retirement job, so to speak.
Something fun, something purposeful, something location independent,
and I didn't want to work that that many hours.
Now, I have a choice.
Sometimes I do work a lot of hours in a week.
Most times I don't, okay?
And I perfect this more and more every year.
It reduces much friction as much waste as I possibly can to make my work really, really efficient.
And enjoyable.
It was very, very intentional and it took years to get it just right.
And as a matter of fact, it's always changing because I'm always changing.
So be patient with yourself when you're trying to create something that's perfect for you.
Sometimes shifting into this mindset and setting yourself up for success takes time,
intention, and patience, but it is so worth it on the other side.
I'm so happy.
I set my business up this way.
Now, I sold real estate for 15 years and I also had a dog sitting business
towards the end of that 15 year period.
I know that was crazy.
When I did this work, I had very little say in when my free time was, right?
I did however learn to make the most of my free time when it happened to show up.
When I first started selling real estate, I remember just sitting around waiting for appointments
and not taking advantage of that space, right?
Because it didn't feel like I had enough time to do anything within that space.
I know there's people out there who know what this feels like.
It's like you have plans at three o'clock in the afternoon.
You feel like you can't do anything for most of the day before that
because you have to do these plans, right?
But what I did learn was to, you know,
be creative with this time.
I took advantage of it.
It took practice because I wasn't getting exactly what I wanted when I wanted.
So it really, it took a lot of practice for me.
But when I released that expectation and took the free time and enjoyed it when I had it,
I was much happier.
So be open to when you can squeeze in some of your self-care routine, okay?
I love that I get to do what I want during my mornings,
but it wasn't always this way for me for many, many years.
There were many years where I would have to get a bit five o'clock in the morning and rush out the door
and then sometimes work until 10 o'clock at night, okay?
And so get creative, squeeze it in when you can,
and slowly transition over to what you want.
So I didn't want to work like that.
So I slowly transitioned, as I said, it took years to what I wanted.
If you keep your sights on what you want, you will get it, okay?
Now, I'm starting off by saying this because
I know that my two-hour burnout busting
self-care routine in the morning is a little ridiculous.
I know it's not reasonable for most people,
but as I said at the beginning, I want to, this is really to inspire people to create one
in all the nooks and crannies of your life where you have that space to throw some self-care in.
One of the first things I do is cater my schedule to when I'm at my best, okay?
So when I'm creating my schedule for work, I do not like doing any sessions before 11 or after four,
especially in the winter. Sometimes in the summer, I work later,
but as soon as it gets dark out, I'm off.
Like, I'm not 100% me.
So this is when I do my calls between 11 and four, because I know,
you know, I do this for myself, but also for my clients,
because I will show up at my best for them at these times.
I do make exceptions sometimes, but not very often.
I also only work Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday,
and sometimes I close off Mondays too when it's slow.
So I slowly set up my business to be exactly what I wanted, even though,
even if I thought it sounded ridiculous, I think that if you really want to make something work,
you will. And I have. And so I'm really happy to show up as the best version of myself for others.
This is self-care inside of my business.
Now, with all that said, let me share with you my favorite,
favorite way to start my day. One that keeps my stress levels,
like really low, and it keeps me happy and content.
Okay? I'm an early riser.
I actually love getting up early. I love getting up before the sun comes up.
And I don't set in alarm, but I still wake up around, usually around five or six.
I just love it. I get to see the sunrise. I listen to the birds waking up the world.
I love to keep my window cracked even when it's cold, so I can hear the birds.
I'll make some coffee, and then I get right back into bed for cuddles with my dog, Melee.
And I usually read or journal first thing in the morning.
But it's a routine that I've had for a couple of years now.
And I don't think I could ever go back.
I always have a couple of different books that I'm reading, because a lot of people ask me what I read.
I read all kinds of stuff from, you know, self-help books to like the dragon and fairy books.
Like I read it all. I have I read a lot. I'm a very avid reader. I have no idea how many books
I read a year, but I read a lot. I'm always reading at least ten books at once, okay?
So it just depends on what kind of mood I'm in.
And then my journaling always kind of consists of a list of everything I want to do that day.
I love making lists. So if you're like obsessed with lists as I am, some people hate lists, but
I love making lists. And I write everything down. I write down like meditation, yoga, you know,
whatever I'm going to do that day, whatever I want to do. I write down the work I want to complete
that day, but I also write down some things I want to do that are fun, okay? And I think it's important
to include fun. I also write out ideas that I have that I want to bring into my business or my life,
solutions that I'm looking for. I kind of talk it out with myself on paper. It's kind of like a
therapy session with myself. I also write out what I want to experience for the day. So when I'm
feeling lazy, and I don't feel like writing, I'll actually just like talk to myself. I know I sound
crazy, but at my age, I've just ran out of shits. I just don't give a shit anymore how crazy I sound.
So I believe that happened around 2020. I don't know. I just don't care.
And I have trouble doing like visualizations and stuff like that. So talking my visualizations
outside out loud really helps me. So whatever I want to bring into my life, sometimes if writing
doesn't work, I speak it out loud. Sometimes I'll pull a tarot card in the morning. I think that's
so much fun. I usually share these tarot cards with my community. I pull a card once a week for my
self-care community that I have on Patreon. If you haven't been over there, definitely check it out.
I'll put a link in the show notes. It's called Soul Aligned Self-Care. And it's really just like where
you can get all your self-care needs met. So if you're looking for self-care ideas and you want to
be held accountable, I do weekly self-care practices, weekly meditations. We do full moon journaling. We do
a lot of stuff over there. There's so much on there. And as I said, I pull a card every week and share it
with my community over there. Another thing I like to do is breath work. So sometimes I do breath work
in the morning. Sometimes I do it in the afternoon. But I'm currently studying to be a soma breath
instructor. So if you're curious about soma breath and you want to try out, definitely contact me.
I'm going to be doing practice sessions. So if you want to get a free session from me, just email me.
That'll also be in the show notes. But breath work, sometimes I do soma breath work. Sometimes I just do
a little deep breathing that really helps with my anxiety. If you're the type of person that sometimes
wakes up anxious, like if you're just having a certain time in your life where you're feeling anxious,
breath work solves this problem almost instantaneously. So I would encourage you to try that out.
At some point, I do get out of bed. Yes, I do. To feed my dog, Millie, and go for a walk with her.
Now, I'm very, very lucky where I live. It is beautiful to walk. It's pretty rural. And so I'm lucky
to be surrounded by nature, beauty. I walk outside and it smells great when everything's blooming. It
just smells sweet. It's so good, except in the dead of winter, then it's not good. But most of the year,
it's absolutely beautiful. And then afterward, I usually come in. I do a couple times a week. I do
a weight workout. Some days I'll run. I only do that a few days a week. But most days, almost every day,
I do a yoga class. And I usually only do a 30-minute class. I'm not going to do an hour every day. I do
sometimes. But most of the time, I'm just doing 30 minutes. And it really just depends on how I feel,
what type of class I do. Sometimes I'm exhausted and I'm just going to stretch. I don't push myself
to do like a workout when my body is tired. I honor my body and I do what feels good. Not to quote yoga
with Adrienne, but find what feels good. At the end of my yoga class, I absolutely love doing a
yoga knee drum meditation. And it's my absolute favorite stress busting. So if you try one thing from
my routine, I would encourage you to do that. You could get yoga knee drum meditations for free on
YouTube. You can go over to Insight Timer. There's so many different places, but definitely try
them out. They are usually longer meditations, but I'm not a long meditation gal. Like the meditations
that I create for my community are usually under 10 minutes. Okay. These meditations are long,
but I usually just don't have trouble doing them. I don't know why that. I find them so relaxing,
healing. It's just like a way to get some deep rest in during the day. And after a yoga class,
you know, it's like an extended chvasna. It's just my favorite thing to do. Then after that,
I'll make a big breakfast. Sometimes it'll be my biggest meal of the day because that's when I
feel I need the most energy. I eat for my activity if that makes sense. So like my smallest meal
usually will be dinner, you know, unless I'm maybe eating with company or something like that,
because I don't need a lot of energy at the end of the day. So unless I worked really hard all day,
and that was the only time I had to eat a meal, usually it's my smallest meal of the day. Breakfast
and lunch are usually my biggest. So that's when I have that. I love a big, big breakfast. Now
after this, I just get ready and I start my day and usually it's, you know, around 11 o'clock.
So my routine includes breath work, cuddles with melee, the sunrise, coffee and bed,
journaling, a tarot card sometimes. So I walk with melee, my workout yoga, a good knee-drip, breakfast,
shower or sometimes I even take a bath. And then my day starts and I know this sounds like a lot,
but I'm telling you it's hard to have a bad day after this. It really is. And it took me a while to
set my life up for this like I talked about in the beginning. This didn't happen like overnight,
you know, like maybe I started with doing a meditation every morning or maybe I just started,
actually I think when I first started doing self-care practices I started with journaling because
that's my favorite thing to do. So, you know, the reading was added in later. It just kind of grew.
And there were other things I tried. I tried tapping. There was so many other things that I tried
that just weren't, you know, my thing, you know. So I think it's really important to try different
things and see what works for you. Because like I think yoga, knee-dra, meditations are magical. You
might hate them, right? I find them very healing. I find breathwork healing. What I like about meditation
and breathwork is that it's free. You could do it almost anywhere. Obviously you can't do it when
you're driving, but you could do a breathwork when you're driving like basic breathwork, but
they're free and they're instantaneous, okay? So like especially breathwork, like breathwork is
proven. Scientifically proving to slow your heart rate down, to lower your blood pressure, to calm
stress, to calm anxiety. So that's what I love about it. It's something you could do anywhere,
anyone can do it, and it doesn't matter how much money you have. You can still take advantage of this.
Every, it's like a level playing field for everybody and I like that. So that is like my two-hour
burnout-busting routine. I can, like, it doesn't always take two hours. I just put two hours because
like when I'm not thinking about time, that's probably what it kind of ends up being. Now when I know I
have a 11 o'clock appointment, I keep track of time. I don't just, you know, like flop all over the
place and not pay attention to it. I set alarm. I'll set an alarm when I know I need to get into
shower, right? So, so that I don't have to think about the time I don't have to watch the clock. I just
set an alarm to let me know when I have to get ready for my appointment. So I know that this routine is
going to change over time. As I change, I might try adding things. I might stop doing some things because
they don't resonate with me anymore. But one thing that will stay the same is that I will, this,
this will always be my morning, okay? I love the way I start my day now and at this time period in
my life, it keeps me happy, healthy, and it keeps my stress to a minimum. So the question that you
need to ask yourself when you're setting up your routine is when do I have time to fit in myself care?
So like if you're maybe you have small children and you're like this is ridiculous, right? I do
realize that when I had small children, I wasn't doing this, okay? But this, this podcast is not,
as I said, for you to like try to do my routine, this podcast is to inspire you to set up a self-care
routine for yourself to fill your cup, okay? Fill your cup so that when your cup overflows,
you get to share that version of yourself with your, with everybody else. When you take care of
yourself at the deepest level, you get to share that well-rested, beautiful version of yourself with
your kids, your loved one, your partner, your friends, your business, your, your career, whatever it
is you're, whoever you're sharing that with, and that rubs off on other people and has a ripple effect.
So I'm encouraging you to set this up for yourself. So if you only have 10 minutes at five o'clock
in the morning before your kids wake up, take that 10 minutes to do something you love. If you hate
meditation, maybe try breath work. If, if it sounds heavenly to have a cup of coffee and read your book
for 10 minutes, do that, right? It doesn't sound like a lot. 10 minutes doesn't sound like a long time,
but you can get a couple of pages in and you could set a timer and then you have that
period of time to yourself. Like I said, when I sold real estate and I had the dog business,
I didn't get to choose when my free time was, but I certainly learned how to take advantage of it
when I had it. Now the next question is, you know, so like pay attention to your schedule. Look at it
every day, like for the next week, maybe just look at your schedule and find those little pockets,
you know, like, you're like, oh yeah, I have like 10 minutes every day in the morning and I usually
just scroll on TikTok or social media. Like take that 10 minutes to do something better that's
going to really, really make you feel better. You can even do a little mini workout. Like you could do
10 minutes of stretching, you could do 10 minutes of kettlebell swings, you could do 10 minute walk
out in nature, you could do what else could you do? 10 minutes hanging out with your dog,
playing with your dog, walking your dog. I don't know, there's so many different things.
Now the next question you said should ask yourself would be what practices feel good to me?
Now if you've never tried any of this, then I would just be like try some of the things that I do.
Maybe go over to my Patreon community and I do a self-care practice of the week every single week.
You could also follow me over on Patreon for free, you don't necessarily have to pay to follow me over
there and I share my podcast, I share my blog post, I share, sometimes I share meditations to the
free part of the community, not always usually that's the paid version, but I share different things.
The card pull is free so you could have two self-care practices right there. You could have the weekly
self-care practice in the weekly card pull so you could join me over there and learn about different
new practices. There's also a free trial so you could get on the inside, I think it's a seven-day
free trial so you could go in, check it out, take advantage of the meditations, I don't know, see
what's in there and see if it's something you would want to do as adding that to your routine as a
self-care practice, you could log on every morning and take advantage of all the past self-care
practices are in there so you could actually look at all the self-care practices and practice a
new one every single day. There's weeks and weeks and weeks of past self-care practices, meditations
and now. The next question, okay, so find some that you know try new things, see what feels good to
you and then hold on to those things I feel good to you. It might just involve reading your book,
it might involve going a walk, it might be having a healthy breakfast every morning if that's your only
healthy, healthy meal, right? It could be very, very simple things, it could be watching the sunrise
every morning. It could be taking a longer shower instead of rushing and getting ready, it could be
taking a longer shower. It could be listening to your favorite music in the morning instead of the
news, very, very, that's a very powerful shift to make in your life. That will lower your stress
levels that one thing alone. Next question, what does your dream day look like and how do I start to
shift into this? So I talked about how over years and years I shifted into this retirement
business that I wanted to create for myself and it didn't happen overnight and it wasn't easy, right?
It was, it actually was, you know, it was actually quite hard to do, yeah. But it worked out, you know,
I made it happen and I'm glad that I started this work. Probably I think it was in 2020 when I started
doing it because I'm setting myself up, you know, when I'm older and I don't want to work a lot,
I'm setting myself up for a great retirement job that I could do for as long as I want. It's not
taxing, it's something I can handle and it's something that I enjoy. So what's your dream day?
Like how can you start shifting into that? Like, you know, you're probably like some of you might be
saying, "Oh, I have this job, I don't like this job." Well, when are you going to retire and
like how could you start your own retirement business if you don't want to not work? Maybe you
like working but you don't want to work at a job job, right? You want to work for yourself.
What would be the perfect business for you? Maybe you want a side hustle. You know, maybe your job is okay,
you could deal with it, it's good money, it's easy, it's not stressful, but it doesn't feel
purposeful. Well, what can you do on the side that would be fun? It doesn't necessarily have to be
a business, it could be a hobby, it could be volunteering. What's going to be your dream life? Like,
if you could do anything, if money was not an option, like you had all the money you needed, you had
some kind of a trust fund. What would you be doing? That, it's a fun question to answer, right? So,
like dabble in that and then look at all the things that you wrote down and then ask yourself,
how could I start to add these things into my life now? Like, why, why not? We get to create our own
experience in our life. I don't care what anybody says. It's not easy, it's, it's not, it doesn't happen
overnight, it takes patience, time, work, right? But you can make anything happen in your life if
that's what you really want. So, what I would encourage you to do right now is answer those three
questions. So, when do I have time to fit in these self-care practices? What practices feel good
for me? What are you going to try first? And then, what does my dream day look like and how do I start
to shift into this? So, there's really four questions, but those are the questions to start asking
yourself. So, this is definitely like some journal work that you could do and I think it's fun journal
work, okay? Dreaming about your dream day, dream life is always fun as far as I'm concerned. Then,
you need to start today. Just try different things. So, usually on the podcast every week, I talk about
something that you can implement in your life right away. You know, sometimes I have guests on too,
but really most of the times when I do a solo episode, it's something that you could, you know, implement
in your life right away, right? So, like, if you're listening to this podcast, I would encourage you
to journal out those questions and start implementing this into your life this week. Don't wait
because you'll forget about it. I know. I listen to podcasts all the time and I'm like, "Oh, that's
great. Oh, I'm going to read that book. Oh, I'm going to do that." But if you don't do it right away,
you kind of forget about it because life's busy, right? And then before you know it, it's gone. And
sometimes you come back to it, like, sometimes when I'm checking emails, I'll run across something
and I'm like, "Oh, I forgot about that. I wanted to do that. Oh, I wanted to take that class." Or whatever,
right? So, I would encourage you to just start, like, pick one thing and do it tomorrow, like,
something you want to try. Try different things. See what works. See what doesn't work. And the last part
is just have fun. A self-care routine isn't supposed to be stressful. It shouldn't be something you have
to push yourself to do. It should feel good. You should want to do it. Like, I always want to do it.
It doesn't feel like a chore. It's not supposed to feel like work at all. It's supposed to always feel
good, relaxed, and something natural to you. So, if it doesn't feel that way to you, it's probably not
your thing. Switch to something else. Now, if you want some ideas and support, like I said, come over.
Did you hear that? My New York accent just came out. Every once in a while, it comes out.
Anyway, if you want some ideas for self-care, it's that word, ideas. I know I say that weird. My kids
make fun of me. If you want some ideas, I don't even know if I could say it right. Ideas? I don't know.
And support. Come over to the SoulLine self-care community on Patreon. As I said, you could follow
along for free. You could do the seven-day free trial so you could see what's on the inside, but if you
don't want to be charged, you have to cancel it, right? But the VIP tier is like the best tier,
which is like, I believe it's $9.99 a month. And you get so much free stuff. And when you go in there,
all that stuff is there. All the stuff that I've downloaded, I have like all kinds of downloadable
worksheets, PDFs, journal prompts, is so much stuff in there. So you'll receive so much inspiration
over there. And I would love for you to be a part of my self-care routine, which is what I share
on SoulLine self-care. Okay, guys, that's it for the podcast today. I hope you enjoyed that. I hope
you start your new self-care routine today. And if you want to share with me what your self-care
routine is, you could talk to me over on the Patreon. You could send me messages within the community,
or you could follow me over on Instagram. I don't spend a lot of time over there, but I do check it out.
Tina at Tina Stinson Coach, that's always in the show notes also. And you could message me
on there also. Okay, guys, enjoy the rest of your week. Happy self-care routine. Love you. Bye.
