Keep your hands on your self-care steering wheel
Do you keep your hands on your self-care steering wheel? Or do you grab the wheel only when things get overwhelming?
Imagine you’re on a long road. When the road is curvy, you need to steer through the curves. When the road is straight, there’s a lot less steering to do, so your attention may wander. You may even take your hands off the wheel.
You may keep on going straight for a while, but before long you’re very likely to start drifting.
Are you the type to continuously nudge the steering wheel to keep the car going straight, or are you the type to let things go until you’re about to crash before taking action?

How about your self-care steering wheel?
You probably answered that you’re the type to constantly nudge the steering wheel. I’m betting most people are. No one wants to crash their car, and lane markers are a constant reminder of where we should be.
Unfortunately, most of us are the opposite with our self-care.
During times when we feel good, we take our hands off the self-care steering wheel. But there aren’t clear lane markers to let us know when we’re drifting, and we don’t really acknowledge that there’s even a possibility of crashing.
We don’t nudge the self-care steering wheel at all. We simply wait until we’re about to crash to grab the wheel and try to yank ourselves back on track.
This is how we get to burnout, compassion fatigue, and exhaustion.
Keep nudging your self-care steering wheel
People are always asking me how I stay centered, balanced, and low-stress. They ask what they can do to help manage the stress in their lives.
I try not to use the word “self-care.” To a lot of people, that sounds like adding something new to their already stressful lives. Take a class! Do yoga twice a week! Take up gardening! Do meditation!
Those are the metaphorical version of letting things go until you need to yank the self-care steering wheel hard over just to keep from crashing.
I prefer to talk about making a habit of constant self-regulation. Learn to constantly nudge your self-care steering wheel through micro-meditation throughout your day.
Micro-meditation is super easy. You may already be doing it.
Take 30 seconds. Stop thinking about anything. Focus exclusively on something in your physical world, and observe it without any kind of judgment. Simply observe it with all your attention and focus. It might be:
- Tactile: The way the fabric of your shirt feels between your fingers. The roughness of the teeth on your house key. The way air is flowing around you. The way the roof of your mouth feels when you run your tongue over it.
- Audio: What are the sounds in your environment? How do they overlap, conflict, or harmonize? What sounds are far away, and what sounds are nearby?
- Breathing: Simply observe your breathing, or focus on taking evenly timed breaths. Feel how the air enters and leaves your body.
- Visual: Observe light and shadow on the shapes around you, or look at the minor variations in color on a single object.
- Something else: Smells, temperature, motion… anything that puts you firmly in the moment, focused entirely on the physical.
Do not spend these times thinking about your to-do list or the things that stress you out. Don’t use these times to solve problems or place blame or mentally rehash grievances. Don’t waste these moments in regret or envy.
Just be. Just observe.
Do this a few dozen times a day. You could do it while brushing your teeth or stopped at a red light. You could do it while riding the elevator or waiting in line at the coffee shop.
After a while, you’ll find that doing it for just 10 seconds at a time can trigger you back into a less stressed, more centered state. Eventually, you’ll realize that you are doing this without even trying.
Why nudging your self-care steering wheel works
All you high achievers out there are complaining, “How does doing nothing help solve my problems? It’s the problems that are stressing me out! I don’t have time to take even 30 seconds for this.”
Micro-meditation is not “doing nothing.” It’s actively nudging your self-care steering wheel back into balance, keeping you from drifting mentally or emotionally. It keeps your mind in a place where you will be more calm and in control, which will improve your creativity in problem-solving and help you stay patient during a crisis.
Connect with me
Free consultation
Looking for more fulfillment, joy, or direction in your life? Want to be a more courageous leader? Contemplating a career change? Have a book in you that you need to write? I can help. Schedule a free coaching session now.
Free core values exercise
This simple worksheet helps identify your core values. Many of my clients find it surprisingly eye-opening, and it’s helped people make some big life decisions. Get it here.
Download my chapter from RELIT free

RELIT: How to Rekindle Yourself in the Darkness of Compassion Fatigue gives practical, relevant, actionable advice on avoiding and overcoming compassion fatigue and caregiver burnout. As a professional coach, I have to pay close attention to self-regulation and my own personal resilience. My chapter explains the things I do to stay centered and stay focused so I can give every client my best, every time.
Download my chapter for free: Show up. Try hard. Be nice.
0 Comments