Being an empowered Christian woman entails various things, such as understanding your true, Biblical identity and learning practical skills (like confidence building).

But self love and self care are also important.

One, because they help keep you healthy. And, two, because they actually strengthen your progress in other areas!

Join me as I explain what I mean by self love and self care; break down their power; and show you how they help spur your overall growth through several related areas!

Show Notes:

• Intro

  • So, as we delve into this topic of self love and self care, let’s first define these phrases. Because sometimes they’re treated as if they’re the same thing, but in reality they’re two different things.

  • To help me, I turned to the internet and found the following definitions:

    • Self love means showing kindness to yourself. Self care means taking care of yourself mentally, emotionally, and physically.

    • Or, to put it another way, self love centers around the thoughts and feelings that you have about yourself, whereas self care centers around your actions.

  • Can you see the difference? They go hand-in-hand, but are two separate things. Self love is mostly internal - the thoughts and feelings that you have towards yourself. Self care is more external; it’s about your actions. And is driven, in large part, by your degree of self love.

  • If you have a fair amount of healthy self love, then you’re more likely to practice self care. But, if you don’t have self love, then you’re probably not taking great care of yourself. Or, at least, not as well as you could be.

  • Naturally, it’s possible that you can have a good amount of self love but simply don’t have time for self care in a busy season. But, for the most part, one helps to inform the other.

  • So, now that we have our definitions nailed down, let’s move onto the more important question which is: how does self love and self care play a key role in my life as a Christian woman? In other words, why are they important? 

  • Well, the high-level answer is this: because a vital part of growing into, or embracing, or continuing to transform into a Jesus empowered woman is loving yourself for who you are. For the woman God created you to be. (That’s why it’s one of my podcast content pillars. In other words, a topic that I touch on frequently in different ways.)

  • There are many aspects of accepting and loving yourself for who you are…and self love and, by relation, self care are part of that. 

  • Let’s go back to our definitions for a moment. Self love is having kind, gracious, patient, healthy thoughts and emotions towards yourself. If, instead, you have cruel, unrealistic, harsh, unhealthy thoughts about yourself, how does that align with accepting and loving yourself as God created you? Or, simply loving yourself as God loves you? It’s not, right?

  • What about self care? Which are the actions you take - or don’t take - in regard to your well-being. If you’re not taking care of yourself mentally, emotionally, and/or physically, then you’re not in alignment with how God cares for you - and wants you to care for yourself. Also, you’re not loving yourself, right? Nor are you taking care of the person God created you to be. Instead, it’s like you’re punishing her.

  • I don’t say this to be harsh or to place blame…merely to be honest. Remember, I’ve also walked this journey. Often, when we come from abusive or tough situations, when we’ve been neglected, belittled, and/or ignored, our sense of self worth plummets. Along with our self-esteem and confidence. In addition, we can also find ourselves in this unhealthy cycle where we think love has to be earned. Because we’ve been in situations where we’ve been manipulated, or where love or kindness wasn’t offered unless we fulfilled something first. And, despite how well we accomplished things, we were still made to feel small.

  • When we come from those kinds of backgrounds, we need to be honest with each other and ourselves so that we can move into a more healthy place.

  • In addition, there are some specific ways in which pursuing self love and self care help spur growth in other areas.      

• One, by loving and caring for yourself well, you’re also growing your sense of self-worth, building your confidence, and learning how to set healthy boundaries…just to name a few.

  • I’ve talked about those topics in more detail in past episodes, but self love and self care play an integral part as well. 

  • Self love means that you’re building a positive mental relationship with yourself. You’re choosing to see yourself through a kind and positive lens. That’s directly related to building your sense of self-worth and your confidence.

  • Self care means you’re going to act on those thoughts and emotions and do things like make time for yourself. This means that you’re making yourself a priority and setting boundaries in your calendar to make room for you.

• Two, self love and self care help to ensure that you’re not overworking, overextending, and/or exhausting yourself.

  • When you come from a place of constantly being in survivor mode, this can be a challenge. The tendency is to want to constantly account for every conceivable possibility, keeping yourself on constant alert. Or doing all the things just in case. Which, as a result, can lead to mental, emotional, and physical exhaustion.

  • However, as you also work on things such as strengthening your faith and trusting in God, implementing a routine of self care ensures that you’re slowing down and taking a breather every now and then. But you’re also trusting God versus operating in survivor mode. You’re teaching yourself to take 60 minutes for a pedicure, or a walk in the woods, and relax and trust in God. To let Him carry any burdens or worries you might have while you take some time for yourself. (And, eventually, you’ll learn to give Him your worries and leave them there as Scripture tells us to.)

  • In addition, this also relates to setting healthy boundaries. Because as you set those boundaries to protect your self care time, you’re also helping to ensure that you have adequate downtime as well to refresh and refuel instead of taking on too much. 

• Three, implementing self love and self care gets you closer to discovering - and living out - your God-given calling.

  • Our God is a loving God. He’s not going to put something on your plate, or place a calling on you, if it’s going to be a burden. Meaning, something that’s going to crush you or be harmful in some way.

  • And the question of whether that something will be a burden includes how well you’re taking care of yourself. If you’re constantly berating yourself mentally, or withholding good things from yourself, or running yourself ragged on a regular basis without making time to replenish and refuel and have fun…then God isn’t going to want to make the situation worse. He’s probably not going to show up one day and task you with starting a podcast, or writing that book, or whatever it is that He has for you.

  • As empowered Christian women, we want to help impact others. Even if we’re still working on our confidence, or have no idea what our calling will be, or wonder how we’ll ever transform into a successful, bold woman. Something deep inside of us wants to impact the world.

  • But here’s the deal, sister, you can’t help take care of others, or impact their lives, if you’re not taking care of yourself first. You can’t fully accept the calling God has for you if you haven’t accepted the woman God created you to be versus putting yourself down all of the time for this, that, and the other thing.

  • Sometimes, self love and self care are presented as selfish things. But nothing could be further from the truth. The love and care that you have for yourself is a foundational pillar that a lot of other things are built upon. 

  • If you make a point of loving and caring for yourself because God loves and cares for you, then that also helps you build your trust in Him. And having firm trust in God is a main component of following and executing the calling He has for you. Because even though you’re growing in empowerment, there’s always going to be an element of faith and trust and having no idea where God is leading you, exactly.

  • If you make a point of loving and caring for yourself because God loves and cares for you, then that also helps you to learn how to set boundaries for yourself. Which is going to be key for your health and the health of whatever business or endeavor that God calls you to. The bigger it gets, or the longer it lasts, the more you’re going to need to be secure in who God created you to be; the more you’re going to need time for yourself to relax and replenish and spend time with Him; and the more savvy you’re going to be when it comes to who and what gets your time and energy.

• Wrap-up

  • Sister, I hope you can see, through the few examples I’ve talked about today, how vital self love and self care is - to your well-being, which is obviously important, but to your overall growth and transformation as a Jesus empowered woman.

  • Making yourself a priority - and making how you see yourself a priority - can lead to so many positive changes. In so many areas. Self love and self care helps lead to strength. Rest. Trust. Healthy boundaries. Fun. Your calling.

  • I may dive into additional aspects of this in later episodes - for example, some practical tips and ticks when it comes to implementation. But, for now sister, work on making self love and self care a priority. Be kind to yourself. Give yourself time to focus on you and do something fun and restorative. Or something that helps build you up in some way. 

  • Pray. Ask Jesus to help you and guide you. He knows you better than I do. He knows exactly what you need and the best way to go about it.

  • Self love and self care, sister. I’m telling you, the dividends are amazing! Cheers!