Speaker 1: Welcome to Almost Dr. Armas. If you're new to this channel, thank you for checking it out and if you're already a subscriber, thanks for being back again. My name is Arielle and I'm a PhD student in clinical psychology. In this YouTube channel, I talk about my life as a grad student and bring you information about the mental health field. So it's finally 2020, the winter break is almost over, and I feel like it's the perfect time to talk about self-care. When you hear self-care, you often think about face masks, taking bubble baths, going shopping and doing things that not everyone has the money to do. Self-care takes on a whole new meaning when you're a graduate student and like all other aspects of your life, the things that you do to take care of yourself also need to adjust as you navigate life as a busy student. So I just wanted to share with you guys some things that I'm doing to prioritize self-care and basically reframing what self-care means and why it's important, especially as a graduate student. Firstly, I think self-care is important because it's sort of a habit that you get into. If you think about it, getting yourself into a practice, a regular practice of self-care while you're in grad school will trickle into your career later on. We've talked about in some of my classes how self-care is not just something you should do, but it's something that you need to do, especially as a clinician. To some degree, you have an ethical responsibility to take care of yourself, both mentally and physically, because if you don't, that can affect the kind of care that you provide to your clients. So as a grad student, you're super busy, you have classes, you have papers, you have a ton of responsibilities, you have life. So where do you fit in self-care and what exactly should you be doing? One thing I tried to do in my first quarter of grad school was designate one day where I didn't do any schoolwork, and for me that was Sundays. To be honest with you, that only worked for a few weeks out of the quarter. It was hard to put everything on the other six days of the week and only have one day, because sometimes deadlines fluctuate or I didn't get to finish something as quickly as I thought, and work started to kind of bleed into the day that was supposed to be sacred and only for taking care of myself. So I think that one thing I've learned about self-care as a grad student is that you have to be flexible and kind of give yourself some grace when you don't have time for everything that you thought or things aren't going the way that you planned. And I think it's important as a grad student to consider that anything you do to perform better or feel better can be considered self-care. So for me, sleep is a big thing. I try my very best to get eight hours of sleep at minimum and no less than seven hours. To some people that may seem crazy because you need as much time as you can to read and get ahead, and I get that. But for me, I know that if I'm not sleeping, I'm not going to perform best. I'm not going to feel good. I'm not going to be in a good mood. I'm not going to remember things as well as I should. And later down the line, I'm not going to be able to treat clients in the best way if I'm exhausted. So for me, I consider sleeping at a decent hour to be my self-care. Some other things that go along with that are exercising regularly, eating well, and those things don't seem like self-care. They seem just like good habits. But if you think about what that does for your body and your mood and your well-being, it is self-care. I do think that eating well, exercising, going to sleep at a certain time are things that take time, effort, and sometimes money. So I understand that. And that's one of the big debates about self-care, where not everyone can afford to take time off and just do nothing. But I think you can pick and choose what's important to you. So if you are strapped for time, money, or even energy, there are some ways to kind of get creative about self-care. I think some kind of low-effort things that I've tried to do with some of my roommates also is like studying in a different environment, studying outdoors or reading outdoors so that at least we get some sunlight, we get moving a little bit, and it improves our mood. That's something that costs you no money and hardly any effort. But it could make a big difference. One key thing in self-care is just reserving space in your life for things that you enjoy. So one student I met loves, loves, loves makeup. And so she just said that every morning she spends 45 minutes doing her makeup, getting creative, and that's her time for self-care. And it helps her feel confident. It helps her have a good time in the morning, start her day off right, because it's something that she likes. So I feel like there are small ways that you can integrate self-care if you can't dedicate a whole day where you're going to have like a home spa. Not everyone can do that and there's no way that you have time for that as a grad student. But there are little ways that you can integrate things that bring you joy. And if you think about it, that is self-care too. One of the things that I love doing is I get up really early for studying, for the gym, or for whatever I need to do, but I open up all the blinds in my room and all the sunlight comes in and I look forward to doing that every day and seeing the sun rise. And that's something that takes maybe five seconds to do, but it brings me a smile in the morning. It helps me kind of reflect on what I'm going to do that day. And it's just a nice way to start my day. And I feel like when you're a busy student, you just have to take whatever joy you can find in the small things. And with that being said, one other way you can practice self-care as a student is celebrating the small wins. We work really hard. We spend a lot of time in the books. So when you get a good grade on a paper or you do well on an exam, take the five, 10, 15 minutes to call somebody and have a moment to reflect of like, wow, I'm so proud of myself. I worked so hard. And celebrating those wins, even if it's just in your head to yourself is also self-care because you're honoring the fact that you're working really hard. Lastly, one other way that you can practice self-care that doesn't cost a ton of money and works for you as a grad student would be to establish boundaries, especially around your work. So I've met some people while I was on interviews for graduate schools that had some really interesting perspectives on this. One of the grad students that I spoke to at a program that I was applying for told me that she's married. And so she has a boundary for herself where every night at 6 p.m., she doesn't do any schoolwork. She doesn't answer emails. She doesn't answer phone calls because that's her time at home with her husband. And she doesn't, she respects that boundary for herself and for her marriage. And she's like, I'm a grad student. I want to get this PhD, but I also want to stay married. And so you have to set those boundaries. And it's totally possible if you give yourself a block, like, okay, I'm going to wake up at 5 a.m. or 6 a.m. and do work all day until 6 p.m., but that's it. Those boundaries are also self-care. So sometimes things that don't look like self-care or self-love actually are. That can be setting boundaries. That can be going to therapy. You can spare an hour a week to take care of yourself, especially to prevent your personal stuff from bleeding into your work either as a student or as a clinician. So self-care is something that we all have to work on, and I'm going to be working on in the coming quarters to manage my things a little bit differently so that maybe I don't have that one day where I do absolutely nothing, but I can find little things that I can do to take care of myself throughout the week. And I just wanted to share my thoughts on it and some ideas that I've heard, things that I'm trying to integrate, things that have worked for me with you guys. So if you're a student or a busy professional or a mom or anyone who has a tight schedule, I hope that this little blurb on self-care was helpful for you. And if it was, please share this video with someone you know. Again, I'm almost Dr. Armas. My goal is to inform you, to inspire you, to spark an interest in you, and hopefully also entertain you. Thank you for watching this video, and I hope you'll check back in next time.