How to Reconnect to Yourself (2024)

Reconnecting to ourselves doesn’t have to be big.

It doesn’t have to include grand gestures or pricey spa days or week-long retreats. It can be small. And it can be totally doable, even if you have a demanding schedule, even if you don’t have much time to yourself.

Here are some small steps and activities to take and try:

• Ask yourself daily, How am I doing?
• Try not to judge your emotions (and yourself for feeling them): I shouldn’t be sad! I’m terrible for feeling jealous! I’m so weak for feeling anxious. I’m awful for getting angry.
• Sit in silence, without scrolling on your phone, without listening to music, without doing anything other than listening to your heart beat.
• Practice a guided meditation every evening.
• Take a walk, without your headphones.
• Listen to the sounds of nature, which can help you listen to yourself.
• Create art. Write short stories or books. Paint something. Pen a poem about yourself, about the sunset, about a difficult (or exciting) emotion. Make a collage of random images that resonate with you. Snap photos of your favorite objects.
• Dance. To slow music. To an upbeat tempo. In a class. By yourself. With someone.
• Ask yourself sometimes,What am I loving/liking/savoring right now?
• Ask yourself,What’s on my mind? What’s on my heart?Maybe jot it down in a journal.
• Spend time in natural surroundings. The beach. The park. A botanical garden. The forest. A lake.
• Take a series of self-portraits and really look at yourself. With kind eyes.
• Start working with a therapist or life coach.
• Make a list of all your dreams and wants and wishes. Think about how you can make one of them come true this month.
• Schedule a monthly date with yourself, whether that’s spending an entire day doing whatever the heck you want, or reading a book at a coffeeshop that you can’t put down for an hour, or getting your favorite ice cream at your favorite place, and savoring every creamy bite.
• Ask yourself,How can I care for myself? How can I care for myself mentally, emotionally, physically, and spiritually? Today? This week? This month?
• Find a piece, a slice, a chunk of beauty in something: in your own eyes, in your child’s eyes, in yesterday’s sky, in the errand you ran, in a book you’re reading.
• Create a small space at home that includes all your favorite things—books, essential oils, a journal, candles, family photos, calming images, your kids’ artwork—and spend some time there every morning and every night.
• Surround yourself with the things that inspire you. Get rid of the things that don’t (as much as possible).

Reconnecting to ourselves is made up of slowing down, and listening, and learning, and exploring, and playing, and wondering, and being interested in and being inquisitive about what’s going on inside.

It is about realizing that you’re important, too, and that all relationships stem and start from that vital relationship with yourself.

How do you reconnect to yourself on a regular basis?

Photo byAshkan ForouzanionUnsplash.