Stay Healthy While Working and Caregiving From Home pt 2

By Roz Jones

Have a look at my first few tips on staying healthy at home here, and read on to learn some more!

Finding Your Health Motivation

What is the reason you want to be healthier while working from home? This is where you can start, and will help with not just your health, but your happiness when you are at home working all day.

Make a list of everything that is motivating you to be healthier, starting with your WHY.

This why may include for yourself, or for your loved ones, so you can take better care of both.

Answer this question in your journal or in a notebook:

“Why do you want to be healthier while working from home?”

This is important, because it helps you understand yourself a little more, and find what is going to motivate you the most. There is no wrong answer here, except one where you aren’t being honest with yourself.

Creating a Healthy Morning Routine

To start working on your healthy habits at home, begin with your morning routine. Don’t worry about having a perfect routine or one that you get 100% right every day. Routines are simply a collection of activities you do around the same time each day.

Everything in your routine should serve some kind of purpose and be something you want to get done in the morning, or that will help you start your day on the right foot.

Benefits of the Morning Routine

Why have a morning routine? When you are working from home, you need some structure. Without a boss looking over your shoulder or co-workers to be accountable to, it requires a lot more self-motivation. This also includes your health journey while working from home.

Some benefits of having a morning routine include:

Starting your day off with healthy habits
Incorporating healthy habits into your routine
Setting yourself up for the day
Getting in exercise first thing in the morning
Changing your mindset to a healthy, balanced one

Health Pitfalls to Avoid

It is really easy to think the habits and routines you have implemented in your work-from-home life are for health, but many of them are about losing weight or being overly restrictive. Here are some pitfalls to avoid when you are on a health journey:

Going on a restrictive diet – Many people think that to eat healthy, they need to be on a diet. But this is not true! Change your mindset from what you need to take away from your diet to what you can add in to improve nutrients and fuel your body.

Focusing on the wrong things – When it comes to your health, it is more about how you feel, not what you think you should be doing. This goes for everything you do at home, from your physical activity and what you eat, to the information you consume and what your routine looks like.

Feeling like you aren’t doing enough – This is especially important when caring for loved ones, when we feel like we may not be enough. But, any small change you make or healthy habit you incorporate into your work-from-home life is going to improve your physical health and wellbeing. It is enough.

Check back later this week for more healthy at home habits, and in the meantime, visit http://www.rozjonesent.com for more information on how to be more productive as a caregiver and check out my upcoming book!

Stay Healthy While Working and Caregiving From Home

By Roz Jones

With more people working from home, a common question has come up – how do I get more exercise and avoid eating too much when I am at home full-time? This becomes even more difficult when you are caregiving from home as well, taking care of yourself, your job, and most importantly your loved ones. But don’t worry, it is possible to improve your physical health even while working from home, just like if you were working in an office.

Here are 3 different things to focus on when it comes to staying healthy while working from home.

1. Staying Active and Stretching

One of the best things you can do when you work from home is to stay active. Even if you sit at a desk or work on the couch with your laptop all day, there are still plenty of opportunities to move your body.

Make it a goal to move more throughout the day, not only with daily exercise, but getting up from your day and stretching more often.

Here are some ideas:

Start your day with a gentle workout session – In the morning, you can boost your energy and move your body with a gentle form of exercise. Yoga and Pilates are great for the morning, but a short walk would also be great.

Find more reasons to walk during your day – Walking is the gentlest form of exercise, and the easiest to do. You can walk your dogs a little further than you normally would, go on a family walk around the neighborhood after dinner, or walk to run errands if it’s close enough to your house instead of driving.

Add in other forms of exercise – What else do you enjoy doing? Do you want to take an afternoon spin class with a friend? Do you like getting out of the house to go on a hike or head to the gym? Find more forms of exercise that will motivate you. If possible, invite your loved ones to join you!

2. Nutrition While Working from Home

Another pitfall that people often fall into when working from home is snacking or indulging in treats all day. If you have found that your nutrition is falling behind from working near your kitchen all day, here are some tips that can help:

Have healthy snacks on hand – If you tend to reach for chips or candy often, keep healthier snacks within your reach. Have fruit or nuts on your desk, keep granola bars on the counter, make sure your fresh fruit and veggies are visible, instead of a box of donuts on the counter.

Do meal prep – Meal prep works great when you work from home too! This does not just have to be for bringing lunch to work. The more you have prepared at home, the less tempted you will be to order food delivery or go out to eat. It will also save time in the long run, meaning you have more time to take care of and spend time with loved ones.

Designated kitchen times – A common trap when working from home is feeling like you can walk into the kitchen at any time and eat something. To prevent this, have designated kitchen and meal times just like you would if you worked in an office.

3. Developing Healthier Habits

Staying healthy while working from home isn’t about being on a diet or trying to be restrictive. It is about balance, which starts with developing some healthy habits.

Do you eat better when you have your workout first thing in the morning? Then you know this can be a wonderful healthy habit for you! Habits don’t have to feel like a chore or something you are forced to do. It is very small changes in your day that make the difference.

Try working on your daily routines. From morning routines to what you do in the afternoon, you can change your routines in order to be healthier at home.

Get your family involved. Sometimes, what you need is to focus on the health of your family, not just yourself. Let your kids help with meal times, exercise with the family, and find family-focused activities to get you up and moving throughout the day.

Check back next week for more healthy at home habits, and in the meantime, visit http://www.rozjonesent.com for more information on how to be more productive as a caregiver and check out my upcoming book!

Why Embrace Your Imperfections as a Caregiver

By Roz Jones

Do you constantly find yourself wrapped up in your imperfections? If so, it could be getting in the way of leading a happy, fulfilled life.

Each of us has imperfections. However, many fight against their flaws; harshly criticizing themselves for not being perfect. There is a lot of pressure in society today to be a perfect person. Unfortunately, this just isn’t possible. So, most of us end up feeling like a failure or developing feelings of self-hatred. This is even more difficult when caring for a loved one.

If you want to learn to love yourself, embracing your imperfections is key. Here, we’ll look at why it’s important to embrace your imperfections and the benefits it can deliver.

Your Positive Imperfections

When you start to embrace your imperfections, you’ll start to see them more positively. Believe it or not, there are some positives to imperfections. For example, if you suffer with anxiety, you may beat yourself up for not being able to do certain things that come easily to others. However, a positive of anxiety is that it often makes you more empathetic. That is a great trait to have in an often-cruel world, and especially as a caregiver. When you can empathize with loved ones, you may be able to better comfort them in what they’re going through.

Feel Free

When you are so caught up on your imperfections, it can make you feel trapped, under constant pressure. By embracing them, it helps to set you free. Nothing is more freeing than living your life without the constant weight of your own expectations. Once you accept your flaws, you’ll feel like a weight has been lifted.

Focus on Who You Are

When you are so focused on your imperfections, it can stop you being who you truly are. It causes you to chase an ideal that you aren’t never going to live up to. However, when you let go of your imperfections, your authentic self will start to shine through.

So, if you feel like you have lost who you are, start letting go of your need to be perfect.

Living Healthier

Constantly stressing over the things that you are not can even have a negative impact on your health. So, if you want to improve your overall health and wellbeing, you’ll want to start embracing your imperfections.

Living your life constantly focused on your imperfections isn’t healthy. It impacts your perspective on things, causing you to make choices you may not normally make.

These are just some of the reasons why you need to learn to embrace your flaws. While it may be difficult, with practice, you can start to think more positively about your imperfections. Remember, nobody in life is perfect, not even you, and you are never going to be. The sooner you accept this and know that it’s OK, the better your life will become.

Conquering Fear – How To Fight Your Phobia

By Roz Jones

Being a caregiver can be a scary thing, especially when we are new to the field. The guide shares a few ideas for conquering some of those fears and phobias when taking care of a loved one once and for all! Please note, the fear of enclosed spaces (claustrophobia) is used as an example – though the steps are applicable to any fear.

1. Expose yourself to fear.

If you have a phobia, you probably go out of your way to avoid the thing that causes you to feel afraid. In the claustrophobia example, you may refuse to use lifts, as they make you feel uncomfortable.

Unfortunately, by avoiding the scenario you fear – the lift – you are actually increasing your overall fear. Avoidance does nothing but make a situation worse, and you need to face the fear before you can conquer it. That means getting into a lift, even if just for one floor. Make yourself do it.

2. Positive reinforcement.

After you have forced yourself to confront your fear once, you need to make it a positive experience. This can be having a dessert you enjoy following your ordeal, or buying something nice from your favorite store. Do this as soon as possible following your first attempt to confront the fear – in the example, you should dive into a cupcake the second you step out of the lift. As a caregiver, you should always show your support to your loved one as much as possible. Let them know you understand their fear, and that you are there to help them conquer it. If you are the one experiencing fear, let your loved one know and ask them for their love and support while you conquer it.

3. Rinse, and repeat.

The way to conquer a phobia is to do the above, over and over again. As you do so, you will learn to manage the fear, and you will also learn that there really is no danger in what panicked you. By continuing to deliberately expose yourself to your fear, and then allowing a congratulatory moment when you succeed, over time, you will rid yourself of the fear forever. Be a team! The caregiver and the loved one receiving care can help each other conquer their fears, together.

Overcoming fear can be intimidating. In order to be the best caregiver you can be, conquering your fears are a must! If you need guidance on how to do this, you need to pre-order my new book, Lifted. It will include a workbook that will help you work through each step.

Are You Productive or Just Busy?

By Roz Jones

Have you ever observed someone who seems to be busy all the time, but doesn’t really get anything done? Do you feel that sometimes you’re in the same boat? How do you know if you’re productive or just busy? It can be easy to get overwhelmed with the everyday tasks when taking care of a loved one. As a caregiver it’s important that we manage our time efficiently, not only to give proper care to our loved one, but to also make the necessary time to take care of ourselves.

Do you have goals? People who are productive generally have goals and focus all of their work on achieving those goals. Of course there are always going to be distractions and obstacles when taking care of a loved one but those distractions don’t take priority over the big picture.

Do you focus or multi-task? People who multi-task often seem very busy. They’re always doing something, but they’re rarely doing any one thing very well. Tackle each obstacle you face as a caregiver directly, you’ll be more productive if you focus on doing one thing at a time.

Do you delegate? Sometimes you may take on tasks that would really be better to delegate to someone else. It can be easy to want to say yes to every task because you want to provide for your loved one. But you might be able to delegate personal tasks while keeping the focus on business tasks. This will improve the quality of care given to your loved one, and minimize the personal burnout you feel as a caregiver.

Do you say no? People who are productive know how to say no to something that is going to take them away from their own important work. It’s okay to say no when you really don’t have time to fit in one more thing. Don’t feel guilty when saying no to certain tasks related to your loved one. Instead, feel reassured knowing that this will benefit both of you in the long run.

Do you let some things go? It may sound counterproductive to erase some tasks from your to-do list. But you may find that you have given yourself tasks that really won’t move your vision forward and will take up extra time. It’s okay to scratch something off the list and go a different way.

Do you have a schedule? People who are productive tend to have a schedule for each day of what needs to be done and when. If you’re not planning ahead, chances are you’re staying busy but not productive.

Do you complete projects? You can be busy doing something all day long, every day and never get a project completed. If you find you’re starting a lot of things without finishing them, it’s time to look at your priorities and become more productive.

Do you feel peace? When you spend your time very busy but not accomplishing much you might feel a sense of anxiety. You may worry about all the things you need to do that aren’t getting done. Try as best as you can to remain present in each moment. Rather than expressing a sense of anxiety, this will help you express gratitude appreciating the time you get to spend with your loved one.

But when you’re productive, you can actually feel peace when it comes to work. You know what’s important and you have a plan to get it done on time.

It can be easy to get overwhelmed with the everyday tasks when taking care of a loved one. As a caregiver it’s crucial that we manage our time efficiently. Not only to provide the utmost of quality care to our loved one but to also make the necessary time to take care of ourselves. If you are struggling with how to manage your time, you need to pre-order my new book, Lifted. It will include a workbook that will help you work through each step!