Self-Parenting 101

Self-parenting, self-love, and self-care go hand in hand. All three are there to help you make conscious decisions and allow you to take better care of yourself.

After doing a lot of internal work, I now have a clearer vision of why we need to practice good self-parenting.

The problem is that many people feel this type of self-care is shallow or selfish. But that couldn’t be further from the truth!

Below are some self-parenting 101 tips and tricks that can help ensure that you always prioritize what you need to thrive and lead a fulfilling life.

Let’s get started.

What Is Self-Parenting?

In short, self-parenting is a type of focused care that involves healthy living patterns and positive daily habits.

It puts a spotlight on the things that truly matter in your life, like sleep, nourishment, and security.

Yet, while those are all great ways to manage your overall health, self-parenting takes it a step further.

At its core, self-parenting is how you can fulfill unmet needs lingering from your childhood.

It’s a way to tone down your inner critic, which is actually a culmination of voices that you’ve internalized and now believe as your own.

As a result, you learn how to listen more to your emotions and thoughts. You become more compassionate towards who you are as a person, and you allow yourself to feel worthy and seen.

It does this by providing new experiences that can lead to more satisfying behavior and a more positive effect, thus helping you create better outcomes in your life.

5 Self-Parenting Tips

In my search for ways of being a better parent to myself, I looked at some of the ways good parents care for their kids.

Then, I used them to create an outline that adults can apply to themselves to enhance their inner parent.

Take a look.

1. Accept Your Emotions

Feelings help us define what’s happening so we can articulate our thoughts and act accordingly. When children have intense feelings, it can sometimes be overwhelming.

If we’re not taught at a young age how to deal with those big, scary emotions, we still won’t be able to deal with them as adults.

This is where self-parenting can really help. Tell yourself that it’s okay to have feelings, no matter how big or small.

More importantly, avoid making yourself feel guilty or ashamed about feeling a certain way.

Instead, learn how to make the most of these feelings to better understand what you’re going through and help yourself move forward.

2. Set Healthy Boundaries

When your life has clearly defined expectations, you can safely navigate and explore within those boundaries. So, make it super clear what you expect of yourself and your life.

Yet, we’re trained to listen to our elders and to behave properly. Then, we grow up and we fear what will happen if we assert our needs as adults. So, we put everyone’s needs before our own to avoid rejection.

However, with boundaries, you have the power. It may sting a bit if someone rejects you for saying no for whatever reason. But you’ll survive and you’ll come out stronger and more confident.

3. Have Reasonable Expectations

Write down realistic goals for the year ahead. Start with long-term goals, then break them down into monthly, weekly, and daily objectives.

Working down from larger to more manageable short-term goals will give you a sense of accomplishment.

Plus, it helps you focus on what you have to do and avoid feeling hurt or helpless.

Remind yourself to be proud of your commitment to do the work. And each time you achieve something on our list, reward yourself.

Then, after each one, think about setting new goals that can help you achieve more in your personal and professional life.

4. Create a Regular Routine

Knowing that you’ll be doing certain things at certain times is one of the best self-parenting techniques ever!

Having a routine helps prepare you for what’s ahead so you can have time to adjust and react accordingly. It also teaches you responsibility, leadership, and discipline.

For example, one of the first things experts will advise you to do is to go to bed at a specific time each night.

Not only that, but you need to create a nightly ritual to help you unwind and relax at the end of the day.

Start by turning off all screens 30–60 minutes before bedtime and dim the lights. You can bring an enjoyable book to read.

Or you can play some soft music to ease you into sleep mode and reduce any nighttime jitters you may have.

5. Know Your Core Values

Adults who come from neglectful homes are often not taught morals when they were children. So, as you self-parent, it’s up to you to determine what it takes to become a helpful, empathetic member of your community.

You also have to learn the importance of respecting yourself and others, as well as being honest and trustworthy. And the best way to do that is by finding out what your core values are.

One thing you can do to appreciate the role that helping others has in your life is to volunteer at a local shelter or community center.

Even a simple gesture, holding the door for someone or smiling at a stranger, can do miracles for your self-esteem.

Baggage Be Gone: How To Let Go Of Emotional Weight

Per Sabrina Romanoff, a clinical psychologist, in an article published in Very Well Mind, emotional baggage “...refers to unfinished emotional issues, stressors, pain, and difficulties we’ve experienced that continue to take up space in our minds and affect our present relationships”

In other words, the psychological wounds we carry prevent us from living peacefully.

Worse, emotional baggage can lead to ongoing stress and depression, and even begin to create physical issues.

It’s not uncommon for people with lots of emotional baggage to experience panic attacks, heart palpitations, shortness of breath, and insomnia.

Though we all carry some sort of emotional baggage throughout our lives, the happiest people are those who learn to control their emotional baggage instead of allowing it to control them. Of course, this is easier said than done.

However, we have some helpful tips on how to let go of the emotional weight so you can start living freely.

Identify What Caused It

Think of addressing your emotional baggage like mold remediation. Though your goal is to treat the mold, you first have to identify what caused it because it doesn’t just appear out of nowhere. The same concept applies to this.

If you carry guilt or commitment issues - two very common types of emotional weight - then it’s not enough to just accept what happened or just jump into a relationship to prove you’re okay.

Doing so may lead to temporary satisfaction, but nothing sustainable.

Instead, you need to figure out why these feelings exist. Like the mold, you have to get down to the real cause and treat that before you can address anything else.

For example, the root cause of commitment issues could be anything from fear of rejection or abandonment that stems from childhood or having experienced abuse in a previous relationship.

By identifying the root cause, you can then address its symptoms.

Seek Therapy

If you’re dealing with an emotional weight that’s beginning to get too heavy to carry, then one way you can start to let go is by letting someone else help you with the load.

One way to do this is by seeking the guidance and support of a licensed therapist.

In therapy, you can address your past and how it’s currently infringing on your life.

Furthermore, you’ll get a chance to address what you don’t like about the baggage, which can help motivate you to unpack it.

Though therapy has become a little more expensive in recent years, there are affordable options through apps like BetterHelp.

Many therapists also work on a sliding scale or even on a pro bono basis, so don’t be afraid to ask about those options.

Learn to Sit With Uncomfortable Emotions

One of the main reasons why we tend to hold onto emotional baggage is because we don’t take the time to process it.

Though everyone has their coping mechanisms, it’s never healthy to avoid your emotions or try pushing them under the rug.

Even if you do that - and think things are okay for a little while - they will eventually pop up again the next time you encounter a similar emotion or situation.

A good example would be grief. If you don’t take the time to feel sad and angry, you may not be equipped to take care of yourself or be a strong support system for others when they, too, eventually encounter loss.

It’s going to be uncomfortable but sit with your sadness when you start feeling sad. Cry when you feel like crying. Scream when you feel angry.

Starting out, and to make this easier, you can even set a timer so you’re only dealing with these negative emotions within a window you feel comfortable with.

When you do this, you take the power back from these emotions, so they no longer control you. With enough practice and time, you’ll be able to encounter a sad moment instead of allowing the emotional weight of a trigger to ruin your entire day.

These are just a few of the best ways you can begin to let go of emotional baggage. While we all have emotional weight, you don’t have to let it rule over you.

There’s a grace in allowing yourself to be human and remember that what words or actions hurt you in the past don’t have to be your identifiers forever.

How did you like this post? If you found this article helpful to you, you may want to share it with others by clicking the social networking buttons – Thank You!


Cheers, Helene Malmsio

Related Reading: Emotional Intelligence - EQ

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