ΛΛπ’Φ΄ΰ» β Self-Care: The Woo Woo Way β π’Φ΄ΰ»ΛΛ
FRAME BY @anitalenia
β Self care is so important for the mind and body. As much as it is important to do external self care, we also need to take care of ourselves internally. Today I want to share some spiritual self care that I do in order to look after myself and my well-being.
ΛΛπ’Φ΄ΰ» MEDITATION π’Φ΄ΰ»ΛΛ
I think there is a lot of misinformation when it comes to the practice of meditation. People seem to think that your mind must be completely blank while meditating and that cannot be farther from the truth. Repeat after me, YOU MEDITATE TO CLEAR YOUR MIND, YOU DO NOT CLEAR YOU MIND IN ORDER TO MEDITATE. I learned this from one of my favorite manifestations YouTuber's, Nero Knowledge, and he compared your mind to a filing cabinet. With your filing cabitnet sometimes you put too many files in there, so you eventually need to make space for new files. In this case your mind is the filing cabinet, the files are your thoughts, and how you make room for new thoughts is to meditate.
β How do I meditate? β
Meditation is very simple and has many techniques that you can choose from. You can meditate to some relaxing music or vibrational rates. There is also guided meditation, you can find many of these on YouTube. There is also visualization meditation, usually used for manifestation, and you can meditate to an affirmation tape.
My favorite way to meditate is to sit in complete silence for a few minutes, sit down, close my eyes, and let my thoughts pass through. This gives me a couple of minutes every single day to just be an observer of my thoughts and clear out that mental filing cabinet.
As far as how long to meditate for, that is completely subjective. I typically mediate for 2-5 minutes a day, but some people love to mediate for 10 minutes plus. It's all in what works for you how your brain works.
ΛΛπ’Φ΄ΰ» POSITIVE SELF TALK π’Φ΄ΰ»ΛΛ
Whether people believe it or not the internal conversations you are having with yourself control the outcome of your life and how you view yourself. Implementing positive self talk in your life genuinely will chnage it for the better. This is something that I've added to my life and it has not only changed my physical appearance but more importantly my mental headspace. I sometimes think about the way I used to talk to myself and I am completely mortefied. The way I used to talk to myself was so ugly and degrading. Now I am muchmore patient with myself and I am definitely happier. In my opinion positive self-talk is one of the most important forms of self-care.
ΛΛπ’Φ΄ΰ» YOGA ΛΛπ’Φ΄ΰ»
Yoga was one of those things that I never understood. I never got how it could be relaxing and it just seemed like a workout to me. It wasn't until recently that I started adding yoga into my life and I can genuinely say that it has made my night routine so much better. It's also helped my joints, and made me much more flexible. I think it's the slow but conentrated movements that make me at ease and let my mind rest for a second. I trypically do it for 5 minutes, right before bed.
ΛΛπ’Φ΄ΰ» EFT TAPPING ΛΛπ’Φ΄ΰ»
EFT Tapping stands for Emotional Freedom Techniques. It is the practice of tapping on the acupuncture meridian points of your body. So the sides of your eyes, under your eyes, under your nose, under your arms, chin, eyebrows, collarbone, and the area betwen your pinky and wrist. People use EFT tapping when they are feeling stressed about a specific situation. I learned about EFT tapping through manifestaion coaches and have really implemented it into my life.
β How do I perform EFT Tapping? β
Basically all you'll want to do is, when you're feeling stressed out, go to a quiet space and start tapping on the specific acupuncture meridian points. You will want to tap for a couple of seconds at each point. While you are tapping you'll want to state just a few affirmations to yourself. EX: "It is okay that I am feeling this way", "I know this feeling will pass." I would say a new affirmation everytime you tap at a new point. I love to tap on my collarbone because I find that point calms me the most and the more you do it the more you'll discover which points work the best for you. I tyoically do this for about 2 - 5 minutes, but adjust that time as needed!
ΛΛπ’Φ΄ΰ» AROMA THERAPY ΛΛπ’Φ΄ΰ»
I love essential oils. I know they get a bad wrap because of all of the MLM schemes, but my god does it work on me. Whenever I have a clean earthy smell in my room, especially with lavender, my mood is infinitely better. It makes me feel more a peace and just like I got my life together. I know it sounds dramatic, but it's so true.
β Those are all my little 'Woo Woo' self-care tips I have that have helped improve my life.
π Μ.βHow To Get a Big, Bouncy Blowout β.π Μ
.β¦ έΛ PREP IS EVERYTHING .β¦ έΛ
A lot of the time, why your blowout does not come out the way you want it to is because you're not prepping your hair. Think about when you go to a salon, they would never put heat on your hair without at least putting heat protectant and some sort of styling cream.
π§ How I prep my hair π§
#1 ~ Heat protectant
Heat protectant is so important for not just the overall health of your hair, but also the look of your blowout. I noticed that whenever I would skip this step my hair looked so crunchy after styling. π
My current favorite heat protectant is the OLAPLEX No.9 Bond Protector & Frizz Reduction. I like this one because it is almost like a gel that you run through your hair.
Another one of my favs is the Dry Bar heat protector because it's in an aerosol can and I've had amazing results with it.
I prefer the serum-like heat protectors and protectors in aerosol cans because it lets you lather the product in your hair way easier.
If you are using a serum, you want to let the product dry before applying heat, especially from an iron.
#2 ~ Styling Cream
If you want that gorgous, Victorias Secret hair, you'll want to use a styling cream. It makes my hair so soft and shiny. It also helps keep your hair healthy.
My favorite styling cream is the OLAPLEX No.6 Bond Smooth Frizz Control Styling Hair Cream.
#3 ~ Oils
Hair oil is such an understated part of not just hair prep, but overall hair routine. I would just oil the ends of your hair before styling, and just every day in general.
When it comes to putting oil in your hair before styling, make sure you let the oil dry before applying heat in order to avoid frying.
My favorite hair oil is by Crown Affair called The Hair Oil. It is sold at Sephora.
.β¦ έΛ STYLING YOUR HAIR .β¦ έΛ
Here I am going to tell you how to prep your hair with an airstyler, how to section your hair, how to curl your hair, how to pin it up, and the overall wait time and techniques you'll want to do when taking it down.
π§ Airstyle before you curl π§
After prep and before I curl anything, I like to run my airstyler through my hair just to freshen up the hair and to curl the ends. Trust me, it makes a world of difference and makes all the products from the prep work more efficient.
π§ Sectioning you hair π§
You'll want to section your hair into multiple parts. I remember watching one of the official VS hairstylists post a tutorial and mentioning sectioning the hair into four parts. I would do a minimum of four sections, but you might have to do more if you have thicker hair.
TIP: When styling your hair, start from top to bottom
π§ Curling your hair π§
When curling your hair your going to want to curl your top pieces of hair inward and your bottom pieces outward. I notice that when I do this, it makes my hair look more vibrant.
π§ Putting your hair in rollers/pinning it up π§
For rollers ~ For your top pieces of hair, for every piece of hair, at the root, put the roller under the piece you just curled. You're going to want to slide the roller down your hair, curl it inward, then pin it with a clip.
For your bottom pieces your going to want to put the roller on top of the strand of hair. Repeat the same process as earlier, but this time curl outwards.
Do this with your whole head of hair and remember to work from top to bottom.
For pin-up ~ The pin-up curl method is extremely similar to the roller method; you just use clips instead. You usually see this method when VS models are getting their hair styled.
What you'll do is when you curl a piece of your hair, gather the fresh curl, roll it in a pinwheel motion, with your fingers, til you get to your root, then pin it to your head. You're going to want to keep doing the method of top pieces inward and bottom pieces outward.
π§ How long to keep the rollers in π§
Typically, people say 15 minutes, but honestly, the longer the better. What I typically do is put up my hair first and then let it sit as I'm getting ready. I'll leave it in for about 1 hour.
TIP: Spray some hairspray while your hair is sitting!
π§ How to take out rollers π§
When taking out your rollers your going to want to twist the roller in the direction your hair is in. You're going to want to be delicate so that there's zero breakage.
For the pin-up method, you simply just want to take the clip out, and it will naturally fall.
When taking out your curls for both methods, you'll want to work from bottom to top.
π§ Aftercare for your blowout π§
After your hair is taken out you'll want to shake out your curls to make it more voluminous.
Flip your hair a lot, and scrunch your hair at the root.
Part your hair the way you like, spray a few extra sprays of hairspray, and now you have a gorgeous blowout!
π²ΦΌπ’ For a while, I have struggled with social media addiction and doing WAY too much doom scrolling. I would spend hours on TikTok, and it started getting in the way of my responsibilities. It would take up most of my day and make me feel very overwhelmed. After months of trying to figure out ways to reduce my social media use, I have now found a simple system that has cut my time in half.
π²ΦΌπ’ GET A HOBBY π²ΦΌπ’
Getting into hobbies helped me so much with staying off of social media, which ultimately made me more creative and happy.
Some hobbies that I got into were ~
πΏ Working Out
πΏ Coloring
πΏ Baking
πΏ Blogging
πΏ Reading
Doing these lets me put my phone to the side and focus on whatever is in front of me. I also like these tasks because they usually take a while, so that gives me about 30 minutes to an hour that I am away from my phone.
π²ΦΌπ’ PUTTING ALL MY SOCIAL MEDIA ON MY LAPTOP π²ΦΌπ’
Doing this has seriously changed my life for the better. I found that doing this habit has been the most effective. I remember hearing this tip from the Upstairs Neighbors podcast, and it's one of the best things I've ever done.
Basically, what I did was completely delete all my social media from my phone and move it to my laptop. I only have TikTok and Tumblr, so it wasn't too much, but the difference in how I feel is actually insane.
First of all, I'm on social media way less. Doing this has also made going on social media way more fun and intentional. It used to feel like something I would do out of habit, but now I actually get excited when I check my social media accounts.
I love doing this too because it makes me feel like I'm living in the 2000's!
Also, moving everything to my laptop makes me feel way less suffocated. I believe this is because our phone screens are so tiny, so it would almost give me tunnel vision and would kind of freak me out. π
Going through this process was a little challenging in the beginning, but it's worth making yourself do it. I promise that after trying this, you will feel so much more at ease and focused; it's gonna blow your mind.
