Setting Yourself Up for Success: Preventative Self-Care for Practitioners

As the pandemic winds down, many are celebrating a return to normalcy. But for practitioners, clinicians and educators, the next challenge has just begun. The two years of instability have done more than cause stress, it has also shown a significant detriment to reading skills and social–emotional development in children and those with special needs, and they need your services more now than ever.

We’ve compiled a list of self-care tips to help you stay resilient as you face the next wave of challenges brought on by the pandemic. Our team of trained assessment consultants is standing by to guide and train you on the most effective assessments and intervention resources. We also have a robust online grading and assessment platform that makes assessments and progress monitoring easier than ever before.

Start with Self-Awareness

It’s tempting to think that the risk of burnout or post-traumatic stress disorder is lower now that things are returning to normal, but that might not be the case. Stay attuned to your body and monitor for signs such as muscle tension, a clenched jaw, increased heart rate, or chest pressure. Other signs of burnout include irritability, a lack of empathy, and even an inability to connect with patients, students, research participants, or others. If you’re experiencing these symptoms, it may be time to seek help from a licensed professional.

Connect with Colleagues

Humans are social creatures, and spending time talking with colleagues not only helps us feel more connected but creates greater compassion and resilience in teams. When possible, make time to connect in enjoyable activities, whether it be a virtual coffee break or a restorative walk around the office, so that you begin to associate work with pleasurable activities rather than stressful ones.

Upgrade (or Change) your Environment

Many of us have developed an automatic negative response to our working space due to the high frequency of stress that we were exposed to in it. If you find a sense of dread setting in the moment you sit down at your desk, change things up! Add a plant, move your desk or hang up some new art, and set an intention to form a new, positive relationship with this workspace.

Remind Yourself of the Good

Burnout often shifts a person’s brain into a negativity bias, which is certainly not helped by the overwhelming amount of bad news in the media. This is where methods from Cognitive Behavioral Therapy can come in handy. Remind yourself of the positive impact you have made, and learn to recognize and reframe any negative thinking patterns you may have slipped into during the stresses of the past two years.

Build Better Boundaries

Just because boundaries were blurred during the pandemic doesn’t mean they have to stay that way. Keep track of your daily activities and make sure that you’re balancing your work and day your free time, and carve out meaningful pockets of relaxation and regeneration into your daily schedule to stay energized. Perhaps you no longer have a water cooler to gather around in the office, but could you take those ten minutes to sit outside and text a friend or colleague?  

Just Do One Thing

After two years of people talking about self-care, you may feel that it’s yet another “to do” on a long list, and that is the very cornerstone of burnout: the treacherous combination of feeling unmotivated, detached, and dissatisfied. Fortunately, even small, selfish steps forward in self-actualization can get the ball moving in the right direction.