Helena and the fluI am just getting back to full strength after a week of the flu.

In other words, I just had the perfect opportunity to practice being gentle to myself. I woke up Tuesday with a high fever, called off all meetings and assignments for the rest of the week, rested, slept, and most of all, had absolutely no expectations on myself and of any type of productivity.

Ditching all expectations on myself is much more significant than it might sound. Opening up for just being, without planning for or demanding any type of output from myself (I even had a few blog-free days last week, because my aim to blog daily is not a Must to me). Letting myself have all the time needed to combat all flu-bugs and just focus on getting well again.

As I sit here and reflect, I realize how lucky I am to have been on the road of Being gentle to me for a few years now. I know how easy it would have been for me to beat myself over the head with angst over cancelled meetings, reports not filled in, emails not responded to and so on.

Now – none of that. Truly. I cancelled those meetings without a bad conscience. I filled in the reports this week instead, and am slowly getting through all the emails of last week. I rested, watched silly movies, read a few chick-lit books and enjoyed leaving my physical immune system alone to do what it does best – return me to physical wellbeing and health.

Welcome to my website, where the underlying tone centers around being gentle to oneself. I will be reflecting on a monthly basis on what that means to me, in the moment, and this is one of those reflections. I hope you enjoy it. If you do, please subscribe to updates so you won’t miss out on future reflections.