64. Beyond the Buzzwords: Uncovering the Real Teacher Self-Care with Cohost Kelsey Sorenson [Summer Self-Care Series]

Excitement for Co-Hosted Episode and Collaboration

[0:00] Welcome to this co-hosted episode with Brittany Blackwell. That's me and And I'm Kelsey Sorensen from wife teacher mommy the podcast We are so excited to do a co-hosted episode and we actually both discovered it is our first Co-hosted episode either of us have done so we're really excited. We've interviewed each other before like separate interviews, And that was so much we had a blast doing that It was so much fun to just talk and it was easy to talk. So figured we do a co-hosted episode Yeah, and it's actually really exciting because Brittany is hosting the summer self-care conference for teachers and I'm presenting at it, which I'm so excited about.

And Brittany just presented at Educate and Rejuvenate too. So we're just like doing each other's stuff, collaborating. So much fun.

Yeah, so much fun. In this episode today, we're going to be talking about self-care and what exactly that is.

So Kelsey, you want to start and just kind of...

Yeah. So we're talking about self-care, kind of like leading into your self-care conference.

Want teachers to kind of think about what is self-care. I feel like that's the biggest thing that I think of when we talk about self-care, because I feel like it's so.

[1:06] Hot right now to talk about self-care and maybe taking a bubble bath and unwinding, and there's nothing wrong with that. But I feel like there's so much more to self-care than just, taking a bubble bath. I kind of call that fluffy self-care is what I call it. There's fluffy Self-care and then like true like deep self-care that's like soul-fulfilling like taking a bubble bath like I might feel good in the moment but it's not like soul-fulfilling it's not completely rejuvenating me it might feel good in the moment but it's not like with all the things that we have going on as teachers or as wives or moms or whatever we have going on in in our lives, like.

[1:43] That's not quite enough self-care in my opinion. Right. And I think that people like when you hear self-care, some people just immediately

Self-Care as Individualized and Reflective Practice

[1:51] think fluffy and then they'll think, oh, well, I don't even know what to do when it comes to self-care. So if you're telling me that taking a bubble bath or getting a manicure is not, enough, well, what is self-care? And when I think about self-care, I'm thinking self-care is when you're aware of your own needs, and you can actually take the action towards fulfilling those needs. And so I, sometimes I do take a bubble bath, and that does work for me, because all I'm needing is some real rest and just calm. That way that my brain can think, I can really take apart all of the stress that I've encountered. But when I also think about self-care, it is doing that dirty work that sometimes we don't want to do. We don't want to.

[2:40] Focus so much on these things about ourselves or really taking care of our mental health in that way. And so, to me, it's not all that fluffy stuff, you know, it's it can be but I don't think it is.

[2:57] Absolutely, there's nothing wrong with it. Like self-awareness, like being aware of what is going on for you. Like Like, one thing I like to do that is a big self-care practice for me is doing what I call a thought download, or a lot of people might call it like a brain dump or something.

And it's really just getting everything out of my head because I feel like so often we just get into these like spirals of overwhelm because we've got so like this running to-do list in our heads that never goes away, right?

If we get it all down on paper and we can like hold it there and we can kind of see what's going on in our brain, then we're like, okay, this is what is going on in my brain.

Can identify like, okay, these are the ones that are like, causing me to feel this way.

And kind of just having that awareness of what is going on. That is one form of self care for me. I don't know, that was kind of random, but like, no, that's just, that's a really good one. Knowing what's going on in your life, like in your mind, in your life, your feelings, processing your feelings, that is another whole thing. Yeah. And those are all self care for me too. Yeah. Like, I think that so often we leave out of the equation of self-care, the reflection piece, like really reflecting on what's going on, how you've felt in certain circumstances and how you can't continue that pattern over and over and over again. Because so often, I think we get stuck in these.

[4:18] Patterns of mistreating ourselves, maybe limiting beliefs that we tell ourselves.

We might get into, you know, just.

[4:27] Poor self-care, where we're not focusing on our nutrition, we're not focusing on taking all that stuff out of our head.

So like you said, like writing all that stuff down, brain dumping all of that, that is self-care because you're taking all of these thoughts and you're putting them down onto paper, getting them out so that you can do something with them.

[4:47] And I love that. I love it. Yeah.

It really just brings awareness to what is going on that like self...

Because when you mentioned like kind of knowing what you need, it's like, oh yeah, that's how I figure out what I need.

And it might look different for other people. But that is something that really, really helps me, for sure.

Yeah. And when the other part of self-care that I think gets kind of left out of the equation is the individualized piece, because like you were saying, it might look different for other people.

Like, to me, when I used to go to these professional developments at school, or people would talk about self-care, they would be very like cookie cutter.

And I just couldn't deal with, I couldn't wrap my head around that.

[5:26] Like, this is not going to work for every single person, because every single person's journey or life or expectations or wants or needs or any of those things aren't going to be the same. And so when I think about self- care, it is a very individualized process where you are, one, becoming self-aware, and then two, really taking action that's going to be good for you. And I don't feel like you can do that without really trying things on.

Like, it's like you go to like a store and you try on a bunch of different outfits and you're like, I'm not sure if I'll really like this.

You know, I don't know if I like this, this, the way that this looks.

Like I tried on shorts the other day and this makes me think of that.

Like I haven't worn shorts in forever. So when I tried on the shorts, some of them, the style was not me.

And I'm like, it fits, but I'm probably not going to wear that.

So put that away, try on a different pair. And once I found the one pair, I feel like I'm just going to wear them all the time, because they're great. They're great for me.

And I think that's the same way with self-care, you know?

Yeah.

[6:32] Yeah, absolutely. And those ones, we were like, no way, I'm not going to wear those.

For someone else, that was their perfect fit, their style. They fit them correctly.

And so it's just finding what that right fit is for you.

The problem I think a lot of teachers run into as well is they don't even go looking for that fit.

So focused on finding everybody else's fit, like figuring out what their children need, what their students need, what their spouse needs, even potentially like with spouses, especially I feel like sometimes we're trying so hard make sure that they're happy that they're not.

[7:05] Frustrated if we're taking too much time away from the kids or whatever, at least that's for me. I don't know if that's for you. Yeah. Yeah. But it's like making sure that everybody else around you is happy. And as long as they're happy, then I'm happy if they're happy. But really, are you?

Because if you're not taking care of yourself, then you might not. One thing that Christina at Educate and Rejuvenate said is you need to take care of the most important person in your child's life or one of the most important people in your student's life, if you're not a parent.

And that is yourself. Because you can't show up for other people if you're not taking care of yourself. But I think so many of us forget, just get consumed in these other roles that we get lost along the way. You don't even know when exactly it happened. At some point, you're like, yeah, back when I was a teenager or in college or whatever, I would do all all these things and then you start teaching, you start a family and suddenly, slowly.

[8:07] Your own personality potentially, not personality, but like the things you do or ways you take care of yourself might slowly dwindle as you add on those other responsibilities if you're not careful and self-aware about it.

Right, and so this is why I love things like Educate and Rejuvenate and the Summer Self-Care Conference because it brings all these different people with all of these different mindsets all together to really bring what they're passionate about, what's worked for them in their journey of self-discovery or self-awareness or self-care or burnout prevention or recovery, whatever you want to call it, but it brings all of these people together so that when.

Exploring Different Self-Care Options

[8:49] There are people coming in, where there's attendees coming in, they can kind of pick and choose. What, what do I like?

OK, well, I've never heard of Breathwork. So let me, let me check out Breathwork. Let me try on those shorts, you know, and see how they fit for me. And maybe you don't like that. But that's what the beauty is of that, is that you can sit there and you can listen and you can say, Oh, I like that, or, Ah, that's totally not me at all. And I would have said that about, just speaking of breathwork, I would have said that about breathwork years ago if you'd have told me, Oh, if you just take deep breaths, it helps with your stress levels. Or it can help you release trauma or heal or all of those things. I would have been like, You are so full of crap. But, as I actually did it, I was like, Whoa, OK, there's like science behind that. There is, there are people that can facilitate it. So even when I don't feel super comfortable with my own ability to facilitate my own breathwork, you know, there's people out there that can do that.

Meeting Experts and Trying New Self-Care Activities

[9:52] And that's what's, I mean, I think that's what's so cool about Educate and Rejuvenate, the Summer Self-Care Conference, is you get to meet those people that have tried these different things. And you can try on those shorts, or you can try on those self-care activities and really dive deeper into your own well-being.

[10:11] Absolutely. And I just love that everybody always brings their own unique perspective to the table.

Like even when there are sessions like on similar topics, like everybody has their own.

Like way of explaining it and sometimes like the way somebody explains it can kind of give you that additional like aha moment or whatever. Okay that that analogy clicked or something like that. Yeah.

So I just love hearing from all the different perspectives and people teaching different things that all like for example in your summer self-care summit like it all falls under that umbrella of self-care. So no matter which direction they go like which sessions they decide to watch or which ones they decide are the ones that are their fit and they're going to try on.

[10:51] They're headed to that destination of better self-care, which I just love that for teachers, because, you know, now in summer is the time to reflect on it. We have some more time to do that, so then we can build those habits that can follow us into the coming school year.

Systems, Sustainability, and Support in Self-Care

[11:06] Yes, I love it. And so one of the things that I was doing this year for the Summer Self-Care conference was, as over the course of the last year, was I thought about how different things come into self-care, like we were just talking about. And so I thought about how systems, you need, you need systems in place that can really take care of you, that allow you to have the time, the energy, the bandwidth to spend on yourself. And so systems was a huge piece of that. So said, there's a lot of different presentations about systems. One, another one being sustainability, like making your.

[11:43] Teaching career sustainable, but also making you sustainable. So the mindsets that go behind that, the, the things that you need to have in place in order to make that sustainable. And then, you know, support, because I think that there is no way for you to be an effective educator, an effective parent, an effective, you know, present person without support. And so often, I think teachers are, are not supported. We hear teachers all the time say things like, Well, you know, my admin doesn't care, or sometimes it's even our spouse or whoever doesn't care about the things.

[12:23] That you're passionate about. and, Really taking care of yourself requires community. It requires support from people who will understand.

Importance of Community and Connecting with Others

[12:31] And so those were the three components under the self-care umbrella that I just really wanted to focus on because I thought those were some of the biggest keys to making a transformation.

Yes, I love the community portion you talked about, too, because sometimes we might not find that right in our homes or in our schools. And maybe you don't click with the teachers who are in your team.

And because I've even had teachers come to coaching, and I feel like everybody talks about having their teacher bestie, and I don't have one or whatever. And they think they're the only one who doesn't have one, which is so not true.

But right, so true.

[13:07] Awesome community or whatever. And what I found at these events, like even virtual events, like people think like, oh, it has to be in person, but it doesn't because as we just saw Educate and Rejuvenate, and as I'm sure we will see at the summer self care summit, these teachers, we come together and when you come to an event like this, you know you're kind of joining people who also want to like start practicing self-care. You kind of have that common denominator to begin with that you want to kind of improve and it's kind of a positive mindset people have at these events. Like, you know, nobody's putting each other down or anything. Everybody's cheering each other on and people are really connecting online and I've seen people like make friends at these events and it's it's really.

Positive Mindset and Making Friends at Self-Care Events

[13:49] Yeah, I mean, I've made, I mean, I have friends that I have made from the Summer Self-Care Conference for the last three years. And so, like, even, even with Educate and Rejuvenate, which was just a couple of weeks ago, like, I'm making friends from that, that met me, and then I met them. And we're just having these conversations. And just having someone that I think people can reach out to, or that they can go to and just have that teacher bestie, even if it's not in their school building and it's online. I think that's super powerful and why I love anything that's community-oriented and probably why I like social media so much, honestly.

Discovering the Magic of TikTok

[14:33] I know. I saw on TikTok recently, one of your TikToks, I'm like, wow, Brittany gets TikTok. I'm still figuring that out. But you get it.

[14:42] I love me some TikTok. Honestly, though, I mean, like, with, with TikTok, I thought, you know, when, when you scroll through, you, the For You page finds the people that are for you.

It is crazy to me because, like, I'll be like, it'll say something like, if this shows up on your For You page, then your birthday is, they don't say this, but, you know, like, December 3rd. And I'm like, it is December 3rd. How did you know that, you know? And then so like I think. It's hard to be in fashion, but cool. Yeah. Yeah. I love stuff like that.

But yeah, we got on a tangent there about social proof. We did. We did. We got on a tangent. But it's all in the same, you know, support community. Right. Finding people that really relate to you and can support you along the way. So that is cool. To be inside or outside your school building or your neighborhood or, you know, it can be, you know, across the country or across the world. That's the great thing about the internet.

Connecting Through Books and Reading

[15:47] Yes. I mean, I found you on the internet, which is pretty awesome.

Yeah. I know. It's great. And then we realized on the last time we recorded a podcast, we're like, ooh, what books? Let's trade book lists of like things we need to read because we are both obsessed with reading. Yes.

[16:03] And we both talked about how both of us read a bunch of books at the same time.

And then synthesize them all together to make our own story from it.

That is so cool. It's the best.

[16:16] People are like, what are you reading? I'm like, do you have time for the list?

You know, I'm reading, I'm friends with Angela Watson from Truth for Teachers.

And I decided, I was like, I've never read one of her books.

And so I picked it up and I started reading Awakened. Have you read that book?

[16:37] I have it and I've read it. It's really good. The one that I've been reading is Grit.

Have you read that one? It's in my Audible library. See, this is like a collector and then I read as many as I can. Yeah. Yes. Oh my gosh. It is so good. I don't know why it's so good, because it's, I mean, like, it's talking about how the power of, of grit and perseverance is what really makes the difference. It's not like your intellect or your, it's really, really good. It's a really good one for that resilience piece, that perseverance piece of self-awareness and self-care.

[17:19] Yeah, yeah. One of my favorites that my session for your Summer Self-Care Conference is about, it was kind of

Embracing Wins and Setting Goals

[17:27] inspired by this book, but then I kind of did my own thing with it, you know. But it's called The Gap and the Gain, and it talks about how, like, so many of us, we just move that goalpost of, like, you know, where we want to be. Like, so we forget how far we've come. So, like, for example, at one point, all of us wanted to become a teacher, right? We had to, like, go to school for that or whatever or, like, you know, do whatever we need to do to get that first job or whatever.

And then we just forget conveniently that we made that whole journey to get this far, And then we're just like, Oh, well, that doesn't matter. Because now I need to get better at this.

Now I don't know enough about the science of reading, or now I don't know, you know, all these different things. And just just always kind of beating ourselves up about where we want to be rather than how far we've already come. So that's kind of what I'm talking about. In my.

[18:12] Session at the summer self care summit is like, owning our wins, like looking at how far we've come. And then from there, it doesn't mean we don't set goals. And we don't try to achieve bigger, better things and learn more about how to be more effective educators or how to, you know, build in more self-care for ourselves or uplevel our own mindset, any of those things, they're all great. But we come from it, from this framework of, wow, look at how many things I've already accomplished. And I'll be sharing kind of my process, like you mentioned, like processes for doing this, for doing this each day. And it's really simple. So I'll be sharing that. I'm really excited to share that with everybody. I am really excited for you to share that too, because that is such a powerful thing. And I do think a lot of times teachers, they get, they get stuck kind of not thinking about the wins. They don't realize how far they've come. They don't do that. And so your session is totally needed. I went from the perspective of the systems part. So I have a session at the Summer Self-Care Conference, too, which is all about automation. Automation changed my whole life. I mean, like, I automate literally every part of my life and I wish I had known about it sooner.

The Power of Automation and AI in Self-Care

[19:26] When I first started teaching, not only did I not celebrate my wins, right? I didn't, I didn't do that for sure. I was constantly getting beat down, and I beat myself down. But then I also tried to do everything. Are you like that? Are you one of those people who just tries to do everything? Like, I, I tried to do everything. And at some point, you can't do it all. And you can't. But if you're a person who is like me, like a recovering high Achiever, a recovering Perfectionist, all of those things, then you need something that's in place that can do some of those tasks for you so it can allow you to do more. And automation is that thing that really helped me be able to do that. Like, I learned.

[20:14] Kahoot and Blookit and all of those things. Those are like things that are automation. But when it comes down to taking care of yourself, if you don't have the time to take care of yourself, you need to automate some tasks. You need to get really strategic about that. And it's easier than it sounds. And I'm really excited to talk more about that and really go in-depth with it, because it's really exciting. It's my favorite thing.

I can't wait to watch. I can't wait to watch that because I mean, I love I like I use automation for some things, but I know that there's more I could be doing both with automation and with AI. I feel like those are tools that we have to help us save time. So we have more time for that self care to relax to reflect to own our wins to do all those things. So it really is twofold. It's like the things we do. But then also, what can we let go of so we can do these things and automation is or AI is kind of a way that we can let go of things we don't want to do.

Without fully letting go of them. We're just kind of working smarter to get it done faster or more automatically.

Yes, automatically. Yes, I think that so many people get stuck on that.

[21:22] Well, I don't have the time to do it or they don't have the bandwidth to do it.

And so AI is one of those things that really frees up your ability to be a little bit more creative, which is part of self-care that many people don't even think about.

Like just being creative, That is a huge piece of taking care of yourself because you're doing something that lights you up and fills your cup, but it's not, you know, it's not taking so much away.

And so if you can kind of balance the scales a little bit for your draining task and your...

[21:59] Retaining tasks? I don't know. Is that what I want to call it? Draining tasks and retaining tasks?

Draining and retaining, yeah. Yeah, so they're bringing you in.

Draining tasks vs. retaining tasks: finding balance

[22:07] The ones that drain you versus the ones that retain you or the ones that even like lift you up.

Yeah, so like when you can actually balance those things and you start taking away those things that are draining your energy and adding more to the things that are bringing you energy, are energizing you, then you start to feel a whole lot better. You feel more in control.

You feel as if, yeah, I can take on this day. And you're able to then own your teacher win.

So yeah, I'm all over it.

I'm so excited. I can't wait for this conference. And I love that you put it together. And I know it's a lot of work to put together a conference because I'm just coming off of mine. So I appreciate the opportunity that you allowed me to be part of it this year, which was a lot of fun.

Of course, of course. And I, like I said before, it's, it's so needed, these types of conferences are so needed to bring these people together, to bring teachers together, to realize that they have more control over their own mental health and their own mental awareness than they realized so that they can start feeling better, start sustaining their career, start.

[23:13] Feeling better about being a mom and a teacher or dad and teacher, you know, like a person again, and so that it's not taking over their entire lives. So I'm excited about the conference, and I'm so excited that you are going to be there as well. Do you want to share a little bit about where everybody can find you if they're listening in on the Resilient Teacher Podcast.

Where to find the speakers and information about the conference

[23:34] Yeah, so I have a podcast called Wife, Teacher, Mommy, the podcast.

And so you can find me there. If you're here, you're obviously a podcast listener.

I would love for you to hop over and check out my show.

I'm also on all the socials just as Wife, Teacher, Mommy, including Threads.

Yes. Which I went through that rabbit hole last night.

[23:55] We're recording less than 24 hours from when it got released. Yeah.

But yeah, all the socials, you can find me at Wife, Teacher, Mommy.

Easy to find and my website is wifeteachermommy.com and you'll find all this stuff there. You'll find info about our events and our club and our new planners we've created, like physical planners that are so fun. So yeah, it's all over there. And how about you, Brittany, for those who are on the Wife Teacher Mommy, the podcast. I know my own podcast name. Tell them where they can find you. Yeah, so you can find me on, my podcast is called the Resilient teacher podcast. You can find that at teachingmindbodyandsoul.com slash podcast, or my agency, Teaching Mind, Body and Soul. It's just at teachingmindbodyandsoul.com. I'm on Instagram at teachingmindbodyandsoul and threads, same thing. And TikTok, I am at missprincessteach. I just never changed my name over there. And yeah, so if you want to connect further, I am always willing to talk to teachers and talk about burnout and talk about self-care and come join us at the Summer Self-Care Conference.

Yes, it's going to be so much fun. And I'm sure we will both have a link in our show notes for you to check out that summit and get signed up. Super exciting. I'm excited.