Bright Futures for Womens Health

An important part of emotional wellness is to value who you are and what you do. Women often have many roles and responsibilities in their lives. They can be a mother, a daughter, a friend, a leader, a co-worker, a wife, a partner, a volunteer, a bill payer, a homemaker, and so on – all at the same time. These many roles and tasks can make women feel overwhelmed.

That's why it is especially important for women to take time to value themselves and all the things they do. Taking a little bit of time every day to do that can help you to do a better job at all of your tasks. It also makes you feel good about yourself!

There are many different ways you could value yourself. This guide outlines some of the most important ones and gives you tips on how to do it:

Build your self-respect

Self-respect is an important part of emotional wellness. Every woman wants to be respected. Have you ever thought about whether you are respecting yourself? This means taking care of yourself in four different ways:

Every woman can appreciate herself more. The tips in this guide can help you enhance your self-respect.

Debbie's story: "I'm a mom who works part time and I have two little kids. Last year, there were so many demands on me I hardly ever took any time for myself. I was exhausted, and I didn't feel as good about myself as I used to. My best friend encouraged me to make some time for myself every day. At first, I thought 'No way!' but I decided to try it. I started by taking a short walk several days a week and trying to go to bed 15 minutes earlier. After I got in the habit of doing that, I started to use the time when I was driving to pick my son up from preschool to think about all the good things I do every day. These small steps have really helped. I still work hard, but I have more energy and feel better. Now I encourage my other friends to do it, too!"

Build your self-confidence

Feeling self-confident helps you believe that you can try new things. Even if things go wrong, self-confidence helps you know that you can try to make them better. You can increase your self-confidence by setting goals that make sense, thinking positively, and being prepared.

Here are some tips to increase your self-confidence:

Stop comparing: Your abilities and talents are unique and special. Everyone has different goals in life and ways of thinking about what success means. Decide what success means for you. Try not to worry about what success means for your neighbor.
Remember your good deeds: Think about the times when you have made a difference in someone else's life. Give yourself credit for the good things you do for others every day.
Forgive yourself and learn from your mistakes: Everyone makes mistakes from time to time. Learn from what went wrong, but don't dwell on it.

Build your self-esteem

Self-esteem is important to your emotional health. A woman with healthy self-esteem knows what makes her unique. She respects those things in her personality. Self-esteem helps you to feel good about yourself, no matter what other people think of you.

Tips to help you boost your self-esteem:

Accept your strengths, and your weaknesses: No one is perfect. Your strengths and weaknesses are what make you unique.
Congratulate yourself: Honor your achievements, big and small.
Encourage yourself and others: Think positive, kind, and loving things about yourself. Let others know the good things you feel about them.
Value yourself: Friends and family are great, but don't depend on others to make you feel good about yourself. Value yourself no matter what other people say about you.
Surround yourself with positive, healthy people: Choose friends who value you.
Turn anger around: Everyone will be angry from time to time. When you get upset, try to use that energy toward positive goals instead of dwelling on the negative.
Praise yourself: Remember at least one good thing about yourself every day.
Do good things: Do at least one thing every day that you feel good about.

Set your own goals and self-expectations

Many women let others tell them what they should be doing and how. To be emotionally well, you need to judge yourself by your own standards and no one else's.

Tamika's story: "I'm from a big family, and I grew up always comparing myself with everyone else. I was constantly disappointed because whenever I would get a raise at work, one of my sisters would, too, or whenever I would learn a new activity, someone else would beat me to it. But eventually, I started thinking about my life and realized that I was achieving all the things I wanted to do. It didn't matter what everyone else in my family was doing: I was leading my own life and was happy about it. Now, I try not to compare myself with other people anymore, and I remind myself to feel happy for my siblings when something good happens to them."

These tips may help you set your own expectations:

Define beauty for yourself: Images of thin, glamorous women are everywhere. However, most women do not look that way. True beauty comes from inside and shines outward. Focus on the things about yourself that you think are beautiful.
Define your own values: Many women believe they need to live up to the expectations of our culture. However, the only values you need to live up to are your own. Take a look at your beliefs and values. Remember how you add value to the world.
Focus on your strengths: We all have strengths and weaknesses, but many of us focus more on our weaknesses. Try this trick to change your way of thinking: Each time you think about one of your weaknesses, follow that with a thought about one of your strengths.

Take care of your body

If you exercise, eat right, and get enough sleep, it will help your physical health. It will help your emotional health as well. You can improve your mood with physical activity, healthy eating, and getting enough sleep. Enough sleep will also improve your memory and help keep you healthy. Most women need about 8 hours of sleep a night.

You can learn more about physical activity and healthy eating in "My Bright Future: Physical Activity and Healthy Eating Tools for Adult Women." You can download a free copy at www.hrsa.gov/womenshealth.

You don't have to make a lot of big changes to exercise more, eat better, or get more sleep. In fact, you will do better if you try to reach your goals in small steps.

Here are some tips to get you started:

Healthy eating habits: Decide on just one thing you would like to do to eat healthier. Keep doing it until it becomes a habit. Then try to form another good eating habit. (If you aren't sure what healthy eating means, here is one definition: Healthy eating means consuming a variety of nutrient-dense foods and beverages within and among the basic food groups, while choosing foods that limit your intake of saturated and trans fats, cholesterol, added sugars, salt, and alcohol.)
Physical activity: Add a few minutes of walking or some other form of exercise to your day. Keep doing it until you have reached your goal. (One goal is to aim for at least 30 minutes of walking or other moderate physical activity on most days of the week.)
Set an earlier bedtime: Make your bedtime 10 minutes earlier. Keep doing it until you've reached your goal.
Develop good sleep habits: Write down your sleep habits for a week and look for ways to improve them. Once you've found the right bedtime, try to go to bed at about the same time every night. Try not to eat, drink alcohol or caffeinated beverages, or exercise right before bed.

Think positively

An important part of emotional wellness is training yourself to be more positive or optimistic. While this may not be easy, positive thinking during tough times will help you stay hopeful. It can improve your chances of moving past your problems. It also has been linked to better health. Some people are more optimistic than others, but everyone can learn how to be more positive.

Here are some tips:

Seek the positive: When things go wrong, look for something positive. For example, if your friend cancels your dinner plans, look at it as a chance to do something for yourself. You could choose to read a book or call another friend instead.
Focus on the good things: Even when something has upset you in one part of your life, you can still focus on the things you value in other areas. This helps you to keep perspective and to cope.

Make time for activities you enjoy and that have meaning for you

One way to improve your overall wellness is to get involved in activities you enjoy and that mean a lot to you. You can get happiness from simple pleasures and from being active and involved.

Here are some tips to help you make time for these activities:

Schedule them: Treat activities with your friends the way you would your work or other appointments.
Find activities that have meaning to you: Spend your time on issues or activities that you really care about. You will be more committed to them and enjoy them more!
Do things with your friends: Make activities you care about an important part of what you do with your friends or family.

Learn skills that help you cope with difficult emotions and situations

Coping is the way we handle difficult situations, people, and problems. It is how we survive stress or conflict. Every woman has her own coping style.

Once you understand which of these styles you tend to use, you can try other coping styles that may help you handle difficult situations. Here are some additional tips:

Activities to help you appreciate yourself

Here are some short exercises you can try to help you learn to appreciate yourself. You can do them by yourself, or with friends and family members.

Take a few moments and think about how to increase what makes you feel good and decrease what brings you stress.

What is something that you have always wanted to try? What are some small steps you can take to make it happen?

Appreciating yourself