Self-Care for Balance: The Renewal You’ve Been Seeking

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During busy seasons, we can get really out of balance. We get caught up, wound up, overwhelmed, or just spread a little too thin, especially as sensitive creatives who are very in tune with and responsive to our environments.

The energy is high in a busy season, expectations are high, timelines can be tight, and we can lose track of our own needs while we tend to the demands and the opportunities all around us. Even when we are doing things we love and value, whether for our businesses and the people we serve or the people we love, a constant state of output and productivity is not sustainable.

What we need are accessible self-care practices that are easy to find, easy to do, and that allow us to return to balance again through simply receiving and through nourishing our bodies and nervous systems so that we can rest and feel refreshed for a new season in alignment.

In This Episode, We Cover:

Balance and Self-Care: The importance of balance during busy seasons and the need for accessible self-care practices
Self-Care Practices: various self-care practices, including grounding, holistic approaches, and the importance of rest
Cycles and Rhythms — The significance of natural cycles and rhythms, such as moon phases, and how they influence our well-being
Sound and Frequencies — The role of sound, music, and frequencies in self-care and emotional balance
Bodywork and Somatics — Exploration of bodywork practices like massage, Reiki, and yoga for healing and well-being
Introspection and Reflection — Encouragement to engage in introspection and reflection to make meaning of experiences
Connection and Community — The value of community and connection in enhancing well-being and personal growth.
Tarot of Flowers — A community Tarot of Flowers card readibng as a tool for self-discovery and reflection

Mentioned in This Episode:

Griffith Observatory’s Moon Phases Online
JOMO — The Joy Of Missing Out
Called to Bloom Season 1, Episode 5: “The Holistic System that Reshaped My Life and Business”
Wellbeing at Nectar & Bloom
Vocal Toning
Solfeggio Frequencies
Jen’s “Frequencies” and “Yoga Nidra” Playlists on Spotify
Hot Stones & Cupping
Reiki
Square Breathing & Nadi Shodhana Pranayama
Called to Bloom Episode 04 “Recovering From Burnout: How to Get Unstuck and Reinspired”
Tarot of Flowers

Resources:

Join the Poetry of Flowers — holistic floral artistry online courses to empower your creative practice from anywhere in the world
Explore Workshops & Mentorships — deepen your floral artistry practice in-person
Discover Tarot of Flowers — a gift of abundant floral wisdom for any flower-lover or seeker
Use code CALLEDTOBLOOM for 10% off your first Tarot of Flowers order
YEAR END SALE! Use code TIMETOBLOOM30 for 30% off any Poetry of Flowers course bundle or single-payment membership purchase for a limited time only

Details from Our Sponsors:

This episode of the Called to Bloom podcast is brought to you by Tarot of Flowers, a floral oracle for inner guidance in the language of flowers.

Tarot of flowers is an original 78-card tarot deck, complete with 200+ page guide booklet and a gift-worthy hard case box to contain it all. A perfect gifto for any florist, flower-lover, gardener, or seeker.

Use code CALLEDTOBLOOM at checkout for 10% off your first Tarot of Flowers purchase.

Keep in Touch:

Thank you so much for being here, and for being part of this radiant community as we step into these creative callings together. If you enjoyed this episode, I would love to hear from you! Connect with me on Instagram: @nectar_and_bloom and @calledtobloompodcast. Also it helps so much if you leave a review on Apple Podcasts or on Spotify. Your words help other creatives and seekers like you to find their way here, and they simply mean the world to me too.

Full Transcript

Welcome to the Called to Bloom podcast. I'm Jen Cavender, founder of Nectar & Bloom and your host as we explore tools and holistic methods that empower you to craft an inspired career and a fulfilling creative life.

I am a floral artist and educator who left an academic career to build my dream floral design studio. Now I empower flower lovers, florists, and creative entrepreneurs like you to find your aligned path and to build your dream.

Together we go deep into topics covering creative entrepreneurship, health and wellbeing, sustainability, personal transformation, the art and business of working with flowers, and practices for manifesting a life you love.

If you are ready to feel inspired and empowered as you build your next Aligned Creative Chapter, you are in the right place. Now, let's bloom.

This is a journey into self-care practices that bring grounding and balance after a busy season, and that help you step holistically into a new season feeling refreshed and renewed.

My criteria for the self-care practices and experiences that I'm recommending to you in this episode is that each experience:

One, must be something you can do on your own or find easily, as in it's accessible.

Two, must be grounding by nature, restorative and balancing in effect.

Three, it must be holistic, as in it supports your whole being from mind to body to emotions to spirit.

And four, it must be something you can easily incorporate into your lifestyle and routine so that it's not just a one-off, but potentially an improvement to your wellbeing long-term.

Here's what these self-care recommendations are not.

One, they are not a health regimen that you have to follow.

Two, they are not a diet or nutritional plan that you have to adhere to.

Three, they are not overly yang or active output-oriented activities.

They are more yin and receptive and receiving oriented activities.

Four, they are not a checklist. You don't have to do everything here. Maybe just listen for what speaks to you, try one thing, see how it goes. I want this to be very easy and supportive.

And five, this will not be an exhaustive or complete list. That would be overwhelming. And overwhelm is not useful to us. Instead, it's a selective list to highlight a few harmonious practices and experiences that help bring you balance without needing to be encyclopedic.

Often having fewer options makes things much more doable and more satisfying anyway.

So in this episode, my whole mission is to share with you a curated collection of restorative, refreshing, and realigning experiences that I've organized into five holistic categories.

I will be sharing with you why each category is balancing and beneficial, plus I've included a few specific and accessible self-care practices within each category that I love and that I highly recommend you try, when and if they call to you, for their balancing and rejuvenating benefits as well.

So with those intentions set, let's begin.

This episode is brought to you by the Tarot of Flowers.

The wise, inspiring, and deeply emotional world of flowers is full of metaphors and messages for us. If you've ever seen someone receive flowers, or if you've ever received flowers yourself, you know firsthand the immediate emotional impact they have. Surprise, awe, hope, joy, these are all experiences that flowers incite the instant they appear.

Flowers are a portal through which we are invited to open up and feel. As a floral artist and writer, I felt called to bring together the powerful language of flowers with the incredible perspectives I've learned in my studies of healing modalities, such as yoga, Reiki and Ayurveda, to create a resource that gives the gift of self-discovery. And this is how Tarot of Flowers was born.

Tarot of Flowers is a completely original tarot deck based in the traditional archetypes of the tarot and interpreted into the vibrant language of flowers. It includes 78 hand-illustrated cards done by my sister who's an amazing artist are full of softness and emotion.

Tarot of Flowers also includes a complete guidebook that I wrote that includes everything you need to know about tarot, how to use your deck, how to pull cards and do readings, as well as complete meanings for each of the floral cards.

You don't need to be an expert in tarot. You don't even need to know how to use

You can be a brand new beginner to Oracle decks or you can be an experienced tarot reader and still enjoy Tarot of Flowers.

Tarot of Flowers is available in my online shop at nectarandbloomfloral.com and it's a perfect gift for any florist, flower lover, gardener, or seeker. And it's also a perfect addition to your self-care routine.

I like to bring a tarot of flowers deck to my weekly yoga class, and my students love drawing insights from the wisdom of flowers, especially after practice when our bodies and minds are more open and more aligned.

As a Called to Bloom listener, can get 10 % off your first tarot of flowers purchase. Use the discount code CALLEDTOBLOOM. That's C-A-L-L-E-D-T-O-B-L-O-O-M. One word at checkout.

And now back to our episode.

The first realm of our self-care journey today begins with cycles and rhythms. All of nature and everything about our own bodies works in cycles and rhythms.

The energy of daylight wakes us at dawn and the diminishing of light in the evening cues our bodies to get sleepy so we can rest through the night. While we rest, our bodies digest not just our food, but also our experiences as we process all of what our life brought that day.

In the spring, all of nature thaws, reawakens, and begins to burst into new growth and bloom. In the summer, nature rises into high production with the heat and the longer days. In the autumn, the energy of the day and the daylight hours begin to diminish,

and nature gives final flourishes as it prepares to shed, release, and rest. And during the winter, when the light is softest and the days the shortest, nature embraces dormancy and a chance to rest and repair before the next growing season.

The moon too reflects another cycle in which we live.

All around us, throughout the year, flowers open and close, birds migrate with the seasons, plants and animals pollinate and reproduce, and all of life continues to breathe and thrive through these cycles and rhythms.

Cycles and rhythms are balancing and grounding for the body because they are what animate and nourish all of life.

They are the pace by which everything grows, heals, sheds, rests, reawakens, and expands.

Our bodies thrive in a rhythm, with a routine, and when we tune our habits to the rhythms of nature around us.

So in this first category of cycles and rhythms, the first self-care practice I want to share with you is to tune your awareness to the moon. Look up the dates of all new and full moons in the coming year and put them in your calendar.

I do this every year, and my favorite online resource to use for this is the Griffith Observatory's Moon Phases page. I'm not too fussed about exact time of day or night when the moon happens, but I do record into my calendar what days carry each full moon and new moon. And here's why.

The full moon tends to bring with it higher energy. The increased light reflected from the sun during the night that reflects off the face of the moon brings in higher tides and often gives us an increasing sense of energy, which can feel really proactive and productive, even sometimes slightly off balance and a little crazy.

The full moon is a good time to release anything that's not serving you, physically or energetically, as that energy of fullness needs to release in order to create space for the new growth that is coming. we start into an energetic time of shedding.

The new moon tends to bring with it lower energy. The absence of light reflected back from the sun by the moon's surface at night allows the night to be much darker, more restful, and more peaceful.

New moon energy is fertile with possibility, like all moments of darkness and unknown. The new moon is a good time to energetically call in that which you desire and what you would like to invite into your life, because in that time of the darkness, there is space.

In the void where a new cycle can begin, you restful resources to cultivate something new.

Use that energy to clarify your goals and intentions and make little realignments toward what matters to you in your life and your work. When the moon is new, we begin an energetic time of rebirth and growth.

Speaking of the new and full moons, many women experience their cycles syncing up with the moon phases.

Many either menstruate or ovulate on the full moon or the new moon and vice versa. So paying attention to the moon cycles also helps you pay attention to your own cycles as well.

When you menstruate, your body is shedding and releasing, so it's important to rest and go easy. When you ovulate, you may experience higher energy and higher confidence, more motivation and ease for showing up in your work and being seen.

So harness that energy and plan for more productive stretches during that part of your cycle.

Of course, we can't control everything about our lives. And sometimes the big travel day or the big project falls right on the heaviest day of your cycle, and that's okay too.

Most of all, we benefit from being flexible and just helping ourselves feel calm and regulated, come what may. So don't worry if planning work and life with your cycles isn't perfect.

Nothing in nature is perfect in the sense of precise timing or flawless control. Nature is generous, patient, and gradual. Let's emulate that.

And at any rate, even just paying more attention to these embodied cycles and how you feel and move through them is a powerful act of loving attentiveness and self-care. And it's very accessible.

After you get the moon phases in your calendar, the second self-care practice of cycles and rhythms I have for you today is the moon bath.

A moon bath is essentially taking 10 to 20 minutes, it doesn't have to be long, to peacefully soak in a warm tub with Epsom salts on the full moon or the new moon, or both.

The Epsom salts, which are made up of magnesium and sulfate, dissolve in the warm water where they're able to soothe and relax your muscles and nourish your tissues. Side note, I learned from my college cross-country coach years ago that our bodies automatically absorb naturally occurring magnesium from seawater too, in case you live near an ocean or you can go out and take a dip.

Magnesium from Epsom salt baths and seawater alike is known to soften the skin, flush out toxins, reduce inflammation, stress as well, all of which the body loves.

You can take an Epsom salt bath really anytime and definitely benefit from it. Aligning your bath with the new and full moons just deepens the ritual and connects a physically nourishing practice with the opportunity to intentionally cleanse and release on the full moon and invite in new intentions and aligned growth on the new moon.

Our bodies are made up of around 60 % water, and just as the moon's phases pull on the bodies of water on Earth, causing the tides, the moon's phases also impact and influence our watery bodies as well. It's powerful to consider and sense that.

The last self-care practice I have for you here today in the cycles and rhythms is simply rest. Rest is the most powerful key to health besides taking care of your digestion. As an Ayurvedic health counselor myself, I can tell you that through my studies of this holistic healing system, it became crystal clear to me that one of the most accessible factors in our well-being, meaning one of the factors that is most in our own hands, is our respect for and observation of rest.

This means our sleep each night, of course, but it also means our daily and nightly routines and our incorporation of rest into our days by way of downtime, free time and play. Rest supports all of the body's systems and incredible powers of digestion and regeneration.

When it comes to rest, here are a few simple tips and encouragements to try. Sleep a little more. Go to bed a little earlier. Block off part of your work day for a do not disturb hour in which you quiet your mind and free yourself from distractions.

Practice something my friend Beth calls JOMO Instead of FOMO, fear of missing out, JOMO is the joy of missing out. Say no and stay in for bath. Leave early and wind down, read, take some deep breaths, or listen to a guided meditation before sleep.

Find joy in the simple self-care act of rest and revel in the rewards it brings the body, nervous system, energy levels, and creative spirit.

Also, can I just share with you for a moment that last year in 2025, I had my most successful year of my business in the whole almost decade since starting Nectar & Bloom.

And it was the first year when I really prioritized rest more than I ever have. This means getting eight hours of sleep at night, and it also includes prioritizing downtime, time away, nourishing travels, and keeping my weekends free of work obligations for flexibility and adventures and play more than I ever have.

For an Enneagram 3 Achiever slash 8 Challenger, I found this more than a little nerve wracking at times, but I practiced gently building trust with myself in these adjustments.

I did this by shifting my attention to valuing rest and balance,

and devoting my go-getter energy to discovering how to be more reasonable with my expectations of myself and with the timelines and goals that I set.

And what I found was genuinely more ease, alignment, and abundance. I think I've become something of a raving fanatic about the importance of rest now, and I don't mind. It is so effective.

And as with all things, just do your best. If your schedule is chaotic and things are crazy for a season, do your best to get enough rest. Don't be hard on yourself. Don't let yourself live in the resistance that drains you even more than the factors that cause the stress.

Prioritize rest and do the best you can and then let the rest go.

Living more with the cycles and rhythms of the days, the moons, the seasons, and the year has transformed what used to be aggravating resistance into supportive harmony in my life. This doesn't mean everything is perfect, better, and that makes me really passionate about sharing with you what a positive difference it has made in my life.

If you missed it, have a listen to Called to Bloom, episode five, the holistic system that reshaped my life and business to learn more about how to step into aligned health and wellbeing based on who you are, your nature, your values, and the natural world around you.

The second category of self-care practices for grounding and balance is sound and frequencies. This category includes music, songs we listen to, or the act of singing or playing an instrument, as well as sound healing experiences and frequencies.

So let's take a look at how and why this is balancing and what accessible practices we can explore here for self-care and renewal.

No matter what your experience level or familiarity with sound and frequencies as a healing modality is, I'm sure you have experienced the way music, the right song and the right moment for what you are feeling can wash over your entire being and give you all the feels.

When you turn on the heartbreak song that lets you cry and release, or when you walk through a shop as a song comes on that reminds you of one of the happiest days of your life, you know how powerful the sonic experience can be.

Human beings are sentient creatures. We feel and sense an incredible array of impulses, instincts, emotions, and nervous system responses to cues from our environment and company.

Think about it, from the moment we wake up, our incredibly powerful and perceptive bodies are already sensing daylight, which cues us to awaken and rise for the day.

Also the texture of our sheets, the temperature of the room, perhaps the sense of hunger as we get ready to have our first meal in the morning, how we are feeling about the day to come and the thoughts flitting through our minds and so on. We use these cues through our senses to make decisions, to take action, and to know how to respond to all of life within and around us.

Our sensory perceptions inform us about our outer environments as well as our inner landscapes. While we typically think of music and sound as a cue for the ear and for our sense of hearing predominantly, in truth, sound is something we also feel through our skin, deep within our bones, and the not so tangible but immensely present emotional body as well.

Sound is actually one of the most interesting tools we have for impacting how we feel.

I'm always amazed when the score of a movie scene makes my heart squeeze and I find myself in tears, or when a scene of intense tension or incredible triumph occurs and the musical score behind it sends my entire body into whatever I'm intended to feel in that scene. And of course the same goes for the impact of certain songs, songwriters, and instruments.

When you think of the sound a guitar makes, you can imagine a certain set of feelings they often evoke.

Think about how a harp sounds and how that feels.

How about the deeply emotional voice of a cello? The fluttering notes or deep dramatic tones that can come from a piano? And how about the powerful percussive impact of drums?

I say all of this to set the stage for the accessible, grounding, and rebalancing effects of sound and frequencies as self-care practices.

I want to begin my recommendations with the self-care experience of a sound bath.

If you've never heard of or experienced this, it's an immersive, relaxing experience in sound, sometimes offered after a yoga class, but also often offered as an experience on its own in places like yoga studios, during which you lie down comfortably with blankets or pillows or bolsters, and a practitioner creates a tonal and harmonic soundscape, using instruments that create deep and sustained vibrations that wash over your body and tune your nervous system into a deeply relaxed state.

Instead of there being regular beats or a progression like a song, you are surrounded by pure resonant vibrations and tones that cue the body on a cellular level to slow down, relax, and enter that restful meditative state that allows your body and mind to process, to release, and return feeling refreshed.

Sound pours over you and allows your other senses to rest while you are transported on its frequencies into a deeper restful space.

A sound bath can shift the nervous system out of sympathetic fight or flight and into that parasympathetic rest and digest mode. It resonates in your body, again on a cellular level, to release tension and to improve circulation, to shift your brain into those slower and more meditative alpha and theta brain waves, which allow you to drop into a more meditative state. And it can even help balance hormones by reducing the stress hormone cortisol.

Pretty awesome, and it's something you can just receive as you rest, which is incredibly nourishing when it comes to the zillion input perceptions we gather and the zillion output activities we do that fill our days.

I was personally so inspired by sound baths and sound healing a few years back that I completed a training to become a sound practitioner myself.

Aside from the immersive sound bath, there is also the simple mood creating and emotional impact of music at large. In any given moment, you can pick a song or a musical track to listen to you that will invite or enhance how you feel.

Maybe you need a release. Maybe you need something calming.

Music is as diverse as the weather, which is also about as diverse as our emotions. So whatever you need to feel to return to harmony, you can make a simple practice of looking up a song or an instrumental track to invite that.

Going to see live music or a concert of any kind that speaks to you has a wonderfully moving and immersive effect too.

Then there's the deeply moving and energy releasing experience of singing or playing an instrument.

This is where you really allow yourself to embody and participate physically in the creation of sound and frequencies. If you don't consider yourself a singer, you don't play an instrument, and even if you think that you're tone deaf and incapable with music, not to worry.

The practice to try here is just to make a little space to embody the healing frequencies of music by inviting yourself to make sound as you sing or hum in the shower, while cooking, or following along with a song you have playing anytime.

For me, when I play my guitar and sing, something happens where time and my sense of a separate self fall away and I'm lost in a good way or immersed in this big sensory experience that feels a lot like moving color and light or rivers and muscle of color, something poetic and transcendent.

Of course, sometimes I go to play and I feel like I've forgotten how to pick the chords or my voice is rusty, but if we can move through that initial resistance, that gateway into a peaceful creative flow is right there beneath the surface.

And I can tell you with confidence that I have never once in my life played my guitar and then wished afterward that I hadn't. Actually the total opposite.

Often when we put something off, we need it the most, especially when it is something grounding, nourishing, and beneficial. So make a date with yourself to sing or listen to music or play an instrument, whatever feels fun, and keep it, even if you're not in the mood, even if you have too much to do.

Remind yourself that five minutes is something you can usually spare and just go into it from curiosity. As with any of these practices, as I will always remind you, just try it out and then evaluate how you feel afterward.

And if you're not into singing or playing an instrument, but you would like to experience embodied sound frequencies, you can also seek out a vocal toning experience, often offered by yoga studios or spaces that offer things like breath work, hypnosis and sound healing.

Vocal toning is the act of creating simple, sustained vocal sounds and tones like humming or chanting, such as the yogic om, or releasing laughter or groans, or extending vowel sounds like ee or ⁓ to calm the nervous system or elevate your energy frequency. And you can do this simply through the vibrations of your voice.

Think about when we take a deep sigh of relief. Try out that ⁓ sound and see how you feel, even just softly saying ⁓ is very calming. So that's a way to explore the effects of vocal toning.

As a last note here on the balancing effects of sound and frequencies, if you can't find or make it to a sound bath or sound healing circle in person you can also easily find healing sound frequencies on many online platforms, including Spotify, YouTube, Pandora. That's just to name a few. Look up solfeggio frequencies. These are often a great way to search for all kinds of spiritual and healing frequencies or frequencies for calm, pain relief, forgiveness, love, abundance, inner peace, you name it.

Keep this one in mind. Also, if you follow me on Spotify, I'm on there as Jen Lagedrost-Cavender, I've created a few playlists with healing frequency tracks that I love. One is aptly called Frequencies and the other is called Yoga Nidra. So you can always check those out too.

Now in our third realm of accessible self-care experiences, we have bodywork and somatics. Bodywork refers to a broad array of healing therapies that support healing and wellbeing through connecting mind and body. And somatics are healing practices that focus on cultivating the internal felt sense of the body.

The word soma comes from Greek and it means body. These practices are deeply balancing and restorative because they help integrate mind and body, which helps us be more present and also more in touch with the sensations and cues within the body so that we're more whole and in more harmony moment to moment and day to day.

Bodywork and somatic practices that I've studied and tried and that I recommend are therapeutic massage, energy healing therapy such as Reiki, acupuncture, breath work, and yoga.

So let's talk about a few of these, starting with massage. Gosh, I love a massage. It is simply one of the most glorious things in life that just makes me feel incredible. Plus, this hands-on therapy helps you relax, releases muscle tension, improves circulation, helps with body alignment, and leaves you feeling rested and refreshed.

There are so many different types of massage, so you can explore and see which is best for you. Some like a gentle, rhythmic Swedish massage, while others like a more intensive Thai massage or a therapeutic deep tissue or sports massage. I can tell you most florists and creative entrepreneurs could use a good shoulder, neck, back, hand, arm, leg, and foot massage.

So really the whole body. That's what I always end up asking for anyway. But you can also customize with a scalp massage or having your massage therapist focus on any specific body part that will benefit you the most.

It's also amazing when offered to add on hot stones, which are lovely and relaxing when placed onto or rubbed along the muscles.

I also love cupping, which does wonders for increasing blood flow and releasing really tense muscles.

One last tip here, anything we want to do for our wellbeing becomes easier when we remove barriers to access. I used to think that people who had a massage therapist come to their home must have an exorbitant budget for that kind of experience. But this past year, I looked into it and aside from a small travel fee, the rates were the same.

Having our massage therapist come set up a bed in my studio made a massage that much easier, more accessible, and just lovely.

And so I wanted to share that tip with you in case getting to a place where you can get a massage is keeping you from fitting it into your life. Look into having someone come to you.

Another practice I've studied because I found it so powerful and fascinating as a method of healing bodywork is Reiki.

Within Reiki, which is an ancient Japanese form of healing touch and energy therapy, a practitioner works with your body through channeling loving and healing energy, which they bring to you through gentle touch and also hovering their hands over areas of the body to release energetic and emotional blockages.

It also helps to cleanse and clear the energy aura, to rebalance and realign the chakras, and to help reestablish a healthy flow of healing energy through the body.

When I first went to a Reiki session myself, I will admit I was a little skeptical. But through receiving Reiki from different practitioners and through my own studies, I realized two things.

One, even if you are skeptical and can't wrap your head around the movement of energy as a healing modality, you are still spending an hour relaxed on a bed in the care of a trained healer, listening to soothing music as they work on your energy and your body in ways that you may or may not immediately perceive. But there you are making space to relax, rest, and be cared for. That is powerful on its own.

And two, I found that I really do have both subtle and powerful releases, sensations, and shifts during and also after a reiki session.

I have felt sensations in my body, I've felt the need to cry or laugh, which is a very normal release of energy from the body, and I have often received really insightful messages and downloads, either from just resting there or from the practitioner themselves who shared insights with me afterward that came to them during my session. Very cool.

Breath work and yoga are the other two accessible self-care practices for grounding and nourishing your overall wellbeing in this realm of body work and somatics that I want to dive in with you here.

Breath work is essentially the English version of the Sanskrit word pranayama, meaning breath control. This is where we use special breathing techniques, breath holds, or timing to calm the nervous system and bring the mind back into the body in the present moment.

Breathwork practices also reduce stress, improve focus, and increase energy.

They can be more grounding or energizing depending which method you choose. But for our purposes, I want to describe for you just two easy techniques for lowering anxiety and inviting more calm into the body and the mind.

The first is often referred to as square breathing. Square breathing has you visualize an even four-sided square as you breathe. First, taking in a slow inhale for four counts, then holding the breath for four counts, then exhaling for four counts, and finally holding for four counts again before you continue with the next breath in the same manner.

All the while during this breathing technique, you visualize the square as a guide. So as you inhale four counts, you draw in your mind the first line of the first side of the square. Then you hold for four counts, visualize the second side, exhale for four counts, visualize the third side of the square, and hold for four counts, visualize the fourth side. So you've completed your square.

It's deeply relaxing. And I often use this practice when I'm anxious or my mind is racing or I'm having trouble falling asleep because it helps steady my mind by bringing my body, breath, and thoughts back into one smooth and stabilizing place through the breath and that visualization.

You can do this square breathing technique sitting up or I prefer to do it lying down.

The second pranayama or breathwork practice that you can do easily on your own and one that is beneficial to do for a few minutes each day just to bring more calm and balance into your mind and body is called nadi shodhana or alternate nostril breathing.

Nadi Shodhana is Sanskrit and it means cleansing of the channels because breathing intentionally through alternate nostrils in this pattern that I'll tell you in just a moment helps you to do just that, cleanse your channels.

Essentially, you are promoting inner harmony between the lunar or yin receptive side known as Ida and the solar or yang active side known as Pingala by balancing these energies and clearing blockages so that prana or life force can flow freely through the body.

This is another practice that helps to shift the nervous system out of fight or flight and into rest and digest as well, which allows us to relax, process and repair.

To practice alternate nostril breathing, can either sit or lie down, and it's nice to close your eyes. That helps you settle your mind and bring your attention inward. Then there's a little hand posture to do here, where you take your right hand and fold down the index finger and the middle finger, keeping the thumb and the ring and pinky finger extended.

So it's kind of like a hang loose, with the ring finger up as well. And you use your hand in this posture or mudra to assist the alternate nostril breathing.

First, inhale slowly through the nose with both nostrils open as normal. Then at the top of your breath, gently cover the right nostril with the right thumb and exhale through the left side with a slow, even breath.

When you get to the bottom of the exhale, stay as you are with the right nostril still gently closed and now inhale through the left side.

At the top of that inhale, switch your hand so that your right ring finger gently closes off the left nostril and slowly exhale through the right side.

Keep your hand as it is at the bottom of that exhale and then inhale through the right side. Then switch. Make your inhales and exhales long and slow and of equal length.

Then you can repeat this little cycle of exhale left side, inhale left side, exhale right side, inhale right side, and continue to exhale left side again as many times as you like, slowly and calmly, cleansing your channels and soothing your nervous system.

I often aim for about 10 rounds, which takes less than 10 minutes, but you can also do just five if you have less time.

Remember to come out of it slowly. On the last inhale on the right side, you can release your hand and exhale from both nostrils.

Then take a few slow normal breaths here and then slowly open your eyes.

As with everything, try it out and see how you feel. I find myself feeling positively transformed after this short interval of just slowly and intentionally focusing on and guiding the flow of my breath.

And the last practice I mentioned that I want to explore with you here and invite you into is yoga. Yoga has become so well known and so widely spread that I imagine you know all about it and have likely tried it already.

Whether you have or not, here is why yoga is balancing, as well as a few tips for a supportive and healthy yoga practice:

One, yoga means union. While here in the West we often think of yoga as simply a workout or stretching, it's actually a somatic practice that encourages inner awareness and cultivates mind, body, and emotional spiritual integration. The union that yoga refers to is between the breath and the movement and between the mind and the body. Essentially, we are practicing a moving meditation that helps to cleanse, strengthen, and balance both the mind and the body.

Two, the yoga we refer to most often is only one branch of the overall yogic philosophy, and that is the branch of asana or postures. It is integrated with another branch that we just talked about, pranayama or breath control, as each movement is synchronized with the breath in traditional yoga as it was intended to be practiced. I mentioned this just to share with you that there are several other branches to yoga beyond asana if you're curious and want to deepen your practice. And maybe we'll talk a little more in depth about all of that in an upcoming episode. Let me know if that piques your interest.

Three, the benefits of a yoga asana practice include improved circulation, mental calm and focus, ability to be present, flexibility, balance, physical strength, muscle tone, internal organ health, and mental and emotional equilibrium.

Four, yoga is beneficial at any level, as long as you are being mindful and safe about it, as in not pushing postures your body isn't ready to do and not focusing too much on what it looks like. If you practice yoga just to get a stretch or a workout, it will still benefit you. If you practice yoga also to deepen your ability to be with yourself, to know how to breathe through all the challenges and life experiences, to have acceptance and deeper inner awareness, and to cultivate compassion and an open heart, it will benefit you even more.

And five, treat yoga as a moving meditation. Let the movements, postures, and intentional breathing guide you inward, where you find slow but profound healing. Somatic practices like traditional and intentional yoga asana practice help us to get out of our heads and back into our bodies, where we can release and realign through the supportive routine and the space to breathe that yoga provides. Plus, it's encouraging to breathe and move in community, in sync with others, which is deeply beneficial and also something we'll talk more about in just a moment.

Now for the fourth category on our self-care journey. This is where we explore practices that nurture introspection and reflection. Introspection and reflection are actions that help us to slow down and make meaning of our experiences.

I remember hearing a Ted talk years ago and I wish I could remember who it was, but the gist of their point was that things happen in life, some wonderful, some incredibly challenging, and so many things in between.

But it is up to us to find the meaning, to discover and understand how this is helping us grow and ultimately why everything that happens for us in life is part of our divine unfolding.

Put simply, we can't make meaning out of our experiences when we are moving so fast that we don't have any space to reflect.

If we are constantly producing creative work, we don't realize the wealth of creative content we've already captured, That's available to share and use and promote our offerings, thereby supporting our businesses by inviting potential clients and customers into the solutions and experiences that we offer and serve.

Whenever I have a burnt out moment when I feel empty or like I don't have anything to share or say, my first reaction is often to push myself to make something new, make it happen.

Maybe it's the athlete in me, and when it comes to a lot of types of tasks or demands, this is helpful and it works. Get it done, bang it out, push through. But this is not sustainable, not healthy at all for long stretches, and it certainly isn't how creativity works.

Creativity is not about muscling through.

I seem to need to learn that one over and over again myself, and I'm grateful. That's why I want to share it with you.

What I keep learning over and over again is that when I feel tapped out creatively, what I need is exactly what scares me. Space. A slow morning. A slow day. Room to process, relax, open up, and think.

It doesn't mean that I need a wild vacation day full of stimulus. In fact, for me, it's the opposite. I need a day or a stretch of time with no obligations and no time constraints. I might still be working on things, but I need space to journal or go for a walk or take care of the garden, stretch, things like that.

I talk more about this in Called to Bloom, episode four, recovering from burnout, how to get unstuck and re-inspired. So have a listen there if you missed that one.

And my greatest encouragement for you here is that activities that support introspection or time and space to look within or time to look back and make meaning are powerful to your sense of accomplishment, fulfillment, and well-being too.

The New Year is a great time for introspection and reflection in particular. We've just come through the holidays. We are all just slowly coming back after the final flourishes of the year, and here in the Northern Hemisphere, spring has not yet returned. So all of nature is still dormant and resting. Very encouraging for us to do the same.

I imagine if you live in the southern hemisphere though, that it being high summer and just after the holidays as well, it's also a good time to cool off and make room to reflect and set intentions too.

Introspection and reflection practices are like inner housekeeping. They give us space to process and digest our experiences and to transform what we have learned and gained along the way.

Out of our experiences, we make meaning and gain understanding, growth, wisdom, and inspiration for our next goals and efforts.

Two ways that I love to practice introspection and reflection that are easy and accessible pretty much anytime and anywhere are as follows.

Number one, journaling. Having space on the page to think and process through writing by hand is powerful. If you get stuck not knowing what to say, just write your stream of consciousness, whatever words form in your mind in order to begin. I often start a daily journal entry with the day, where I am in that moment, what's going on around me, what the weather is doing.

It centers me to begin and once you begin, everything can start to flow.

Maybe you just record your recent experiences or make a list of things you're going to do today. Maybe you recall or work through complex interactions with others or just give yourself space to unpack and examine something on your heart or on your mind.

Sometimes I just start journaling by writing down things I'm grateful for, which is a great mood elevating move too, especially when I'm down. I love to journal in the new year about the biggest lessons, victories, and gifts of the year gone by, sometimes going month by month. Then I'll journal about my goals and aspirations for the new year. I don't use the term resolutions intentionally because it feels kind of shame linked and like there are things you have to feel bad about until you resolve them.

Instead, I like to express gratitude and appreciation for the lessons that I've been learning, and I like to write out what I aspire to and what goals I would like to achieve for the new year.

The second tool for introspection and reflection that I love and recommend is an Oracle deck. I love a good Oracle deck or a tarot deck, which is fully why I was inspired to create my own deck based on the wisdom of flowers, where I could integrate my studies and healing modalities with my knowledge of the wise messages flowers carry into the archetypes of tarot to share a bountiful body of meaning and messages that flowers give us.

Drawing a card from any oracle deck is like drawing up a magical mirror to look inside and hear what your deep inner knowing is trying to share with you.

It is a ritual that makes space to open up, listen, reflect, and make connections. And it helps us be more intentional with where we want to put our energy and how we are understanding and interacting with the world around us.

I always reassure people that oracle and tarot decks are not divination and they're not predictive of the future, but rather they are a chance to look within and listen.

They are a tool filled with wisdom and archetypal human experiences, cues and details to help you slow down, ask questions, and make those connections to help you feel more agency and understanding in the experiences of your life.

Plus it's just fun. I love to do card drawings and readings with friends. It gets us all talking and sharing and feeling that connective energy that flows through us all in this beautiful experience that we call life.

And that brings us to our fifth and final category of self-care experiences for today's episode, the importance of connection and community.

Humans are social creatures. We are not meant to do this thing alone. Books, plays, movies, photographs, and media of all kinds connect us to countless human beings from our past, enriching our lives with their stories, mistakes, perspectives, and guidance.

Classes, workshops, gatherings, programs, circles, faiths, neighborhoods, meetups, and celebrations all connect us with others who are living and evolving and experiencing life right now along with us.

While solo time and experiences on our own are essential to self-care and inner growth, time feeling genuinely connected and in community is equally important for wellbeing, including growth, a sense of belonging, a sense of purpose, opportunities to laugh and learn from one another and the kinds of experiences that reassure us that we are not alone in this life.

Never do people say at the end of life that they wish they'd gone to the office more or worked harder or even earned more money. They wish they'd enjoyed more time with the people they love, the people who meant the most to them.

Let's make space to genuinely connect and be together and honor that as something as valuable, if not more, than almost everything else.

Examples of self-care for connection and community include circles, gatherings, celebrations, dates with friends, classes and workshops, meetups, a cafe date, a dinner party, a walkie talkie, as my mom calls dates to go for a walk and catch up together, you name it.

And being together is just simply balancing and reassuring, period.

If you are a solopreneur or you work from home, you can probably relate to the experience of getting out of your office or studio for a minute, maybe to run an errand and feeling this rush of reassurance or something just energy giving simply by seeing other people out doing what they're doing around your town too.

I've taken a break before on a work day to do something like go for a quick run at the beach between meetings and found that seeing all these people on a random Tuesday morning, walking or surfing or lounging, to be so delightful and reassuring, like, my gosh, look at all these people who are not in their office working. It is okay to take a break or have a weird schedule or be on vacation or even be retired.

It really helps me get out of my head when my achiever side has taken over and thinks that the only way to get there is to be in my workspace making progress. This is where I have an extra appreciation for my friends who are a little more type B.

I love my fellow type A friends too, so much. But the type B friends are unencumbered by being a little more free, a little more relaxed, a little more, that's good enough for today. And that is so reassuring for someone like me. And at any rate, while I'm a huge fan of space and solitude, I'm also pretty extroverted and I feel so much better feeling connected and in community with others.

And I think even if you consider yourself a hundred percent introvert, you know when you've had a little too much time on your own and that that sense of connection and community helps to reinvigorate you and make you feel connected again.

I'm pretty sure lot of florists and creative entrepreneurs are pretty individualistic. I know I am. And we enjoy having autonomy and agency over our own work and goals. But we also don't have to go at it alone. And we don't have to work in isolation.

Reach out to a friend and make a date. Work together at a cafe with a lunch break in between productivity sessions to catch up and bounce ideas. Try out that yoga or breath work class you've been curious about and chat with the teacher or someone in class afterward. Host a little dinner party or celebration of anything with friends.

My mom used to have us do a January Blahs party in mid-January when I was a little kid, where we just made fun food and wore silly outfits and probably made cards to give each other. It was a celebration that she totally made up to brighten a slow and sleepy time of the year.

And it's a good reminder that we don't have to have something specific to celebrate to make a fun gathering to feel connected.

Try a dance class or go to a poetry reading at a local bookshop. Get together to create vision boards with friends or play music. Join a book club.

You can also find a new avenue through which to share your gifts and passions. When I put so much of my floral education online, I found that I really missed hosting a group more often in my studio, which called me back to teaching yoga. So I started teaching just once a week again at a local studio that I love, and it has been life-giving and so delightful.

I have met and made so many new friends simply through teaching that weekly evening yoga class and I'm so grateful. To my students and friends at the studio, I just adore you guys.

So give yourself a moment to ask yourself and then feel into what might be nourishing for you in the realm of community and go for it.

This is often the missing piece to self-care when you work for yourself or you're on your own and you're doing other good self-care practices, but something is missing. It's community and connection. There's nothing like that present, jolly, genuinely warming feeling of sharing time and space together and knowing that here you belong.

And now as we begin to close this episode for today, remember that rejuvenation and renewal of your body and overall well-being can be supported by any one of these categories or example practices.

Take a moment to think back to just one that jumped out at you or that comes to mind now as I mentioned it as we wrap the episode. Keep things easy and start there. Listen to your body for its instincts and nudges. And if something feels exciting or enticing or interesting, there's a reason. Trust it and take a step to explore it.

Won't it be glorious to receive that care, that grounding, and the gifts of returning to balance?

Add the moon phases to your calendar. Tune into some healing frequencies while you relax or while you drive. Try out a sound bath or book a massage. Make a little space to turn inward and reflect, whether by journaling or otherwise, and maybe make a little room to explore this more regularly. Try out the square breathing or the alternate nostril breathing and see how you feel.

And maybe most of all, allow this episode to give you permission or to encourage you to give yourself permission to start a new season with a new practice or two that fill you up and help you feel grounded, balanced and present. Remember that that could be being in community too.

And just for fun now, as we wrap the show for today, I would like to do a brief little Tarot of Flowers card reading for us collectively. Inside the guide booklet, you can find instructions for different card readings that you can do. But for today, we'll do a single stem pick for a simple one card glimpse into messages we are meant to share now in this moment together.

The cool thing to me is that you will hear what you need to hear in the meaning of the card you draw. And energetically, you will draw the card you need in this moment. So let's take a deep breath, settle into your body, and ask within, what is the guidance I need in this moment? Or what guidance will help me toward my greatest good today? Breathe in, breathe out, feeling in your body, and be with those questions for just a moment and then we'll draw.

Today's Tarot of Flowers card is Lilac, King of Pentacles. Cool! First of all, Lilac. I mean, what a rich, abundant, bouncy, and fragrant flower this is.

As this is the King of Pentacles, the suit of Pentacles is the suit that deals with tangible resources, finances, the body, home and hearth. And the element associated with that suit is earth, the solid grounding stability that we stand on and where we find support and rest. That tracks for us today.

The King of any minor arcana suit most often has to do with decisive masculine energy, that yang energy of action, direction, and output. This is interesting for us during an episode about self-care and practices for shifting into the receptive, feminine, restful yin energy. So let's look a little deeper.

The chakra for this flower is Manipura, the solar plexus, which is like our inner sun, our energy center at the diaphragm, the center of self-confidence, self-esteem, and willpower. And here's what Lilac, King of Pentacles means from the booklet:

"Like an earthly comet of star-shaped bells, heavy and ringing with fragrance, Lilac embodies a deeply grounded sense of wealth and worth. In the laden abundance of this flower, there is also an orderly tidiness and a sense of ease, a lot of one really good thing instead of an elaborate collection of many.

Taken as a method, this practical and prioritized simplicity can produce beneficial results in your work and financial strategies. Take a step back and observe what is flourishing around you, or perhaps within you. Make space to honor and nurture that aspect amid your ambitions. As you prosper, you can increase your fulfillment by recognizing the talents of others around you and encouraging their growth too.

Lilac blooms mid-spring, a season teeming with profusion and plenty. When it appears, take it as a good omen that you are in your truth and on the right track. Keep going."

Ooh, I love this card for us. So you will hear within it what you need. Notice what stands out to you and trust that. Listen to that, ponder that, be with that as a question to explore as the next days unfold.

And if I may add a layer for you as well, I would say to pay attention to cultivating a deeply grounded sense of self-worth, focusing in on one really good thing over an elaborate collection of many things. And taking a step back to reflect on what in your life is flourishing.

This is a wellspring for you and to share with others around you, which will help the good in your life to grow.

I also love the reminder that this flower is showing up for you because something you are doing is in alignment with your truth, reassuring you that you are on the right track. Trust that.

Perhaps it's as simple as just being here right now, receiving encouragement and guidance through this podcast to take small and simple acts of self-care so that you can step into a new season feeling both refreshed and renewed.

Beautifully done. You just completed another episode of Called to Bloom, another step forward on your creative journey. Finishing any resource that nourishes your being and makes you feel more connected is one of the most empowering things you can do for your business and creative calling.

Now to expand your experience hit follow so that you never miss an episode and also please leave a quick review. Your words are so powerful in helping other creatives like you discover the podcast. Plus they just mean the world to me. Then head over to calledtobloompodcast.com to find show notes, resources, discount codes, and details from our sponsors.

If you're ready to deepen your practice with classes and immersive experiences in flowers and wellbeing, head over to nectarandbloomfloral.com and explore my workshops, one-on-one mentorships, poetry of flowers, holistic online courses, wellbeing experiences, and my original tarot of flowers deck.

You can also find me on Instagram @nectar_and_bloom for more inspiration, tools, creativity, and like-minded community.

For now, keep blooming. The world needs what you are here to create.