30 days of Self Care

Could 30 days of conscious self-care

make a drastic difference in how you
feel?

Vanae Tran

http://vanae.com
Author : VANAE TRAN
Day 1
The webshow host of
The Vanae.com Show Reading a good book before going to bed
on YouTube.

I am an Empowerment &
Dating Coach empowering
professionals since 2007.

I started with a passion: to

bring more self-awareness
and meaning to professionals
through the medium of fresh,
motivating videos.

My background:
Certified Integral Coach.
Earning M.S. in Counseling
(Marrige Family Therapy)
B.A. in Communication, Psy-
chology.

As a coach and entrepreneur with a crazy busy life, I challenged

myself to a concentrated 30 days of self-care, to be healthy to my
mind, body and soul. I would post my daily self-care on my Face-
book to share with friends…I wondered..after 30 days...Would I feel
different? Would my life change? Would it be worth it?
Here’s my journey and what I learned. I wish you much self-love and
self-care when you embark on your own 30-day Self Care Challenge
(especially with your friends!)
Lately, with my busy schedule, the only books I read are textbooks
from my master’s program. But I miss reading books for fun. My friends
know that I typically only read non-fiction, educational books on
dating, relationships, spirituality, sex and personal development. So
motivated by my friend, Noah, I got in some Vanae-time by reading
30 minutes before going to sleep. This is Day#1.

Connect me
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Day 2
Eating my lunch at the park
Instead of eating my lunch in my office or at home, I decided to take
a nice walk to have lunch. I found a really nice spot at the park.
Surrounded by eucalptus trees, I enjoyed my sushi lunch at the park.
Fresh air and fresh eucalptus. Being in nature helped me appreciate
life and feel very thankful for being alive.
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Day 3
Personal Therapy Session
Since 2007, I have been helping clients and friends about their life
challenges, confidence and dating life.
So part of self-care is to allow myself to receive support as much as
I give. I decided to have regular therapy sessions. I had my first ther-
apy session in a while and I was so excited to be a client for once. It
felt so nurturing and good to be supported! Therapy and coaching is
badass!
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Day 4 Day 5
No Sex Suicide Prevention Walk

I made a conscious decision to not have sex for these 30 days. I will Part of self-care is allow-
refrain from sex and going on any dates. I disabled my dating profiles. ing myself to feel and
I did this so that I can fully focus on my own fulfillment. I didn’t want to heal. To be ok with be-
fill a void with another person. I want to fill up my entirety with healthy ing vulnerable. Along
love. This month is 30 days of Vanae’s self-love. with my friend, Marie, I
completed the Suicide
Prevention Walk in hon-
or of my younger broth-
er, Trung. We were giv-
en bracelets that said
“Out of the darkness”.
Very fitting in honoring
my brother, not being
in shame because he
was a suicide victim of
Bi-Polar and for allow-
ing myself to face the
sadness that came with
this lost.

OUT OF THE
DARKNESS

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 Day 7
Mini-pamper: Manicure & eyebrows

It’s nice to have someone take care of my and beautify myself. My

Vietnamese waxer said, “Now, you don’t look like gorilla anymore.”

Day 6
Afternoon naps

To allow myself to take an afternoon nap.

To be ok with doing less and understand that it’s doing more for me.

Oh, how a busy-body like me, really had a tough time allowing myself
to take a nap because of ‘feeing guilty of wasting time’ but once I
got to experience this self-care. I was pretty addicted.
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 Seeing my facebook t hers
in g o
Inspir
postings, my cousin
in Vietnam wanted
to join in the 30-day
self care and 3 of
my friends were
inspired as well.
vulnerable was
helping others with
their own self-care.

Day 8
Speaking Up

I had a friend who would flaked all the time and contacted me when
he needed a favor. In the past, I would ignore my uncomfortability
with it. But since it was my self-care month, I decided to put my feel-
ings as a priority and communicated how I felt. Though it’s awkward
at first, it felt great to express my feelings and to speak up.

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Day 9 Day 10
Sleeping early: Get full 8 hours of sleep Devour red: Velvet cupcake

It feels good to indulge sometimes. The act of letting go and enjoying

something sweet.

I am a recovering night owl. But I was recognizing the effects of stay-

ing up late. Usually by 10am every day, I would feel exhausted. My
best friend, Dana, helped me realize that I needed to challenge my-
self and sleep by 11pm to get a full nights rest. I get up early enough
to make my green smoothies and power through the day.

After 2 months of sleeping at 11pm, guess what? It worked! I woke up

feeling refreshed and now going to bed early is a piece of cake, now
that my body is used to it.

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Day 11 Day 12
Going pescetarian for rest of this plan. Dance my face off damn good music!

Having yummy, veggie breakfast with my lovely sis (who just fly into My friends know me as a music geek. I LOVE live music and dancing. I
town from SF). Eating less meat, more veggies and healthy grains, used to go to shows in SF all the time, but not so much since I’ve lived
makes me feel damn good! in San Diego. Guess what? My sister took me to see TWO DOOR
CINEMA CLUB – and it was an epic DANCE PARTY! love!

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Day 13 Day 14
Ending an evening stroll with swings Being kind to myself

I live in a neighborhood that is really friendly and working from home

sometimes makes me forget to get out there and enjoy my neighbor-
hood.

I took a nice 2 hour stroll and found a park with swings. After watch-
ing the sun set as I was walking, I went on the swings. And I felt young
again!

I caught myself saying “You’re getting fat.” I had to

be conscious to scatching/releasing those self-neg-
ative thoughts that pop up. As my life mentor, Matt
Sorgenfrei, once said to me: ”You know those nega-
tive things you say to yourself? Do me a favor? Can
you not talk about someone I care about like that
because it hurts me when you talk about someone
I love and really care about. If only you knew how
much she means to me -please be kind to her.”
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Day 15 Day 16
Picking up my Night Mouth-Guard Forgiving A Past Lover

Not forgetting but forgiving all the negative that surrounded it so the
lessons are deepened. felt nice.pick a past lover or friend who hurt
you. start with forgiving something they did. then work up to forgiving
that person. as my wise friend once said to me “act of forgiveness is
for yourself”.

For those teeth-grinders out there, you’ll know what I’m talking about.
So every night, I grind my teeth like crazy! I wake up with a super sore
jaw. The easy solution? A mouth-guard.

And guess what? I had one made at the dentist 6 months ago and
never picked it up. I have been putting it off! So I said “Enough time
has passed by, lazy ass. You need to do this for yourself and pick up
that damn mouth-guard now.” And so I did. And now, my jaw & teeth
couldn’t be any happier.

Sometimes, it’s just the little things. Especially, the little things we
procrastinate on!
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 Day 17
Getting out of the house & working
at local coffee-shop

A few of my
A few of friends
my friends
private messaged
private messaged
me onmeFacebook
on Facebook on
on how
howthethelatest
latest
activity “forgiving
activity “forgiving a
a past lover” real-
past lover” really
ly resonated with
resonated with
them. They wrote
to methem.
aboutThey wrote
their
to me about
emotional journey their
andemotional
how thesejourney
postsand how
were these
inspir-
ing. posts were
inspiring.
Each day, my
Each
friends day,sup-
were my
portive by liking
friends were my
postsupportive
and sharing by liking
comments
my postofandsup- I always find myself working indoors, in my place all day. So I decided
port!sharing comments to walk to my favorite local coffeeshop to work. To be surrounded by
people.
of support!
This really helped me with the isolated feeling, to be around people. I
actually was a lot more productive since I didn’t want people to see
Facebook as my screen, I worked more.

Bonus: The fragrance of fresh coffee and there was an open mic! I
love live music and I pushed myself to do an impromptu guitar on
stage.
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Day 18
Take a belgian-Waffle scented bath
I realized that after living in my cute vintage apartment for half a year
now, I have yet to use the bathtub for a nice soaking! So I decided to
stay in, draw a hot bath and pour in some walffle-fragrance bubble
bath. It was so relaxing and pampering!
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Day 19
Learning a new song on the guitar
In the past, I would pick up my acoustic guitar and fiddle around with
it. Learn a song here and there, but since I got caught up with my new
schedule, I simply forgot about my guitar. There it sat...in the corner.
But today was different. Music soothes my soul. So I picked up my gui-
tar again and learned a pretty song I really like “As I much as I ever
could” by City & Colours. It’s a beautiful song. Made me very happy.
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Day 20
Enjoying the sunshine
Living in San Diego, you’d be surprised how much
time I spend indoors. So I went to the harbour and
spent some time in the sun. There’s something about
the smell of the ocean, the view of nautica and feel-
ing of sunshine on my skin that brings me HAPPINESS!
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Day 21
Not caring about what the scale said
Lucky for me, I have a wonderful sister to leaves amazing notes for
me. This note reminds me that “You are perfect the weight you are.”
Today, I allowed myself to not care about what my weight is and care
more about my health.
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Day 22
Green smoothies galore!
I’ve never been a huge breakfast fan, because I’m always running
out the door at 7AM. But I’ve been developing the habit of making a
green smoothie to drink as my breakfast. An almost-daily ritual. Gives
me great energy and I feel dang good about starting my days off
right! My green smoothies consist of: kale, spinach, mango and ber-
ries.
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Day 23
Be a kid again
Working at a middle/high school setting, I have many opportunities to
do fun arts & crafts activities. So I forgot that I was a responsibile adult
for a second and took a break to put together a cute Halloween craft
for my office! Oh, the joys of being a kid.
I emptied out my container of stress/mental weight from the therapy i
did earlier today by having convos w/others - made me feel so much
lighter.
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Day 24
Forgiving Myself
Something deep came up for me today during my therapist session.
I’ve been holding on to a heavy piece of guilt – something that I said
to my brother when he was still here. It was very sad; a heavy piece
of guilt that I buried deep. With the help of my sister, and therapist I
received the support to forgive myself. Now, a deep wound healed.
interesting that a reframe and confirmation can lift up so much.
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Day 25
Cuddling up to warm tea
I have what some people call “cold hands, warm heart”. Well, when it
comes to cold fall days, the only thing that really helps is a nice, warm
mason jar of good ‘ol tea to hold and sip! Warms the body and spirit.
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Day 26 Day 27
Morning meditation Listen to music in the park

I started Deepok Chopra’s free 21 day meditation program, that I do

at home. I noticed breathing deeply and fixing my posture. Thinking
tall, listening to Deepok talk about abundance. Felt amazing!

At the beautiful park in my city, it hosts great free music events. I went
with my friend to enjoy great organ opera music in the park. Surround-
ed my neighbors and people of my community, it was a nice music
break from what I normally listen to.

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Day 28 Day 29
Enjoying a lunch by myself Made myself a healthy salad!

As a person on-the-go, often times, it’s a lot faster and convinient for
me to just grab delicious fried Mexican food down the street. But I
challenged myself and whipped myself up a fresh arugula salad with
lemon dressing. This was inspired by my best friend, Dana, who is a
Nutrition & Wellness Coach.
Enjoying a Vietnamese lunch by myself at the restaurant. I typically get
things packed to-go and eat it at home while I work. But I never liked
that they used styrofoam to-go. So slowing down, being eco-friendly
and enjoying good ol’ comfort food.
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Day 30
Emptied my mental container
Earlier in the day, I had a stressful day at my therapy internship.
Working with minors is no easy task. There’s complexity with the kid,
families and as a professional, I’m bound by law to report so many
things. I emptied out my container of stress/mental weight from the
therapy I did earlier today by having conversations withothers - made
me feel so much lighter. Then in no-time, 30 days had just passed.
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Conclusion
I move really fast. I pull triggers. I create. I make things hap-
pen. But sometimes I’m moving at such a speed, I forget to
enjoy the little things and the purpose behind doing these
“things”.
As a coach, therapist, entrepreneur– If I’m a container for
others, what space do I clear for myself?
From this, I learned that in order to have the capacity for oth-
ers and myself, I had to empty out my container each day.
Then fill the bottom layer with my self-care as a cushion for
everything my clients want me to hold.
What I gain from this 30 day
self-care project:
At the end of this 30 day Self-Care Project, I felt more bal-
anced than ever. I felt an incredible happiness and clarity
from within. My friends were pointing out to me how ground-
ed I was. I felt more connected to myself than ever. I was
able to recognize the strength in me, the positivity and those
little things I would do that counts of self-care but didn’t rec-
ognize before. Most importantly, I beat the bullshit excuse of
“not having time for myself”. And it felt great to prove myself
wrong.
What would your 30 days of Self-Care look like? I invite you
and your friends in embark on your own 30 days!
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Sharing - If you care to:
1. Send me an email/video testimonial to
v@vanae.com. I may feature it.

2. Post quotes or reviews on Facebook.

3. Do a book review on your site.

4. Share this ebook with your friends and start your

own 30 day Self-Care Project and Inspire your friends
to join.

5. This ebook is donationa-based, if you felt that it

helped you in any bit, please consider sharing a pay-
pal donation to v@vanae.com.
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