Self-Care Intentions

A senior director who intellectually understands self-care but interprets most of its dimensions - emotional, spiritual, social, leisure - as indulgence that isn't appropriate given her current workload and responsibilities. She will likely populate Physical and Occupational with ease and leave the other seven dimensions thin or empty, not because she doesn't value them but because she hasn't given herself permission to claim them.

Frame the tool as a whole-person performance inventory before she fills it in. 'This tool asks about nine dimensions of your functioning. We're not building a spa day. We're mapping everything that sustains your capacity to do the work you're doing. Some of these dimensions are more familiar than others. The ones you've been treating as optional are usually the ones that are most depleted.' That framing reframes emotional and social care as operational, not indulgent.

Watch which dimensions she fills in fully and which she writes one-sentence placeholders for. Emotional, Spiritual, and Leisure are the most commonly thin for high-performers who have rationalized them away. Also watch the language she uses in the filled-in dimensions: clients in permission-deficit often write cautious, minimal intentions even for the dimensions they engage with ('try to exercise more,' 'maybe read sometimes') rather than specific commitments.

Start with the thin dimensions. 'Walk me through Emotional - what did you write there?' Then: 'When did you last do something that belongs in that dimension?' If it's been months: 'What's the argument for keeping it this thin - what does the depleted version cost you?' Then look at the full picture: 'Of the nine dimensions, which ones, if they were stronger, would make the biggest difference to your effectiveness in the work you described at the start of our engagement?' The question that creates movement: 'What would you write in the dimension you left most empty if permission weren't a factor?'

A manager who has done variations of this exercise before and produces thoughtful, specific intentions across multiple dimensions. The intentions never become practices. At the next quarterly check-in, she produces the same intentions with slightly different wording. She's excellent at articulating what care would look like and has never examined why the intentions don't convert.

Stop before she restates intentions she's written before. 'Before you fill this in, I want to name something: you've done this exercise at least twice. The intentions you've written have been similar each time and haven't become practices. Today we're going to do something different: instead of writing new intentions, we're going to pick one from the list you already know and figure out what's between the intention and the practice.' That reframe prevents the tool from producing a fourth set of intentions that also don't convert.

Watch which dimension she picks when asked to choose one to act on rather than intend. The choice itself is diagnostic: the dimension she chooses to work on may differ from the one she most values, and that gap tells you something. Also watch whether she can identify a specific obstacle between the intention and the practice. 'I just don't make time' is a description, not an obstacle analysis. 'Tuesday evenings consistently get taken over by work email' is an obstacle.

Start with one dimension she's intended to improve for two or more cycles. 'You've written something in this dimension before. Read me what you wrote. Now tell me: what specifically has happened in the last three months that isn't this?' Then work through the obstacle: 'What gets in the way when you try to do this - specifically, not in general?' The question that creates movement: 'If you committed to this one intention starting this week - not all nine, just this one - what would the first action be and when would you take it?'

A founder in his first year of business who previously had well-established personal routines - exercise, social connection, reading, creative outlets - that were built around a corporate schedule with defined hours and predictable weekends. The entrepreneurial schedule has dissolved all of those structures. He hasn't replaced them. Nine months in, he's running on momentum and awareness that something is missing, but hasn't identified what specifically has been lost.

Frame the tool as an inventory of what used to exist before the audit of what should exist now. 'Before you write intentions, let's identify what you had before - which of these nine dimensions had active practices in your previous season. That gives us a starting point: we're not designing self-care from scratch, we're recovering and adapting what worked.' That framing reduces the scope of the exercise and connects it to known personal effectiveness data.

Watch which dimensions he describes robustly in the 'what existed before' conversation versus which ones were already thin. Founders often discover that several dimensions were structurally supported by the corporate context (social connection through colleagues, physical activity through commuting, intellectual stimulation through work variety) rather than intentionally built. Those dimensions are the most vulnerable in a new season because the structural support is gone.

Start with the before-picture. 'Walk me through your typical week eighteen months ago - which of these nine dimensions were active, even if informally?' Then compare: 'Which ones are still active and which ones have dissolved?' The question that creates movement: 'Of the dimensions that have dissolved, which one, if you rebuilt it intentionally, would make the most difference to how you're functioning in the next six months?' Then build from that one dimension before expanding to the full nine.