Restorative Self Care in a Challenging Political Time

Reflection by Arianna Cazares

February 19, 2019

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Background: 
Being a part of the CoCurricular Programs for two years now -starting off as the Special Projects Assistant (SPA) of Colleges Nine and Ten, my second year and then taking on the role as the Faculty Initiatives Assistant(FIA)- has made helped me dive deeper into what community really means. As I reflect back to the work that I had done as the SPA and now as the FIA, the intentions of my events have evolved to be more purposeful in understanding the impact societal issues have on folxs.  
Reflection:
My intention with this event, Restorative Self Care in a Challenging Political Time, was for the community to be able to use this space as a form of healing, relaxation, and expression of self. There are so many factors that affect our well being and I thought that doing an event that reminds us to care for our mental, physical, and emotional health is very important for avoiding burnout and any other medical issues that can be caused by not properly caring for yourself. The Restorative Self-Care in a Challenging Political Climate's purpose was to allow folxs to explore factors that may affect the expression of their identity and learn new forms of healing and practice them at the event. One way of understanding the effect of stress on the body was through massage therapy. Before participating in the massage, our massage therapist, Rubi Sami of Rising Root Wellness, would go over current tensions in the body with each participant and then teach them what might be the cause of the stress and how to relieve it.  
Skills: 
The skills that I have learned so far (not just from this event, but from being a part of The CoCurricular Programs Office) include communication via emails, phone calls, outreach, and networking. Working on this event has helped me master these skills. Being a student, my time management was put to the challenge. But having a strict schedule and deadlines contributed to being able to meet the needs of the event in a timely manner.  Not only does it come down to time management, communication, and critical thinking, but being able to conduct research and looking into reliable sources that correspond with the topic of the event and being able to illustrate the information into posters that others can engage in and answer questions.