15 Strategies for Maintaining Wellness as a Counselor
Wellness is a critical aspect of a counselor's professional life, yet it often takes a backseat to client care. This article presents expert-backed strategies for maintaining wellness in the demanding field of counseling. From designing flexible routines to establishing clear boundaries, these insights offer practical solutions for counselors seeking to prioritize their own well-being.
- Design Flexible Wellness for Neurodivergent Brains
- Simplify Decisions to Combat Professional Fatigue
- Build a Chaos-Proof Wellness System
- Regulate Your Nervous System Daily
- Treat Self-Care as Non-Negotiable Appointments
- Establish Clear Boundaries Between Work and Home
- Write Down Goals to Stay Consistent
- Rebuild Structure After Life-Changing Events
- Maintain Consistency Over Intensity in Wellness
- Use Timers to Reclaim Wellness Breaks
- Turn Meal Prep into a Social Ritual
- Create Buffers Between Business and Personal Time
- Lock Away Distractions During Meditation Time
- Balance Physical Job Demands with Wellness Goals
- Schedule Workouts in Advance for Accountability
Design Flexible Wellness for Neurodivergent Brains
Wellness routines aren't one-size-fits-all—especially when your brain doesn't follow the "normal" rules.
One of my biggest challenges in maintaining my own wellness routine is consistency.
Not because I'm lazy.
Not because I don't care.
But because I'm autistic, I have ADHD, and my energy, focus, and executive function fluctuate wildly—even when I'm doing everything "right."
I can go from meal-prepping, gym-going, and tracking like a pro... to forgetting to eat, missing workouts, and spiraling into all-or-nothing thinking.
And for a long time, I thought that meant I was failing.
But I've learned that my wellness has to work with my brain, not against it.
Here's what helps:
Flexible structure - I build routines that bend instead of break. If I can't make it to the gym, I have backup ideas like a walk or stretching. Movement counts—even if it's not a full workout.
Visible cues - My calendar, whiteboard, and phone reminders are lifesavers. I track habits in ways that feel rewarding and visual, not punishing.
Accountability, not shame - I check in with my trainer and have a small group of people who get it. They don't guilt me. They nudge me. Encouragement over criticism is everything.
Daily resets - I remind myself that every day is a chance to try again. If yesterday didn't go to plan, I don't throw the week away. I just start from now.
Understanding my "why" - I trained and qualified as a PT not to be perfect, but to create space for people like me. That purpose keeps me showing up, even when it's messy.
I don't need to be consistent every single day to be committed.
And that's been the biggest mindset shift.
I now design my wellness routine around self-compassion and sustainability, not unrealistic expectations.
Because the truth is, some days I show up fully.
Some days I just survive.
And both are valid.
If you're struggling to stay consistent, especially with a neurodivergent brain, know this:
It's not a flaw.
It's a signal to do things differently.
And different can still be powerful.
Simplify Decisions to Combat Professional Fatigue
The Psychiatrist's Paradox: Taming Decision Fatigue for Wellness
My greatest challenge in maintaining a wellness routine is a condition I often discuss with my patients: decision fatigue. After a full day of complex clinical analysis, intense listening, and making critical decisions about treatment plans, the cognitive energy required to decide what healthy meal to cook or which workout to do is often completely depleted. It's a professional paradox; I spend my day promoting healthy choices, yet the work itself can exhaust the very mental resources needed to make them for myself.
To overcome this, I practice what I call "radical simplification." My strategy is to eliminate as many in-the-moment wellness decisions as possible. This means I do aggressive pre-planning on the weekend: I plan a simple menu for the week and chop vegetables in advance. I also lay out my workout clothes the night before. By making the healthy choice the easiest choice, I put my routine on autopilot, requiring willpower only once a week during planning, not every single day.
For accountability, I rely on a strategy of being "compassionately consistent." First, I schedule my workouts in my calendar with the same importance as a patient appointment—they are non-negotiable blocks of time. But the compassion piece is just as crucial. If I miss a day due to exhaustion or an unexpected event, I consciously avoid all-or-nothing thinking. Instead of seeing it as a failure, I treat it as data, acknowledge my need for rest without judgment, and focus solely on making the next scheduled appointment. This self-compassion prevents one missed day from derailing the entire week.
Build a Chaos-Proof Wellness System
One of the biggest challenges I face with wellness is motion. I'm constantly traveling, raising four kids, and running a business that doesn't believe in 9-to-5 boundaries. Traditional routines fall apart quickly in that kind of environment.
So I stopped chasing a perfect routine and built one that could survive chaos. My approach is rooted in three strategies:
Minimum Effective Dose: I lean on technology like Hypervibe to get serious results in short bursts—10 minutes of vibration-based movement gives me better circulation, balance, and neuromuscular activation than an hour of conventional training, especially when I've just stepped off a 14-hour flight.
Biometric Feedback: I track HRV, sleep, and muscle tension using wearables and adjust accordingly. If recovery is low, I pivot to breathwork or light mobility instead of forcing a workout.
Gamified Accountability: My kids join in with "movement missions." I stack workouts with Zoom calls. And yes, I log everything in a Google Form because data keeps me honest. It's weirdly fun.
For me, wellness isn't a calendar block—it's a flexible system. The key was designing it to move with my life, not fight it.
Regulate Your Nervous System Daily
As a psychiatrist, one of the biggest challenges I've faced in maintaining my own wellness routine is separating my energy from the emotional weight of others. Holding space for people's pain day after day is sacred work—but it can blur the line between empathy and emotional enmeshment if I'm not vigilant. Early in my career, I used to think I could absorb it all and still stay centered. However, over time, I learned that keeping my peace isn't selfish—it's essential for doing this work with presence and longevity.
What has helped me most is building daily practices that regulate my own nervous system—completely separate from clinical settings. That includes movement, time in nature, digital boundaries, and meditation that's not just calming, but grounding. I start most mornings with intentional stillness and breathwork before checking messages or schedules—this keeps me rooted in my own energy.
To stay accountable, I treat my wellness rituals like I would any non-negotiable appointment. I also remind myself that my clients don't need me to be perfect—they need me to be present. And presence comes from regulation, not overextension. When I take care of my nervous system, I show up with clarity and compassion instead of depletion.
Sustainable care starts with self—and that's a discipline I return to every single day.
Treat Self-Care as Non-Negotiable Appointments
Challenge: Staying consistent with a wellness routine while juggling a demanding work schedule.
Like many office workers, I found that long hours, last-minute deadlines, and sheer mental exhaustion kept pushing my workouts and healthy meals to the back burner. I convinced myself I'd catch up later, but later never seemed to arrive.
My Solution: Now I treat every piece of self-care as an appointment I won't skip. I block three non-negotiable slots in my calendar for exercise, light meal prep, and quick mental breaks, placing them alongside client calls and team huddles.
Accountability Strategy: I pair this setup with a habit-tracker app and share my weekly targets with a good friend. That little nudge—and her occasional text cue when I'm dragging—makes it a lot harder to blow off a session. Because wellness is calendar-locked, consistency has gone from wishful thinking to routine.
Establish Clear Boundaries Between Work and Home
One of the challenges I've experienced in sustaining my wellness routine is not distinguishing between work time and personal time. Pediatric dentistry requires concentration, intensity, and emotional availability. At the end of long clinic days, I would bring the tension home, returning calls, sorting through charts, and preparing for the next day. That time-recapture behavior usurped workouts, rest, and mental restoration. Eventually, the imbalance weighed on my mood and physical endurance.
I established a firm cutoff in the evening. Work is completed at 6:30 p.m. No exceptions. Then I transition into non-work activities: cooking, light exercise, or family time. I had all work-related notifications turned off on my phone after work hours. That one change made a psychological barrier between work and home.
To remain accountable, I use calendar blocks. I approach wellness time just like I approach patient appointments. Morning walks, Sunday dinner prep, and three quick workouts per week are on the calendar. If they're on the calendar, they're done. I also call a colleague weekly who's doing the same. We compare consistency, not performance. The idea is to continue showing up.
Discipline follows structure, not motivation. When your routine breaks into a clean system, action becomes second nature. That's how wellness becomes a regular part of your life instead of an afterthought; you try to fit around everything else.
Write Down Goals to Stay Consistent
One of the biggest challenges I've faced with wellness is staying consistent. I've always had bursts of motivation. I'd eat well and exercise every day for a few months, then end up slipping back into old habits. Working in construction, I was constantly stressed, skipping meals or eating whatever was closest, not sleeping properly, or binge drinking at the end of the week. That would lead to a late-night kebab, a hangover the next day, and before I knew it, I was back off the wagon. I used to tell myself I didn't have time, but really I just wasn't prioritizing my health at all.
Everything changed after my mum was diagnosed with early-onset dementia. That shook me. I started properly thinking about how I was living, what I was eating, and how much time I was getting with my kids. We sold everything and started travelling full-time as a family. That gave me the space to breathe and reset.
The thing that's helped me the most is ridiculously simple. I started writing things down. Every morning I grab a pen and paper and list what I want to do. It can be as basic as 10,000 steps, a 15-minute workout, or 100 push-ups. Not just chores, but the things that matter.
Then at night, I write down what I actually did. Some days the two lists match. Some days they don't. But just writing it down has helped me stay consistent for longer than ever. If I do slip, seeing "did nothing today" on paper is enough to kick me back into gear. I'm not perfect, but it makes getting back on track easier.
What's amazing is now that I do it, I keep hearing the same advice everywhere. Celebrities, entrepreneurs, all saying the same thing — write down your goals. Once I started, I began seeing it everywhere.
It's funny how we all show up to work with a to-do list, ticking off tasks for someone else, but don't do the same for our own life. Why are we more organized for our job than for our own wellbeing?
It's not fancy. No app. No tracker. Just a notebook. But it works. Seeing it in your own handwriting makes it real. When I skip it, I drift. So I go back to the page. It's the simplest but most effective thing I've ever done.
You can follow more of our journey at wingingitworldwide.com. I would really appreciate a backlink if this is featured.
Rebuild Structure After Life-Changing Events
When I got divorced three years ago, my entire life changed. I went from being a stay-at-home mom to suddenly being in charge of everything: the bills, the finances, the yard work, the household, and my three kids and all of their emotions. On top of that, I was navigating the loss of old friendships and trying to build a completely new social structure and life. I had always been someone who thrived on a perfectly structured routine, but divorce completely altered that. My wellness routine disappeared, I gained 20 pounds, and I struggled with anxiety and overwhelm.
Once the dust settled, I realized I had to get back to what I had always done best: have structure. I gave myself permission to stop surviving and start rebuilding and living. I made a decision after looking in the mirror one day to no longer play small. I was finally free to choose to live a powerful, above-average life. That shift in my mindset changed everything for me.
The strategies that helped me stay accountable were, first, hiring a coach—someone I had to report to and send progress photos to, someone who challenged me and helped me stay focused. I also did the internal work necessary to heal so I could fully love myself and live in authenticity. And then I got organized. I created a schedule and made a daily checklist with everything I needed to do to live a healthy, abundant life.
In a nutshell, I would say: hire a coach, create a schedule, make a checklist, write it all down, do the work every day, and most of all, do not settle. You get to design the life you want, so live it to its fullest!
Maintain Consistency Over Intensity in Wellness
The most challenging aspect of maintaining a wellness routine as a founder in behavioral health is the same principle I advocate to clients: consistency over intensity. I used to pursue structure as if it were another goal to "achieve." I would go all-in—meal prepping, working out at 5 AM, and journaling. Then I would encounter a stretch of 14-hour days, get drawn into crisis mode at the center, and suddenly two weeks would pass without doing anything for myself. The all-or-nothing mindset was subtly burning me out.
The turning point came when I realized wellness isn't a checklist—it's a rhythm. For me, the anchor became a morning walk. Not a workout. Not a podcast-fueled multitask. Just a simple 20-minute walk without my phone. That became non-negotiable. Even during busy seasons, I could maintain that commitment to myself. And that single act helped ground everything else—how I showed up for the team, how I handled stress, how I protected my evenings.
Accountability didn't come from apps or tracking—it came from transparency. I informed my leadership team about what I was working on personally, just as I ask them to be transparent in their own development. We integrated it into our culture: wellness isn't extracurricular here—it's expected. I had to lead from the inside out.
As a business owner in mental health, you're never off duty emotionally. You hold space for many others. But if you're not tending to your own nervous system, eventually it catches up with you—and the mission. So now I stay consistent, not perfect. And I keep it simple. Simple sticks.
Use Timers to Reclaim Wellness Breaks
Reclaiming Wellness in a Digital World: How a Timer Saved My Body and Brain
In the ever-on, always-hustling culture of the digital workspace, wellness can feel like something we'll "get to later." Ironically, that "later" never comes. As someone frequently immersed in screen-based work—writing, strategizing, supporting clients—my biggest challenge hasn't been motivation. It's been remembering to pause.
The problem crept in quietly. I'd sink into long stretches of hyper-focus, only to emerge with stiff shoulders, aching hips, and that glazed-over screen fatigue. Wellness, I realized, wasn't just about good nutrition or regular workouts. It was about creating space to move throughout the day.
The unexpected hero? A humble Pomodoro timer.
The Pomodoro Strategy: Small Time, Big Shifts
Originally designed for productivity, the Pomodoro Technique breaks work into 25-minute sprints followed by 5-minute breaks. I started using it to sharpen focus—but the real breakthrough happened during the breaks. That timer became a cue to step away.
And not to check my phone. To stretch, hydrate, walk around the house, or breathe deeply by the window. I placed a resistance band by my desk as a visual reminder. Some breaks were full-body stretches, others just a few minutes of movement to shake off the screen slump.
This small habit created a profound shift in how I felt at the end of the day—physically looser, mentally clearer, and more present.
How I Stay Accountable Without Burning Out
Timers do more than mark time—they build discipline without feeling punishing. Here's what's kept me on track:
Automated Alerts: A browser-based timer that dings at break time removes the mental guesswork.
Visible Cues: Tools like a yoga mat or water bottle in plain sight make healthy choices a little more frictionless.
Mindset Shift: Breaks aren't distractions—they're part of the workflow. Five minutes can be a reset, not a derailment.
What I've Learned
Wellness doesn't need a grand gesture. Sometimes, it just needs five minutes and a little beep reminding you to move. That timer hasn't just helped me work smarter—it's helped me reconnect with my body in the middle of a digital day.
Turn Meal Prep into a Social Ritual
I used to combat afternoon energy slumps by grabbing whatever was most convenient because, between client calls and site visits, I barely had time to eat. The real issue wasn't a lack of willpower but the absence of a system to make better choices automatic when I was rushing from one task to the next.
What finally broke the cycle was turning Sunday meal prep into a mini ritual—and inviting two colleagues to join me via a WhatsApp "Prep & Share" group. Each of us prepares four days' worth of balanced lunches—think grilled chicken, roasted vegetables, and quinoa. Seeing their prep photos motivates me to follow through, and a quick "Nice work!" keeps the momentum going. Now, instead of scrounging for junk at 2 PM, I just grab my container and know I'm fueling my body properly, and I haven't missed a week of prep in six months.
Create Buffers Between Business and Personal Time
By far, the most challenging aspect of my wellness routine has been unpredictability—specifically, the unpredictable nature of last-minute high-end private driver requests in Mexico City. The last-minute aspect can disrupt any pre-planned day.
For example, last year during Día de Muertos, I had 14 last-minute bookings in four days, mostly related to airport pickups that changed with flight time changes, meaning my sleep, meals, and workouts were non-existent. I quickly realized that if I didn't build a buffer between business and myself, I would burn out.
So I did two things:
1. I built a small, trusted team of backup drivers that I could delegate to—even if it meant that my direct revenue would be lower.
2. I also time-boxed my wellness habits before the day starts: a 15-minute bodyweight routine in the morning and a daily 10-minute journal check-in.
My tool for accountability is simple: I track streaks through a shared Notion dashboard with a friend who is also a founder. We are not competing against each other—but simply encouraging one another and sharing our slips. It is the human nudge to keep going.
Owning Mexico-City-Private-Driver.com is demanding, but when I show up healthier, my business does too. Clients feel it—and as a result, stay loyal.
Lock Away Distractions During Meditation Time
I repeatedly promised myself a daily 10-minute midday meditation, but every time my phone buzzed, I would give in and skip it. To address this issue, I constructed a small "phone fortress" using an old cookie tin with a simple combination lock. When it's time to meditate, I place my phone inside, lock it up, and then actually sit down—out of sight truly is out of mind.
To maintain honesty about using the fortress, I record each lock-up in a small notebook taped to my desk and take a photo of the closed tin for our team's Slack "Wellness Wall." Knowing my colleagues see it—and sometimes tease me if I forget—transforms a solitary habit into a shared ritual. That physical barrier plus the gentle public nudge has maintained my meditation streak for over three months straight.
Balance Physical Job Demands with Wellness Goals
As the owner of a moving company, one of the biggest challenges I face in maintaining a consistent wellness routine is balancing physical exhaustion with the desire to do more for my health.
Moving is incredibly demanding - lifting, walking, climbing stairs - it's a full-body workout in itself. After a long day on the job, the last thing I usually feel like doing is hitting the gym, even though I know how beneficial strength training or stretching could be for long-term wellness.
The good news is that my work keeps me active, but I still strive for more consistency when it comes to things like mobility work, nutrition, and recovery. One strategy that has helped me stay accountable is setting small, realistic goals that don't require a full gym session. Even 10-15 minutes of stretching in the evening or a quick home workout goes a long way. I also try to treat movement as part of my lifestyle, not something I have to force. That shift in mindset makes it easier to stay committed without burning out.
Being in a physically demanding job has its advantages, but finding time and energy for a structured wellness routine is still something I'm constantly working on.
Schedule Workouts in Advance for Accountability
One challenge I face in maintaining my own wellness routine is staying on track during the summer months when my daughter is out of school. Because when the kids have no strict schedule, it's much more difficult to schedule activities of my own!
The strategy that helps me stay on track this summer, however, is having a personal trainer to hold me accountable.
Together we create a workout schedule one month in advance, where I train with him twice a week. On the other two days of the week, I sign up for a workout through ClassPass.
Not only does a trainer make sure you actually show up to your exercise sessions, those automatic payments coming out of your bank account twice a month are definitely a reason not to skip the gym!
