Introduction: The benefits of self-care to reduce stress/burnout amongst health professionals are currently a ‘hot topic’ within the health care system. The exact self-care tools or strategies used by medical professionals (1) and the best way to inspire or motivate people to make healthy lifestyle choices are not well defined. The purpose of this study was to investigate whether education on self-connection and self-love can motivate nurses to make healthy lifestyle choices to support their health and wellbeing.  

Methods: A six-hour staff wellness day involving ‘Gentle Breath Meditation’ for self-connection, gentle body-connection exercises, discussions on self-love and a fully clothed ‘nurturing massage’ was offered to a ward of 40 nurses. The benefits of the day were assessed with questionnaires and written feedback both immediately after the wellness day and 6 months post.

Results: Immediate feedback indicated that nurses recognise self-love and self-connection as very important qualities needed to make healthy lifestyle choices. Six-month results showed that nurses still recognised self-love and self-connection as key qualities for making healthy choices, but felt that the ability to choose to live with self-love and self-connection was difficult to maintain.

Conclusion: The ‘Gentle Breath Meditation’, body-connection exercises and discussion on self-love were shown to be beneficial tools to promote self-connection and self-love in nurses. It also demonstrated that self-love and self-connection inspire nurses to make healthy lifestyle choices, but that ongoing support is needed to continue to encourage and inspire nurses to make such choices.