As college students we hear a lot about self-care. Professors, therapists, friends, and peers suggest self-care tools like journaling, practicing mindful breathing, going on walks, and watching your food intake. However, it is hard to maintain accountability when we do these self-care exercises. To make sure you maintain your self-care practices, you need daily or even hourly reminders to practice them. This is one reason why apps like Finch, Plant Nanny Water Tracker Log, and Standland are great apps to use to apply your self-care tools. The app and yourself both have to keep each other accountable to maintain your self-care throughout the day, week, and month.
If you are someone who loves pets and helping animals, then Finch is the perfect self-care app for you. You hatch an egg, name it, and build mindful habits to help your new pet thrive. Finch’s features consist of mood tracking, goal settings, and practicing gratitude; this is all done by taking care of an adorable pet. Finch is a great app to help you take care of yourself by giving you daily tasks to complete, especially when your motivation levels are low. Even though these tasks may seem mundane, they can make a big difference in your mood and well-being. When we pack our days with too many things to do, we often forget to take care of ourselves. I have definitely experienced this in college. This self-care app changes your tasks and turns them into a fun game. When you have finished your task, you can “level up” your pets and even customize them! This five-star app is free but can be upgraded for $4.99 per month. When comparing this app to other self-care products such as face masks, candles, and journals, this app is quite cost effective.
An article from Fresh H20 suggests that “drinking water is one of the key components of practicing good self-care. Water is an essential element needed for your body and brian to achieve a happy and healthy you. Self-care is about taking steps to improve your overall well-being. By making a better choice of what you put in your body, you are practicing self-care.” Plant Nanny Water Tracker Log app is a great way to keep track of how much water you drink throughout the day. If you also love plants, this is the perfect app for you. Whenever you drink water, your plants also get to drink water. Every day you can collect and take care of your little plants by hydrating them! The more water you drink throughout the day, the more your plants will thrive. There are a variety of adorable and lively plants that you can choose from. You can also customize your pots and containers, develop a cute plant family, and unlock and collect a variety of different plants. The app gives suggestions for appropriate amounts of water to drink on a daily basis based on the user’s body data and exercise habits. However, you are able to customize how much water you want to drink in a day. By giving you reminders throughout the day, this helps establish a regular habit of drinking water, and you and your plants will be able to be healthy together on the Plant Nanny app. This app has an $8 monthly subscription, which is unusually high. But if you put self-care first, then it is totally worth it.
Just as drinking water is beneficial for our emotional, mental, physical, and spiritual health, standing up throughout the day has the same effects. As a college student, I find myself sitting for hours in class and doing homework. Sitting down for long periods of time can be detrimental to our health. Research has demonstrated the connection between prolonged and unbroken periods of sitting and weight gain, obesity, unhealthy blood-sugar levels, Type 2 diabetes, and a greater chance of obtaining heart disease, along with increased risk of depression. The Standland app helps break a sedentary habit by getting you to move every hour. This app is dedicated to breaking sitting habits with any age group or population. With this app, you collect adorable 3D creatures by standing up and frequently moving. Standland has the option of selecting missions throughout the day, and once you finish the mission, you can collect more stands. Stands are like coins and you can use them to buy 3D creatures and other features. This app is free, with in-app purchases available. Standland is a very simple and straightforward app that brings more awareness to your sitting habits. You will need to grant the app access to your Health data to measure your stands for the day. If you feel like you sit too long studying, writing essays, or watching TV, then this app is perfect for you.
Free or not, self-care habits and tools are vitally important as college students. Some of us may need people to keep us accountable for making sure that we are taking care of ourselves through self-care habits. Having a group of friends helps us keep each other accountable for making sure that we are practicing self-care. However, some of us may not like the idea of accountability sharing with our friends and find it easier to rely on the self-care apps mentioned above. Taking care of yourself is very personalized to whatever you think needs to be taken care of. Either with apps or friends, self-care should be prioritized on a daily basis.
The Student Movement is the official student newspaper of Andrews University. Opinions expressed in the Student Movement are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors, Andrews University or the Seventh-day Adventist church.