This Is the Mantra Brooklyn Decker Uses to Stay Focused When Things Get Hectic

This video is part of Health's My Mantra series. Follow along with new videos on our Instagram page and share your own words of wisdom using #MantraMonday.

Model, actress, and mom of two Brooklyn Decker, 34, has some really great advice on how to think about your self-care routine: If it's stressing you out, it's doing the opposite of what it's supposed to do.

"What happens is when we have this idea of self-care, it [can] become another unattainable goal," Decker tells Health. When you're super busy or stressed out, she explains, trying to find time to practice self-care might actually be draining. For this reason, her mantra focuses on prioritizing what she can and can't control in the moment: "My mantra is, 'Control what you can, and then work really hard at that thing.'"

Decker tries to keep this in mind no matter what season of life she's in. "If right now, you can only control showing up on a Zoom on time or crushing a job interview—take what you can control, work really hard at that," Decker says. "You've got to let everything else go because we can't be everything to everyone or to ourselves all the time." (How's that for #relatable?)

This life lesson came to Decker after giving birth, when her gynecologist asked her about her routine. "This is TMI, but my gynecologist asked me what I was doing for self-care, and this was—I had a newborn, had gone back to work two weeks after giving birth," she says. "Things were just crazy and wild and wonderful, but there was a lot going on. And I remember saying, 'That's not a box I can check right now.'"

This taught Decker the importance of setting realistic goals—and remembering that things change, and nothing lasts forever. She recalls thinking, "This is a time for me to just grind, and I just know that it's temporary and it's a phase and I have to work through it."

Watch the rest of Decker's mantra in the video above.