A Guide to Being Selfish
Some thoughts on where to begin with pleasure...
This year has already been a doozy for so many of us; no matter your political leanings, we have all experienced the intensity of this season. The stress of these times (gestures wildly) and the depths of winter sucked me down into a bit of despair for the first part of the year, so of course, I feel compelled to write about it.
I was able to slowly upward spiral out of my despair by utilizing a variety of resources and also by giving myself permission to be a little low and off some days. A big theme of the season was moving toward things that genuinely brought me joy and pleasure; I actively chose things that felt good and stabilizing for myself.
And because I don’t like the term “self-care”, I am giving you a guide to being selfish. I should clarify that I am working chiefly off of the portion of the definition of the adjective in which it states that being selfish means you are making choices specifically for your own pleasure.
Many of us orient our lives and choices away from our peace and pleasure, maybe because we have been socialized to think we don’t need to be a priority or because we have found that there is a payoff to dismissing our deepest needs. Regardless, there is an impact on our long term health and wellness. Recently I was listening to a RobCast episode and he named that there is a distinct link between despair and a lack of adequate care for oneself.
He names in the podcast how he tends to ask people, when they say that they are feeling discouraged, whether or not they have been taking good care of themselves and they most often say “no”.
I know that time is often the major limiting resource here, many of you reading this may not feel as if you have the time for your own pleasure and comfort. I get it. AND I wonder if there is some space for me to push back against that belief. Can you audit your time and check in with yourself? Can you listen to your favorite album on the way to work instead of the news? Can you ask a friend to help you out by watching the kids while you take a walk around the park? Begin with the simplest things and then move out from there.
Once you have audited your time, can you shift your attitude toward yourself? This may seem a little backward, like maybe you should change your attitude before you change your behavior, but I intentionally made action first, because oftentimes we cognitively know we need to shift things before we truly believe in our bodies that it is the path to go down.
Rest, pleasure, care, comfort, all of these things are absolutely necessary for your health and wellness. So can you move yourself toward believing that reality a little more? Can you finally get the message that your fatigue is impacting your despair and your despair is making you more fatigued?
If we want to have any kind of helpful impact on the world, we have to shift the way we behave towards ourselves.
Thoughts on this? Let me know!
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