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Busting the Myth of Self-Care
Self-Care is Gutsy
It’s not just about bubble baths and massages. It’s about true vulnerability with yourself, knowing and loving yourself, honoring your deepest values and needs, then acting and moving from that place.
I know the word self-care has been thrown around a lot, especially when it comes to women, new mothers, or currently, global pandemics.
People give you advice like:
“Make sure to practice self-care.”
“Prioritize self-care.”
“It is not selfish to practice self-care.”
But what does “Practice self-care” really mean?
I had always been led to believe that self-care was a spa day, getting my nails done, doing some yoga, reading a good book… All actions. More things to check off the list.
For me this has always been problematic because I am a chronic overachiever and busybody. I have found that being busy and doing tasks/actions is where I derive my self-worth, as well as how I avoid and numb uncomfortable feelings of vulnerability and insecurity.
For me, practicing self-care, as a check list of to-dos, was a death sentence. It was just one more task to do (or not to do well enough) and then beat myself up over.
I think a lot of people fall into this category. The need to do is always so important that self-care just becomes one more item on the mile-long to-do list of life.
For those of you who are not perfectionist busybodies, the doing aspect of self-care may not be the issue. You may not feel such issues around self-worth and doing, but perhaps it’s about not knowing which activities you should be doing, or how you should be doing them, which leads to decision paralysis about which bath bomb or essential oil would be the ultimate self-care practice for you. You’ve now taken what should be a relaxing experience and turned it into yet another arduous decision you have to make.
The quest for self-care becomes a struggle to choose; a game of self-doubt and anguish because you never seem to get it quite right. One more thing for which you punish yourself, which completely defeats the purpose of self-care in the first…
