I am the priority.
For me, this is the hardest lesson I have had to learn.
To put myself first.
Being selfish is taboo. The word alone is enough to make most people uncomfortable.
The funny thing most people don’t realise is that, once you put yourself first, you can give so much more to others around you.
Does that sound counterintuitive?
When you’re aboard a plane and they go through the safety instructions, who do they say should put their oxygen mask on first?
That’s right. You.
Imagine trying to help the person next to you while you’re gasping for air and losing consciousness. What good are you then?
When you make yourself the priority and you are able to breathe, you have the capacity to help others.
When you focus on yourself and take responsibility for how you feel, others benefit.
Sometimes all it takes is for someone to smile at you in public and you immediately feel an uplift in mood. That person’s energy has an effect on you.
If you really want to help others, help yourself first.
If everyone did this, objectively, the world would be a better place, right?
“If you really want to help others, help yourself first.”
What about other areas in life?
Being the priority can snowball into all domains of your life.
You sharpen your focus and notice your feelings. You no longer tolerate being comfortable in your discomfort.
I started noticing how certain foods made me feel. I noticed that removing gluten made me feel so much better, followed by dairy.
All of a sudden, I was so much healthier, simply because the focus was completely on me.
I stopped paying attention to the news.
When I paid close attention to how I felt, it only ever made me feel worse. So why do it?
Being so tuned into all the atrocities in the world only serves to make you feel awful.
I have always loved the quote, “It is not your civic duty to make yourself sick.” It’s spot on.
We feel like it is our duty to know everything that is going on, as if that really helps anyone. It doesn’t.
You are only hurting yourself.
Turning my attention away from the atrocities in the world is one of the best things I have ever done for myself.
Making myself the priority in relationships has never been easy for me.
I learned the lie growing up that I was responsible for other people’s feelings.
Every friendship, every romantic relationship and especially familial relationships felt as if I was holding their feelings in my hands.
If they were ever upset, I felt like it fell to me to do something about it.
I had to make them feel better, and the reason they didn’t feel good was because I just wasn’t quite good enough.
If I could make them feel better, then I could feel good enough, if only for a moment.
This led to a carrot-on-a-stick-style pursuit where I could never quite reach that delicious “good enough” carrot.
Think about that for a second.
Think about what a ridiculous burden it is to be responsible for anyone else’s feelings.
And yet, we all do it.
There is a romantic idea to being the reason for someone’s happiness.
“You make me happy.”
Sounds sweet, right?
But if you make someone happy, you can also make someone unhappy. Miserable. Depressed, even.
That doesn’t sound so sweet, huh?
“If you make someone happy, you can also make them miserable.”
The most empowering thing I have ever done is to take complete and full responsibility for how I feel.
To do the opposite is to be a victim to everyone else and to give my power away.
I see how easy it is to fall into this dynamic.
That way, nothing is your fault.
Most people do not see or understand the power they possess. It scares them. It makes them responsible. It calls them to action.
To most, that is a scary proposition.
When you take full responsibility for everything in your life, everything changes.
You realise you do not have to be in a relationship with someone simply because you are worried about how they feel.
You are free.
You create space to love more deeply and profoundly.
When you choose yourself, you are loving yourself.
That is true self love.
I choose myself.
Obsessively.
Obnoxiously so.
I am no longer willing to abandon myself.
And yes, that is selfish.
Much love,
Sandy