Here’s why getting intentional about your self-care (and ‘me’ time) matters

A blue VW Beetle overgrown with Ivy - sitting neglected in the garden outside a whitewash house.

This is the story of my chronic neglect of my ‘Self’, how I stopped resisting and why I no longer feel guilty about ‘me time’ (and how you can get to this place too!).

Self-Care Neglect

Once upon a time my self-care was a bit like this car.

A bit neglected, left to it’s own devices and bit forgotten about.

If my self-care had been a friend, she would have given up on me for never being there!

And here’s the truth.

For YEARS, whenever I heard people talking about ‘me time’ I used to feel:

a little bit intrigued - it wasn’t something that was role modelled well in my family (sorry mum, you were amazing, so much so that your needs often got forgotten)
a little bit critical - (yes, I definitely carried a belief that it was self-indulgent twiddle twaddle - because that’s what I had been brought up to believe).
A little bit envious - for although my reflexive response was to be critical, that was because I could see that they were onto something, I just didn’t want to admit it.
A lot “It’s not for me” - I’m not the sort of person who does all this namby pamby stuff, like, who has time for it??

So whenever I was feeling overwhelmed, overloaded, stressy or drained, or down-right frazzled and exhausted, and my emotions sent the signals to my brain leading those little words…“I need some time out for me…” to flit across my brain , I would bat them away.

Because it felt wrong.

It felt wrong because I ‘should’ have been able to deal with all that stuff without needing all this soft, love-thyself nonsense.

I ‘should’ have been able to be ‘selfless’ without crumbling under the weight.

And there were always so many other things I ‘should’ be doing, that there was no time for this self indulgent, self-absorbed, self-care stuff?

Sound at all familiar?

But, REALLY? I mean - what the flip?!

Self-Care Culture

But the thing is, culturally there’s this thing where women are seen as the ‘helper’ the ‘supporter’ the ‘giver’ -we’re the ones that just hold everything together, it’s what we do. And we keep doing it even when we’re knackered, when we don’t feel like it, when our buckets are full.

We feel it’s our DUTY!

Certainly in my family, mum did everything, without ever complaining (or so it seemed) and so that’s how I thought I had to be.

Making sure everyone else is OK, putting my needs last, because that was my ‘job’. And being the big sister amplified these feelings.

To be ever present for the people who need me, without crumbling and without complaining.

It’s just what society says we do.

And being a people pleaser on top (because I hate conflict, and because I tangled up my self-worth with all the wrong things - but that’s another story…) made things 100 times worse!

So the mere prospect of saying out loud “I’m going to take some time out to do this thing, simply because it’s what I need* to do” left me feeling so selfish, that I would silently be screaming it, but never saying it out loud.

(*and looking after our needs is just the basic essentials - did you know, (DRUM ROLL) you can actually do stuff just because you want to, because you DESIRE it?? - it has taken a while to get my head around that one!!)

So, perhaps like you too, I was culturally brain washed into believing it was ‘wrong’ for me to take time just for me and my needs, and that’s why I felt selfish and GUILTY.

Especially when I became a mum.

Self-Care & Mum-Guilt

The Grotty Gremlin of Self-Care

The self-care Guilt Gremlin kept sneaking in and taking over.

And this is where things have turned out all wrong for so many women.

And it’s not our fault. The Guilt.

Let’s just take a sidestep for a moment to understand what guilt is.

Understanding Guilt

Guilt is an emotion we feel when we have done something ‘wrong’ - it’s nature’s brilliant way of telling us that we need to make amends in order to stay included in the social group.

And because we’re given this ‘be a selfless giver and don’t complain’ messaging, when we start to look at giving time and attention to ourselves, it feels like we’re doing something wrong.

And the guilt kicks in.

So it’s not our fault.

And we use words like ‘treat’ and ‘indulge’ to talk about ‘me’ time, which simply adds to the feeling that it’s something ‘special’ something ‘luxurious’.

So I kept putting my needs to one side. Ignoring that yelling voice inside.

And instead of tending to what I needed, and treating my self-care like the essential, everyday thing it is, I devoted my energy to:

brewing resentment - that came out when I didn’t want it to.
breeding exhaustion - that left me totally lacking in energy or enthusiasm.
Diligently gathering buckets of emotional overwhelm - that spilled out in snappiness, irritability, impatience, intolerance and a tonne of passive-aggression!

I became a flat, grumpy and no fun to be around control freak with no patience to suffer fools (or toddlers) and no ‘time’ for anything other than all the demands being placed on me. And this left my head full and my energy tank completely dry.

A TERRIBLE combo!

Here’s what I now know to be true…

Self Care is not a Luxury!

Self-care is for Everyone, Everyday!

After decades of adulthood and resisting, I eventually gave in and acknowledged that this long held belief that ‘self-care and me-time is not for me’ was a total load of BS - (Since then I have wondered how different my mum’s life would have been if she’d realised that too!)

And rather than it being a sign of me being a strong, capable and self-reliant woman, it was actually a sign of chronic neglect of my ‘self’ and this had left me feeling burnt-out emotionally, in a fairly constant state of overwhelm, losing confidence because I just didn’t have the energy to do the things I was doing ‘well’ and also feeling ‘bad’ about the fact that I wasn’t showing up as my best self for the people who really mattered.

So I had guilt on top of guilt.

I mean, how big a guilt pile can one little person carry? (Quite a hefty big one as it happens!)

It has taken me a while, but now I ‘get it’.

Cultivating a Self-Care Mindset

Now I know from first hand experience that there is nothing to be gained for me, or for anyone else, from an insistence on always looking after everyone else before I even think about me.

Because when I consciously connect with what I need, and intentionally make sure that this is built into my days and weeks, I show up as a better version of me.

And I feel great!

And that means I radiate all my sparkly wonderfulness, not my dreary crabbiness.

(and I have been reminded of this only very recently, when I was beginning to slip back into bad old habits of chronic neglect of ‘me’ and I noticed how much more difficult and how much less fun everything became).

I have worked at reframing the idea of ‘me time’.

It’s so hard not to think of it as selfish, but I now think of it as being ‘selfist’.

‘Selfist’ reflects that I care about myself, in the same way that I care about the other important things in my life. It reflects that “I matter too”. That my needs can be given the same priority as the other important things.

It’s about recognising that “Being the kind one” means being kind to yourself too!

It also requires some intentional choices about the things we give our time and energy too (see last week’s blog on the importance of getting intentional!). And this might mean that sometimes we do put ourselves FIRST, and sometimes we might choose to put our needs on the on the back burner, but always with a sense of purpose and intention.

Prioritising our needs too. On an EQUAL footing.

And when I give a s*** about myself, I am much more likely to prioritise the things that I need, which helps me to show up as a better person.

It also sends a message to me, myself, and everyone around me, not that I am more important, but that I am important too (and FYI -this can be super helpful for setting healthy boundaries too - just saying!!).

And that benefits EVERYONE, not just me.

So give yourself a regular duvet day, knowing that it’s essential!

How does getting more ‘selfist’ sound to you? Let me know in the comments or drop me a line (I love hearing from you!).