The Need For Self Care

Pleas for compassion and charity will never cease. There will always be a need for both…a need that will never be fully met.

There are those who ignore the calls and those who do what they can to answer them.

Then there are people who breach the boundaries of common sense and consistently exceed their own physical and psychological limitations in a bid to right the wrongs of the world.

They ignore the truth that the first duty of care is the duty of self care and they do so at their own peril and often to the detriment of those in their immediate family and community circles.

Self care and survival are linked. Self sacrifice is not about self destruction. It starts with self assessment and understanding. It’s a personal thing.

Those who know who they are, accept who they are and love who they are can better understand their capacity for benevolence and empathy. They know when to take stock of their emotional resources. They know that there will be times when there will be the necessity to step back and regroup.

Head and heart both need to be nourished and nurtured. To ignore one or the other is to invite imbalance and uncertainty. The result can be disappointment and failure…physical or mental exhaustion.

The only way to ensure the continual compatibility of mind and spirit is to protect both.

Self care is not self indulgence, nor is it selfish. It’s a way to bolster will and determination. It’s a vital protective coping mechanism that gives us the strength to keep moving forward and upward in a world where so much conspires to drag us in the opposite direction.

We can only give so much. We can only do so much. We have to know where to set our own boundaries. No-one can do that for us.