Self-care is all too often overlooked. There is a driving tendency to take care of the needs of those around us before we turn our attention to the needs of the person inside of us.
We are quick to set aside our own sadness and suffering in a bid to ease the sadness and suffering of others. In and of itself that much is admirable. We need to be caring. We need to be empathetic. There is often a job that both demands to be done and is not easily avoided.
But, having taken care of business, it’s essential that we return to the spot where we parked our self-care, pick it up and move forward. To do otherwise is to promote self-neglect…the negative end of that particularly emotional spectrum.
Sometimes the things we do for others, the relationships we maintain, cause us pain and suffering. We can be stretched to our limits.
Only the individual can decide their own limits. Only the individual knows their own capacity for hurt and confusion. And only the individual can decide when limits have been exceeded and action that is both restorative and reparative are needed. Again, whether that necessary action is taken only the individual can decide. It’s obvious, however, that the same action or inaction repeated will have the same result.
We find the strength to help others by looking within ourselves. The strength to help ourselves is drawn from the same resource.
Then it becomes a matter of priority. If we want to tend to the needs of others we must first tend to our own needs.
Our first responsibility is to ourselves. Self-care is essential.
Gary Bentley Counselling 