Doing For Yourself is Not a Crime:

Doing For Yourself is Not a Crime:

Hello readers, I wanted to talk about a topic that keeps coming up around me lately. I feel like a lot of people are struggling with this, so I wanted to give you my thoughts. I read another friend’s blog the other day and she wrote some fantastic insights about this same topic. Her name is Marlena Smith by the way. So at the end of my blog will be a link to hers. I hope you give hers a read too. I am going to piggyback a bit off of what she says.

In a nutshell the topic is this; making people happy. I am hearing a lot of people say, “I have always tried to put others first. I have always put my own needs or wants last and yet, I still seem to always make someone angry or upset? How and why does that happen?” There is a simple reason actually and that is that you are not taking care of you first. When you let other’s happiness take precedence over your own, then you let them drain you of all of your self worth. Even if it is people you love that you are talking about. If you spend every day constantly doing things for your significant others, children, parents, co-workers, etc. and you are doing nothing for yourself, you are telling yourself, “I’m not as important as them. I’m not worth any time or energy or love.” If someone else said that to you, would you put up with it? Or would you punch them in the face? (My hope would be you would do choice number two. 😉 ) JK violence is not the answer. But honestly, wouldn’t you say, “That’s so terrible of you to say and you’re wrong! I am worth all of those things.”? Then why would you not say the same to yourself? (Hmmmmm…..puzzler huh?)

The real reason that we do this is because most of us have had it ingrained in our minds that people who put themselves first are selfish, self absorbed, bitchy, rude, etc. etc. I could go on and on here. What were you told? But the truth of the matter is that this is all bull sh** lies. If you do something for yourself, to make yourself feel good or feel healthy or feel fulfilled, that does not make you a bad person! That makes you smart! Because you are filling your own cup of self worth and telling yourself and everyone else that I AM worth my own time, energy and love. You know what? When you start to believe that and shine that energy out for the rest of the world to see then you are being your best self, your true self! That will make everyone else around you be drawn to you and love you even more. People love to see others radiate confidence and that’s what you would be doing.

If you haven’t heard it yet, Pink just released her video to her new song called Wild Hearts Can’t Be Broken. It’s awesome!! I highly suggest watching/listening to it. But my favorite line in the song matches this topic so well. She says, “To want my share is not a sin.” It is so true! We want to have what we are worth. We want the things in life that will make us happy and that doesn’t mean we are sinners or bad people. In fact, a lot of the time when people feel that they have abundance and they are happy with their own lives, they tend to give even more generously to others. I am not just talking about giving money either. They give hope, love, time, energy, space, knowledge, kindness, material goods and more because you have to fill up your own cup first. If you give all of your cup’s contents to someone else, guess what? You’ll die of dehydration my friends.

If you have ever flown in a plane, think of what they tell you during the safety review. If there is an emergency, the air bags will drop from the ceiling. Secure yours first before you help anyone else with theirs. Do you know why they say that? Because if you put someone else’s on first, you have the potential to have a problem with yourself, you could pass out or get hurt or any number of things. For many of us this would feel unnatural to do. In fact, when they say that I’ve often rolled my eyes and thought, “Yeah right, I’d help my kid first.” But realistically I shouldn’t, I should take care of myself so that I am then able to take care of him properly.

I am not trying to say that you should never help a family member, friend, co-worker, neighbor, stranger etc. I am saying do that, do it often. But make sure you are not forgetting to do some things for yourself too.

This goes hand in hand with people claiming that they “don’t have time to write.” What they are really saying is that writing is not that important to them or they are not worth that time. I have heard this a lot lately too! I actually created a free tool to help people with this issue. I will be posting the link to it on my Wise Warrior Writers Facebook page. If you’re interested, go ahead and join the group, it is free. I know we all like free! J The link is below. So my friends try to think more about this and put you first. Read Marlena’s blog below and check out my group for the free tool for adding writing into your life and why you should. Take care my friends, until next time remember, writing=happiness ;).

Marlena Smith’s blog: https://mylife428.wordpress.com/blog-post/

My Wise Warrior Writers Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/311357982714998/