The Healthy And Selfless Art Of Prioritizing Oneself

Prioritizing yourself is a healthy, useful, and necessary practice. Carrying out such a craft is not an act of selfishness, because loving that person who is reflected in our mirror without excuses, cracks or postponements is taking care of yourself: investing in personal well-being and quality of life. Furthermore, those who take care of themselves as they deserve can also offer their best to others.

For example, it is curious to know that Socrates himself focused part of his teachings on the concept of self-care or on what was defined at that time as “epimeleia heautou”. Later, Michel Foucault would once influence this idea, to break it down a little more and conclude in the following: only when a person manages to truly know himself, taking care of himself and offering himself value, can he achieve authentic freedom.

The truth is that we do not know at what point and for what reason most of us were instilled that putting such a strategy into practice was little more than an interested and selfish act. Terms were confused, to the point of making us believe that altruism and respect for the other does not harmonize at all with self-care or with being able to prioritize ourselves as we deserve it. Something totally false.

Thus, and almost without realizing it, we have been building relationships where that devout sacrifice lives where we think that the more we offer to others, the more they will love us, the more they will value us. Links where what we really do is abandon self-love in a gutter, and to its own devices, without looking back thinking that we are doing well, that that is what everyone expects of us.

Let’s avoid this unhealthy practice, which is essentially the trigger for many of our problems, frustrations, anxieties, sleepless nights and even physical pain …

Who stops prioritizing, is exhausted

When one stops prioritizing to fill their agenda, their mind and wills with the “I must do this and that”, “they expect from me what is beyond” or “I have to do this for this person” what they actually get is to drain themselves . It empties itself of energy, identities, desires and above all self-esteem. The most complex thing about all this is that sometimes, we carry out these acts without hardly thinking about it, without reflecting for a moment on whether we really want to do that favor, that act, that action.

Psychologists explain to us that we fall into the automatism of “doing, doing, doing” , rationalizing those actions as something natural and necessary. Because if we are useful to others, we will be valuable and because if we are necessary for our loved ones, then we will be loved. However, this rule of three does not always give the expected result; in fact, it rarely does.

What happens in these cases is something as devastating as it is sad. When we perceive that our continuous efforts and sacrifices are not valued, we develop a very critical view of ourselves, we blame ourselves for having been so naive, so devoted, so trusting. That internal voice can sometimes be very cruel and when this happens, somatization does not take long to appear, translated of course, in that muscle pain, in that fatigue that grips us, in those digestive problems, those infections, that headache, that fall worrying about the hair …

Learn to “serve yourself”

There are many people like this, embedded in other people’s itineraries, like locomotives that travel on rails in other territories, in other worlds far from their own . They carry loads that are not theirs as their own and they do not have a single day of vacation; a day to be themselves and take care of themselves, to serve their wishes exclusively. Maintaining this situation for a long time endangers our balance and our health, and that is why we recommend a change of focus for this inertia.

How to learn to prioritize in 4 steps

• Time. People who have stopped prioritizing have automated the word “yes.” Before any demand, the magic word is enunciated as a result impossible to control. It is necessary to curb this impulse; Therefore, when someone asks us, suggests or sends us something, what we recommend, first of all, is to keep silence. We will avoid giving an immediate response to reflect for a few minutes and honestly assess whether or not we want to do what they ask us to do. Let’s learn to say “NO” .
• Perspective. To learn to take care of ourselves, to serve ourselves, it is necessary to manage the distance – widening or shortening it – with everything that surrounds us. There comes a time when the person automates the need to “do, do, do” so much that perspective is lost. In this sense, saying “I don’t want to, I can’t, today I prioritize myself” is not the end of the world.

• Auxiliary phrases. It never hurts to have a small collection of phrases that can help us at certain times to protect our own needs, identity or personal time. “I’m sorry, but right now what you ask me is not going well”, “I appreciate that you have thought of me for that, but I am going to dedicate time”, “At this moment I do not feel like doing what you ask, I need to be with me ”.
• Stop certain conversations. We all know how those conversations begin that ultimately end with a lawsuit. Those flourishes conversations where the entertainment culminates with the proposal and where it is often taken for granted that we are going to fulfill it. Since we are already more than trained in these strategies, we therefore learn to stop them as soon as possible. We will avoid exhaustion and practice assertiveness.

To conclude, these 4 steps are not learned overnight. If we put the will and make the firm decision to take better care of ourselves and understand that prioritizing ourselves is actually a disinterested, necessary and vital act, day by day we will be more effective in these strategies: maintaining care for the other, but also for ourselves.