Why We All Need Radical Self-Care in the New Year
It’s the time of year when we are about to be inundated with messages where there’s something about us we need to change, to alter, or to lose in order to gain. That we are blemished, unworthy and need to be molded into something better through diet plans, juice fasts and daily gym sessions.
None of that’s true, but there is a truth in the idea behind commercial “self-care” trends.
That is: Fill your own cup first.
We’ve all heard it, tried to live by it, and maybe embraced the idea of it.
Self care is maybe something that we could do or try to do or make an effort toward once in a while, when we have more time. That idea is the one that embraces the occasional spa day or a sheet mask, time in nature or solitude, or maybe the self care is in connecting with others.
We’re supposed to eat right and exercise, caretake for others, care for ourselves, our businesses and our images, our careers, our vision.
We often mistake our basic self care needs for a luxury reserved for a better version of ourselves. And we also think that we need extra money or time or something that we don’t have right now to allow ourselves that reward.
We deserve that now.
In this moment, in every moment, we deserve to honor ourselves. The plain fact is that we keep ourselves too busy to care for ourselves and wear the burden of the hustle like a battered badge.
We don’t have to buy anything or do anything extra to care deeply for ourselves. Certainly we don’t need to alter our physical bodies to feel better about showing up in the world. We all belong here.
But still, even when we recognize all of it, we will start some sort of regime to temporarily avoid the discomfort and we then realize that balance isn’t sustainable.
Next, we hit overwhelm and burnout, where the excitement and the ease come to an end and everything feels like an obligation again. Basic care of our physical self isn’t a luxury and it’s definitely not a reward. We need to eliminate the hustle culture in 2021. If this year has taught us anything, its how to slow down. And it’s my opinion that we need to embrace that collectively as we reshape our public lives.
We’ve all been there.
Everyone has moments or even seasons where we are at odds with ourselves, feeling trapped, uncertain, uninspired and flat. We’ve stopped doing these basic things to maintain ourselves and know ‘we should start doing x again,’ but there’s always something that comes first. Many of us have a tendency to live in an entirely destructive mode of hypercriticism. Even when we’re doing right by ourselves, there still exists that subtle pull of ‘when this happens, I will feel x, and all will be right again.’
We are collectively way too hard on ourselves.
To put it simply, this state of overwhelm and burnout is the shift that happens when we aren’t able to make the effort to appreciate the present version of ourselves.
Consider this idea: We are here to love the best version of ourselves into existence while giving grace to the person that exists imperfectly, yet whole and fully complete, right now.
Enter Radical Self Care
Radical self care is the bold idea that we care for ourselves first.
It’s realizing we are the main character in the story of our lives, and embracing that responsibility with honesty and grace. And compassion when we hit that wall. But instead of just going back to that cycle of pressure to just workout and eat better, we look deeper.
Radical self care is having the audacity to align our actions with our genuine purpose and fill our needs first without shame or guilt or feeling selfish any of the host of emotions that come up when we think about ourselves first. We give ourselves the opportunity to create new patterns that embody our commitment to that future self, while honoring and giving grace to the person that we are in present moment, even the eviscerating ones.
Radical self care goes far beyond self love, beyond caring for the physical, emotional and even the spiritual body. With radical self-care, we give ourselves permission to radically, transformationally embody a deep reverence for the part of us that shows up even when everything feels impossible.
Radically caring for the self is asking the hard questions of ourselves while gently and honestly molding the answers into a set of behaviors that honor the wisdom we’ve collected through them.
