Are We Conditioned to Not Care about Our Self-Care?

I have to be honest...the concept of self-care is sometimes a bit foreign to me.

As I gain more self awareness, I start to ask myself, why that is?

Why it doesn’t come-up for me often?

What I am starting to realize is that I have been conditioned to not care about my self-care

Let me explain:

There’s a Somali proverb that says “Nin lagu seexdow, has seexan”

This translates to – If there’s someone sleeping on you, don’t sleep.

In other words, if you have people depending on you, you can’t afford to sleep.

This proverb explains exactly how I feel about self-care

As a young single mother, I often was busy doing everything that I could to meet my children’s needs. there was not much left to think about self-care and my own needs

When I entered the workforce, I felt that I better make use of this opportunity! I better work my butt off to go above and beyond to show my boss that they weren’t wrong in giving me a chance.

And when I finally became the manager of my Centre, I had 20 bosses that I answered to. I considered everyone in my team as my boss. I felt that it was up to me to make sure they were happy. I was the go to person for all their issues at – I had that open door policy for real!

But the problem with that was that I felt their needs were always more urgent than mine.

I did that because I felt, I wanted to do a good job. Support my people the best way that I could and at all cost.

In the background tho, the story that was playing was, like me so that I can keep my job.

I felt if I talked about my needs, I wouldn’t be seen as a strong person. I would be dispensable.

Can a WOC afford to complain at work and run the risk of being seen LAZY! Or God forbid Difficult! Can you relate to this?

I felt so depleted at the end of the day, I had no energy left for my family and myself to enjoy life. I just came home and crashed! Only to repeat the same thing tomorrow.

And now, As an entrepreneur I find myself at times this mindset showing up in different ways.

The thing that I have to be mindful of is that If I don’t show-up for me and my needs, I can’t expect others to do it.

One mistake that I made as a parent is that I’ve always sheltered my children from the problems, struggles cause I wanted them to have worry free life.

But what I realize is that even your kids need to understand that you’re human and that you have needs.This is why it’s important to allow kids to understand your needs as a parent and your challenges without traumatizing them.

That helps them understand and appreciate you and have compassion and empathy for you.

As I become more aware of this, I realize that the mindset behind my thinking is the lack.

It’s the belief that my needs are not important. That I exist only to serve others

As you reflect on your feeling towards self-care, recognize what's coming up for you:

• Do you feel comfortable to say no when something feels too much for you?
• Do you feel like you need a strong reason to say no?
• Do you resistance resistance expressing your needs?
• Do you feel like you have to do it all by yourself?
• Is the Strong Black Woman Syndrome showing up for you?
• Are you unwilling to do fun things just for you?

Remember, just because you have responsibilities does not mean that you don’t have to practice self-care.

Self-care is a feeling that you matter, and that you’re a worthy of prioritizing your needs above all