You create the journey in your map of life.

How often do you feel like you should be doing this? Or should be doing that? Do you find yourself in situations you really don’t want to be in and just there to appease others or because you feel like it is the right thing to do?

It’s time to change your perspective.

The right thing to do is to take care of you. That means giving yourself what you want and what you need. This may sound confusing and foreign. For many of us, we never lived like this. Myself included.

I lived for so long being the person everyone else wanted me to be. I thought that by saying yes to everything, it meant people would like me more and I could continue living in the pursuit of perfection. No one had to know the inner turmoil I was dealing with inside.

This resulted in anger and resentment. And this anger and resentment was directed at me. I was not being true to myself. I was not practicing self-care. I was neglecting my personal sanity and peace of mind to make sure everyone else liked me.

This didn’t get me far. It left me feeling spiritually and emotionally bankrupt. Self-care seemed like a foreign concept.

I was being selfish to myself. I was not giving myself the time or energy to be with me.

So here is why self-care is not the same as selfishness and why it is time to embrace self-care:

• You have an inner guide within you.

This guide is your intuition. It is your truth. It is the piece of us that we often neglect because we don’t believe it is good enough, strong enough, loveable enough. I am here to tell you that inner guide is more than enough! It is the most important relationship we have. Listen to it. Take care of you.

• You are responsible for yourself

Are you caught up in the mentality that other people, places, and things will make you happy? Maybe they will for a short period of time, but life is a marathon, not a sprint. You are responsible for your own happiness, your own sanity, your own love. You have all the power within you and take some time to nurture that power and love. Start taking care of you.

• “No” is a full sentence

This may sound strange or scary for some of us but it is okay to say no. It’s exhausting to say yes and commit to everything and everyone else. The only person you need to commit to is you. From there, you can leverage all the infinite goodness to the world around you. Saying no does not mean you are selfish. It means you are practicing self-love and respect. You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to do.

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Apprentice Editor: Ola Weber / Editor: Catherine Monkman

Photo: courtesy of Pixoto