Messaging
there's this thing that happens in most of my social media circles - mostly female, and very much of the 'you go girl' variety.
themes i see:
- if you survived today, you did just fine
- do whatever you need to do to take care of you
- nothing is particularly vital, kids will recover, dishes will still be there, as will laundry. it's okay to ignore stuff.
but what this doesn't address is that there is not always time for that. especially if you have anyone else with any reliance on you. job, family, pet, whatever. the dog does not magically decide that me sitting on the sofa is the best thing for my mental health. he whines and gets annoyed because he still has his own needs. work does not ignore if i go offline in the middle of the day for a 30 minute meditation and 60 minute bath. i have responsibilities.
it's starting to feel delusional how much i see this 'you are the most important thing' narrative. mostly because i understand that to not be true. and i think it feeds into this self-worth issue that i'm NOT doing enough to take care of myself because i DIDN'T just survive today, i emptied the dishwasher and balanced a budget and onboarded two new employees and ran a meeting and built a presentation deck and made breakfast and lunch and thought about dinner so i could defrost things and yes, i will still take the dog for a walk today.
i want to change the narrative. you get one of those 'survival above all' days a month or something. beyond that... yeah, i need to step up.