Self-Care Isn’t Just About You

Care for yourself so you CAN care for others.

My wife told me a story one time about a senior leader in her organization who decided to retire. My wife asked him what the most important lesson was that he learned after working there for 35+ years.

His response: “Take time for yourself and your family. When I’m on my deathbed, I’m not gonna be thinking to myself, ‘Damn, if I had only spent more time at work.’ No, what I’ll be wishing to myself is how I should’ve spent more time with the people in my life that matter.”

Spending time with the people that matter in your life is important and certainly should be a priority, but that’s not what I want to highlight here.

The takeaway that I got was if you want to prioritize people in your life, start with yourself.

Self-Care Isn’t Selfish

For every degree of health (mental, physical, emotional, spiritual) that diminishes, so too does your ability to provide for the people who depend on you for the same. This means that in the context of a *healthy relationship, those peoples’ health is directly proportionate to yours.

*keyword is “healthy” here, because there are plenty of couples out there who would probably do better on their own.

Now of course this begs the question, “how much emotional support (for example) is enough?” because you don’t want to cross the line into co-dependency. The answer is, it depends. What’s important here is to communicate with your partner what that support requirement is and how much.

Anyway, for all your visual types, here’s the relationship between the status of your health to your ability to provide (which I call Providership) and the level of support your loved ones receive:

Of course, there are disabilities and individual health conditions to consider, too, so the above labels are relative to you. Anyway, let’s briefly qualify these terms. This is by no means a medical assessment or health benchmark of any kind but rather a few quick thoughts. You may disagree with these and that’s fine, I’m just highlighting my definitions, so you know my mental point of reference on the graph.

Every month I’ll post one full article for free. If you’d like to receive full article access which includes a podcast narration and journal prompts, please consider becoming a paid member.

Healthy - Top End

• Physical. You can pick shit up and put it down. You can move from point A to point B at a light jog and not gasp for air. You can move freely with uninhibited mobility and don’t dread standing up or tying your shoes.

• Mental. You’re nice to yourself. In other words, there’s no negative self-talk that goes on between your ears when things don’t go your way. You don’t get down on yourself or others but instead get curious and introspective.

• Emotional. You’re comfortable voicing your feelings and concerns while being self-aware enough to know how they’re being received. If they’re not received the way you intended, you do some self-analysis as to why. When negative emotions do come in, you don’t avoid or suppress them but rather face them head on.

Healthy - Lower End

• Physical. Your only physical activity is when you get off the couch to get another beer so you have something to wash down that donut with. There is no intention to start any kind of physical activity or healthy way of eating as long as you remain upright.

• Mental. Negative thought patterns keep you in a self-defeating spiral. You’re constantly looking for things that are “wrong” or how things aren’t good enough (different than wanting to improve). The silent warrior sneaks in and destroys your confidence, and you listen. You get mired in the alternative reality of “what should be” or “should’ve been” because you refuse to accept what is in the present.

• Emotional. You have tantrums reminiscent of a five-year-old because your emotional maturity never developed. You let people or events easily irritate you because you never developed the coping skills to deal with difficult emotions. If you’re a man, you tend to ignore emotions because talking about them or processing them is for the “weak.” But this is akin to being a warfighter, not a warrior.

Providership. This refers to the capacity—not just capability—to support yourself and/or others indefinitely—not just in the near term. So, if you were to sustain your health where it is right now—i.e., not change anything—would it allow you to still be around in 10, 15, or 20 years to support those you depend on you?

The last point I want to emphasize regarding providership is that health is not just a physical component. If you go back and assess the above through an emotional lens, ask yourself similar questions:

Are my emotional habits sustainable? How do my emotional responses serve me? Serve others? What excuses am I making for myself that perpetuate the status quo?

The question becomes, what happens to the people who rely on you if you can’t provide for them? This is the same philosophy I hold toward teaching Martial Blade Concepts. Every human being has a right and an obligation to defend him/herself and their neighbor—as long as that neighbor isn’t an asshole (kidding ;)—because that little old lady who’s about to have her purse taken or that little boy who’s about to be scooped up by a stranger, can’t. That’s where you come in.

We care for ourselves so we can care for others.

Examples of Self-Care:

• Meditation. The benefits of meditation are beyond the scope of this article, but there’s plenty of research that indicates how effective meditation is at reducing stress and improving overall mental health.

• Exercise. Dr. John Ratey, associate clinical professor at Harvard, highlights in his book Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain how exercise is more effective than SSRIs in treating anxiety and depression and it reverses the effects.

• Music. Playing a musical instrument has been shown to lower blood pressure and reduce stress, which subsequently leads to lowered anxiety and depression.

• Journaling. Journaling is a way to open the lid of the pot of boiling emotions and let it air out. One study found journaling to lower anxiety, depression, hostility, and psychological distress. Moreover, people who journal have been shown to have fewer doctor visits and reduced symptoms of chronic disease, such as asthma and arthritis.

• Breathing. I can’t emphasize intentional breathing enough. Tons of studies show the positive benefits on not just mental health but physical health when it comes to breathing.

• Stretching/Mobility Training. While stretching and mobility are not the same, the emphasis here is to be able to move comfortably when you want to. If you have limited range of motion, then the mere thought of movement becomes a chore and that’s not good.

Other examples of self-care include:

• Cooking

• Painting

• Writing

• Yoga

• Reading

Self-care isn’t selfish, and taking care of other people isn’t an excuse to avoid self-care. You can’t take care of other people effectively if you don’t take care of yourself.

Self Care Journal Prompts

What will I start today?

What self-care practice would elevate my life? How?

What’s holding me back from starting?

What gets in my way of practicing self-care consistently? How much of this is self-imposed? What’s really behind that reluctance?