By Jamie Milne, Multi-World Record Holder
It’s never the load that breaks us down, it’s the way we carry it.
I learnt that the hard way, training for the S.A.S Selection course as a Navy Man trying to be an Elite Army solider.
Which has been metaphoric for my relationship with Self Care.
Self-care is a very unbeautiful thing.
It’s making a spreadsheet of debts, enforcing a morning routine, healthy meals, no longer running from problems rather facing them, and finding solutions.
It’s often doing the ugliest thing that you have to do, telling a toxic friend you don’t want to see them anymore, getting another job so you can have savings or figuring out a way to accept yourself so that you’re not constantly exhausted from trying to be everything for everyone.
It’s taking deliberate breaks from living to do basic things like stretching, walking, meditation, or turning the phone off.
It’s not the load that breaks us down it’s how we carry it.
In a world in which self-care is a trendy topic is a world maladaptive.
Self-care isn’t something we resort to because we are exhausted and need reprieve from our own choices and lives.
True self-care is building a life not needed to escape from.
Personally I’ve found I no longer use my hectic busy life as justification for self-sabotage in the form of beer and procrastination.
It’s learning how to stop trying to “fix yourself” and start trying to take care of yourself.
Maybe finding that taking care of one’s self attends to a lot of the problems you were trying to fix in the first place.
Its no longer choosing a life that looks good over a life that feels good.
Self-care can be pausing, breathing, stillness, chocolate cake, pizza every now and then enjoying life, not escaping from it.
