Remember that one time you were on the verge of tears but couldn’t cry because your best friend was having a mental breakdown of her own? Remember that one time you were pressured to give up an extra night of studying for an important exam to go out and drink one too many beers for someone’s birthday celebration? Or that time you wanted to stay in, curl up with a fuzzy blanket and read a nice book but couldn’t because you were expected to be at work in 5 minutes or meet with a group for a class project. It seems that life tends to get in our way when we want to take one day, night or hour for ourselves. We constantly put everyone and everything before ourselves because we’re too good, too caring or too nice to say, “No.”
When we remember to take care of others, we forget to take care of ourselves.
Now, I’m not saying that you should push all your friends and family members to the back burner. I’m saying that it’s OK to keep them on the front burner and let them simmer. Your friends and family members live lives alongside the one you live; you all coexist in this mess of a world. If you tend to others’ needs repeatedly without tending to your own, your needs will be forgotten and, with time, will burn. I’m no artist, or else I would paint a picture of this lovely stove metaphor. Just hear me out.
You come before your friends. You come before your family. Friends and family come second—always. How do you expect to console your best friend if you can’t find the time to take care of your own problems first? It’s OK to be selfish when it comes to yourself because you can’t possibly take care of others if you don’t take care of yourself first. You are the most important person in your life. Say it with me: I am the most important person in my life. Not your boyfriend, girlfriend, dog, second cousin twice removed—no one.
Sometimes you need to take a day for yourself. Literally lock yourself in your room, turn off your cellphone and do things for yourself. Whether it be reading that book, painting a picture, binge-watching your favorite Netflix show or doing homework and studying, at least you’re doing it for yourself. No one told you to do those things. You chose to do them because you probably thought to yourself, “Hm, I need to do something for me.”
If your friends invite you to go out one night and you simply don’t want to, lie to them. Tell them you’re not feeling well. Tell them you need to wake up early the next morning for… something important. Fake a cough. (Or, if you don’t want to lie, just tell them you don’t want to go out because you don’t want to go out—I guess that would be the right thing to do.) You probably get my point by now, so I won’t hammer it out too much more.
The point of my rambling: Be selfish sometimes. Focus on your own mental health before you busy yourself with taking care of others. Remember, your friends and family are simmering on the burner beside you. Tend to them occasionally, but tend to yourself always.
