Self-care vs self-indulgence: when does wellness turn insufferable?
I’ve watched many people including myself go on various health kicks. These are typically filled with far and few between sparks of so called ‘motivation’ that last for short periods with strict rules that are bound to make you uncomfortable. Being a student, struggling with exams revision and then the pressure to look your like your ‘best-self’ what really is the perfect balance of comfort and challenge to orchestrate the best version of yourself?
Self care is truly subjective. What the media says is that you have to comply to certain ‘rules’ to look young and attractive for as long as possible when in reality SELF care is prolonging your contentment and longevity for happiness; feeling free on the journey to fulfilling this idea of self love. If your ‘self care’ is strenuous and/or stressful, you’re doing it wrong. And most likely aren’t doing it for your own benefit but rather for the approval of others. We all crave validation in small doses. Usually so small that we aren’t even aware we do it half the time.
I’m going to tell you a secret, The key to the glowiest skin, your dream body and obtaining the highest version of yourself is: authentic practice. If you’re living for others, following their habits; acting in their manner, you’re transforming into what’s best for them instead what’s truly for you. Resulting incidentally in letting your true self (in theory) rot inside you. The glowiest girls follow their own incentive, make their own narrative and lead their own life in the way that they themselves thrive in being. I can tell you that the key to your healthiest highest self isn’t some probiotic gummies on TikTok shop. It’s about building your perfect authentic practice through the art of micro habits. I have typically thought of myself to be on the journey of authenticity for a long time, finding my own ‘niche’ so to say. But then I instantly get humbled in a social situation where my subconscious radars and on alert for the mission of being ‘liked.’ It’s very normal and common to fall back to this.
Despite a quest for individuality, its also important to note that there is always going to be a group in your niche that relate and correspond in the same way you do. Maybe someone a bit older that you can learn from. Maybe an influencer who has your same morality and ideologies. Maybe a friend has the same gut health issues as you and you help each other find the best source of nutrition, there can be multiple. Think of it all as being in an orchard and picking off different kinds of fruit from different trees and bushes. Your basket will then be filled with fruits in a slightly different pattern to the person picking before you, and after you. self care isn’t at all a one size fits all theory and what’s trending isn’t necessarily what’s right.
Let’s face it, we don’t always do what’s best for ourselves. We sometimes eat pure crap, we go out, drink, smoke but here is where the debate comes in. How much of self care do we need in ratio to our self enjoyment?
To care about yourself is to truly love yourself enough you know to deserve the best. Like how a parent loves their child and wants to protect and nurture them so that they in turn help mould their child into the best person they can be. I’ve watched people -including myself- self sabotage this as I feel we accept what we believe we deserve from life and often that is in low quality. But being too strict with your progress and health can at times make you long for the non-planning, indulging side of your brain causing you to fall back into bad habits. You have to actively nurture yourself.
This is where you have to turn to yourself for analysis. You have the world telling you cardio’s good and so is weight training as well as drinking celery juice for breakfast. Self care is trial and error. What is good for YOU and what makes you happy? We will enjoy one sport more sports than others so why repeat what you hate when there is a better form for you. Most have heard of the 80/20 diet for a reason. The reason being is that it’s successful. I think 80/20 should be implemented with not just foods. We are not perfection. The imperfect parts of us should have a place to rest while you dominate that with your discipline and hard work. You should want to work hard for yourself because you deserve what you don’t possess currently.
Balance isn’t talked about often. Yet it’s the key to success. When you’re feeling burnt out, instead of saying ‘oh shit I’m burnt out’ and letting that cycle repeat, stop and reflect each day on what is imbalanced in your life; causing negative emotions and stress. Breakdowns and bad days are never a result of one singular problem. It’s buildup. As a society we have been told to wait until crisis before it’s recognised a problem. We call the police after the victim got stabbed up in the street. We wait until the breakdown turns into irreversible thoughts and mental health issues before we report them. This is simply how our systems are structured but what if we all managed ourselves and were taught how to do so? In order to not or rarely reach those points of crisis ever again. There are always signs killers are killers before they kill. There are also signs that people are at a point of breakdown before the breakdown has a chance to lift its head up to the surface. We are only as flawed as the systems put in place for us are.
How do we fix this? we have never been taught to identify it so we simply walk blindly through life waiting for chaos to erupt. We fix it by teaching ourselves in the hopes that one day the systems in society will wake up and ‘smell the coffee.’
There’s no use in talking in metaphors any longer. This is how I manage it as a type A person who diagrams her whole life because she’s interested in learning about her negative patterns, behaviours as well as mentality that no one taught her either:
Early example of something I created that links to the explained format
I have split my entire life into 7 categories to insure that I am self aware of my overall progress when growing. This can seem extremely high maintenance. I can however assure you that this works as you can figure out where your natural imbalances are and how to get yourself back on track to being the most all-rounded, happiest version of yourself that Is easy enough to maintain regularly. The 7 categories are:
MY BALANCE:
Engravement
Physical
Mental
Social
Spiritual
Emotional
Working on
These are then filled with subcategories that are graded on my own personal opinion and progress dependant on how I feel towards them. I then give myself an overall percentage on how fulfilled I feel in each category and then finally reflect on what i should be working on/towards.
ENGRAVEMENT:
The word Engravement technically doesn’t exist as a word. However, I felt it was fitting enough to name this category. I would call it a ‘Katie’ word as well as the word ‘INNOVATIST’ that is completely made up. Anyways, ENGRAVEMENT is all about what’s had a lasting impact on the patterns and cycles in your brain. Whether that’s childhood trauma, a massive event, friends, family, a tv show you watched when you were young. What is installed into the deepest parts of your brain to make you act the way you act? This is arguably the most important thing to analyse as these patterns turn into subconscious cycles that will then lead you towards decisions you make in the future. By capturing your Engravement you can make a positive influence on your brain patterns and your default cognitive function.
Engravement is split up into six subcategories:
Self care
Fight or flight
Bad habits
Good habits
Bad patterns
Good patters
In reality, you can change any category to fit your needs but this is what i like to base myself on.
Self care: Is rated on how loved I feel by myself. Am I putting in the work towards building up an improved version of myself who is healthy strong and taken care of?
Fight or flight: Is rated on how safe I’m feeling in day-to-day life. How comfortable do I feel in my everyday settings am I constantly fearful and attempting to escape situations in-turn, filling myself with anxiety? (If you want to learn more about fight or flight there are many articles including this subject dotted around the internet that give you a better insight on how this idea reflects your nervous system)
Bad Habits: Little things I do often that can build up and catch me off guard and that contribute to harming my mental health. For example, checking social media too often to see if something bad has happened.
Good Habits: Little things I do- similar to micro habits- that build up to create a positive outcome, yoga every other day, drinking more water etc.
Bad patterns: Larger issues that have accumulated in my brain to create subconscious and continuous negativity. For example: going for overly controlling men because that’s the pattern you’ve been exposed to.
Good patterns: It’s harder to creative this but good patterns combat the negative patterns that have been set in place. Often used to override the bad patterns in your life. Some are lucky enough to have instilled good and healthy patterns subconsciously into their system without having to fight for it. For example: your parents being in a happy loving relationship changes and makes a positive outlook on your future relationships.
You can see for this category its split evenly into positive and negative impacts which is also important in contributing to your final conclusion of how strong you feel in this category.
PHYSICAL:
Physical is more of an obvious reflection as it’s active. It counts for anything your actively doing to contribute for your bodies function.
Physical is split into three subcategories:
Fitness
Food relationship
Energy
Fitness: Working out, cardio general training, heart health, natural body state.
Food relationship: Are you eating a balance diet with nutrients as well as enjoyment? Is your diet healthy, neutral or more disordered?
Energy: Sleeping patterns. Am I getting 8 hours of sleep? when am I crashing in the day if at all. How active am I?
MENTAL:
Mental health is obviously all about the mind. It’s different from engravment as it’s what is outwardly happening as a result of your mindset rather than the inner workings that cause it. It includes the logical structure of the mind.
Mental is split into four subcategories:
Academics
Logic
Motivation
Drive
Academics: School up-keep; revision as logging this minimises stress.
Logic: Logic can be identified through common sense which consists of the basic social constructs and knowledge that can be built from worldly experience, reading, writing, education and learning in general.
Motivation: What is your end goal? What do you wanna achieve? Why did you decide to start something in the first place?
Drive: Different from motivation as it’s more of an incentive to boost short time commitment to your goals so you create consistent change.
SOCIAL:
This represents people management and the idea of stepping out of certain comfort zones or finding your types of people by doing so.
Social is split into three subcategories:
Social
Serenity
Media
Social: How are you with other people? Are you comfortable in your social spaces? Are you a good friend? Do you have good friends in your circle?
Serenity: Do you feel like you’re around the right people? Are you inspired whilst being comfortable in your space? Do you feel you are losing yourself for other people?
Media: Do you feel over invested in social media to the point where you don’t really have your own opinion? Are you able to spend time away from the media?
SPIRITUAL:
This is believing in something bigger than yourself. I think this helps keep you as a human grounded. We should always strive to minimise ego and look towards a higher power. Some people use god, traditional religion, energy healing, science, even things like the gym or being in nature, reading consists of something like a higher source of power.
Spiritual is split into five subcategories:
Gratitude
Self love
Support
Belief
Higher self
Gratitude: Appreciating the space and time you’re currently in, being thankful for the moment and being thankful for what you currently posses instead of thinking about what you strive to posses.
Self love: How much you invest into yourself. Being able to be a foundation for yourself that pours out confidence because you know exactly who you are and who you’re meant to be so that your untouchable to others.
Support: Who are the people in your life who fill you up? Who loves you unconditionally? And who do you love and gravitate towards? Are people serving you in the way that they need to be so you can be the best self possible?
Belief: What/Who do you have trust in that gives you peace? What are you willing to invest your time in? Are these things healthy?
Highest Self: The END END goal, your highest potential. Who are they? What do they do, look like and behave like? Are you moving towards them or getting further away? What do you truly want?
EMOTIONAL:
The outburst of what happens on the inside. What happens after all the buildup.
Emotional is split into three subcategories:
Fear and anxiety
Overflow
Inner monologue
Fear and anxiety: What causes you long-term stress. Self reflection on what scares you enough to create build-up. Is it looming exams? People?
Overflow: What’s causing the buildup? How can you manage this stress? Is there anything you can actively control and if not maybe its time to let go and let be?
Inner monologue: Arguably the most important. What is your self talk like? Our thoughts make up your whole perspective so why not channel it into positivity?
WORKING ON:
Now that everything is categorised and reflected on… I like to percentage everything and then create an average. I then interpret that into what percentages I want to raise and lower. For example if my overflow is 90% and it’s causing me to be constantly overwhelmed, that may link with my low sleep percentage. Most of these categories interlink with each other, like a big jigsaw puzzle. The big task is then working to stabilise these levels rather than eliminating them altogether as that’s simply not realistic. At the end of the day it’s all about stability and maintaining your self in order to grow and heal. I write what I’m working towards from these categories as a visual reminder of my short term goals.
The big conclusion is simply that balance is the key to maintaining your peace and stability. It’s not necessarily about living super rigidly and never allowing yourself enjoyment or the occasional McDonald’s after a rager. It’s about when you do these things how do we get your percentages back to stability so that you don’t undergo continuous breakdowns.
