A few years ago, I got sick with mono and gallstones at the same time I was trying to finish my undergrad degree, recruit for a job and figure out what I was going to do with my life after graduation. It was a deathly combination all at once. Although it wasn’t fun, I did deal with it all and move on. One upside: I have some hilarious stories of attempting to stay awake during inopportune moments to fall asleep!
More than a year later, after moving to Toronto for a job opportunity, I began suffering from homesickness and job-related stress. I wasn’t happy, but, thanks to a few good friends and the support of my family, within the year I found a solution and relocated to Nova Scotia to be closer to family and to seek out a new career path.
We all have unique periods of ups and downs in our lives – stress, family issues, deaths, births, moving, job changes, personal relationships. And, we all deal with these different stresses differently.
While we all deal differently, one commonality is that the most fundamental relationship we each have throughout our lives is the relationship we have with ourselves.
So, if you ain’t happy, you’d better fix it. I believe the solution always starts with you.
When I was in Toronto, trying to figure out how to fix the situation I was in, I had a conversation with a near and dear friend of mine. We no longer live close by each other, so we stay in touch on the phone. She’s in social work, a far cry from the business world I live in day to day and one day on the phone she mentioned the concept of “self care.” I didn’t really know what she meant, but after we hashed it out on the phone (à la therapist) it was much more clear to me that each of us owes it to ourselves to care well for ourselves.
So figure out what gets you up when you’re down! For me, I’ve come to know it’s a mix of yoga classes, massage, or downtime with the people that matter. Sometimes I just need a night in on the couch with a bag of chips and a chick flick. Other people need different things; we all have different ways of taking care of ourselves and feeling good.
And in this month of luuuuve we not only need to care for ourselves, but we need to learn to love ourselves more.
Somewhere between mono/gallstones/Toronto I slowly learned what it means to care for yourself, and most importantly, how to love yourself. Once I chose to move, change careers and cared more about what I wanted and needed, I became a much happier person.
So for better or worse, Generation-y shows signs of understanding why it’s important to be cautiously self-centered, some of the time. We all should know our own pain points, our strengths and weaknesses, and most of all we need to understand how to love ourselves.
Loving yourself doesn’t mean becoming a narcissist. It means knowing who you are, and being both proud and comfortable with who you are.
Because if you don’t love yourself, you can’t and wont love another person with the real love you both deserve.
