There’s so much pressure on all of us to be perfect. Especially as women, we tend to overextend ourselves to make everyone around us happy. As a result, we often neglect ourselves. However, there’s never a bad time to make a change. Healthy selfishness could be the key to transforming your life for the better. Here’s everything you need to know about it.
What is healthy selfishness?
It’s pretty much exactly what it sounds like. While selfishness gets a bad rap, if done mindfully, it can actually be healing, energizing, and like rocket fuel for your relationships. Healthy selfishness means not always disregarding your own needs and desires and putting others first all the time. It means realizing that you matter too, and honoring that in the way you live. It means honoring yourself by making decisions that nurture and uplift you and make you feel supported and fulfilled.
However, this concept isn’t just about the way you treat yourself. Healthy selfishness is also about the way other people treat you. It means not allowing people to walk all over you or cross your boundaries. Additionally, it means demanding respect when it comes to the decisions you make and the way you live.
Why is selfishness not always a bad thing?
There’s nothing glamorous or noble about disregarding your own needs and desires to make other people happy. People-pleasing leads to low self-esteem, a fear of rejection, crippling indecision, and depression and anxiety, just to name a few negative side effects. Self-sacrifice not only harms your mental and emotional well-being, but it will also ultimately have a negative effect on your relationship with others.
“You need selfishness in order to be selfless. There’s a reason why we say, You can’t pour from an empty cup–too much of one thing is never a good thing,” explains Tracy Vadakumchery, LMHC. “When you are taken care of, the quality of the care, attentiveness, and time you give to others is better too. When you’re overworked, burned out, or fatigued from giving too much, you’re not able to give other people your full, undivided attention. Think of it like the yin and yang.”
How you can practice healthy selfishness in your own life
1. Take your needs into account too.
If you’re a natural people-pleaser, it’s tempting to ignore what you want and need to make sure everyone else in your life is cared for. That works fine for a while, but it will ultimately backfire when you realize you’re feeling drained, exhausted, and totally neglected. Practice healthy selfishness by considering what you need and honoring that. Compromise is healthy at times, but not always.
2. Don’t overextend yourself.
Doing things you don’t want to do and lack the mental or emotional bandwidth for has to stop. The people who care about you wouldn’t want you to run yourself into the ground. They probably wouldn’t even ask if they knew you were struggling. It’s okay to say that you’re overwhelmed or simply need to tap out. If people don’t understand, that’s on them.
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4. Be brave about saying “no.”
Similar to the above, don’t be afraid to say no. This might come as a surprise to people who are used to you acquiescing to their every whim, but oh well. It’s important that you feel empowered to say no. You don’t need to justify or explain it. If something asks something of you that doesn’t feel right, that you don’t have time for, or that you simply don’t want to do, say no. It’s one of the most radical forms of healthy selfishness out there. It’s life-changing.
5. Offer yourself compassion and grace.
You’re a human being. As such, you’re going to make mistakes. You’ll have times when you royally screw things up and you’re kicking yourself for making silly mistakes. Instead of berating yourself, give yourself grace. Forgive yourself. Recognize that messing up is how you grow and evolve. Mistakes are opportunities. Use them as such.
6. Prioritize self-care.
Self-care is often discussed, but not all of us give it enough attention or put it into practice. However, it’s a vital part of healthy selfishness. “This can include things like making sure to get enough sleep, exercising regularly, and eating a healthy diet,” therapist Jason Tuma, MA, LCMHCA, tells Bolde. “It can also involve setting boundaries with others and making sure that you are not overextending yourself in order to meet their needs at the expense of your own.”
Potential pitfalls to look out for
Practicing healthy selfishness won’t necessarily go over well with people who usually demand a lot of your time and energy. However, that doesn’t mean you should stop focusing inward. “Something to keep in mind when practicing healthy selfishness is to identify what is healthy guilt and what is toxic guilt,” Vadakumchery says. “Healthy guilt is when your decisions are based on your values, benefit you, and the accountability feels good. Toxic guilt is when your decisions are based on someone else’s values, withdraw from your well-being, and feel like a burden. The best way to differentiate between the two is to ask yourself, Am I directly hurting anyone by doing this? Am I being coerced into doing this, or is this something I need to do for myself? Ask yourself these questions when making a big decision.”
In addition, you should still consider how the things you say and do affect the people around you. Your needs matter, but that doesn’t mean no one else’s does. You should still be compassionate and empathetic. “While making efforts to practice healthy selfishness, it’s important to try not to conflate prioritizing yourself and attempting to develop healthier self-compassion with simply doing whatever you want irrespective of the impact it may have on others,” says Saba Harouni Lurie, LMFT, ATR-BC. “When healthy selfishness is not practiced mindfully, one could easily start to neglect or disregard the needs of others.”
When done thoughtfully, healthy selfishness can improve your personal life as well as your relationships with others.
