The Duality of Self-Care and Responsibility

I turned 25 a few weeks ago and it’s still new, but aging can put some things in perspective. Not in a “mid-life crisis” kind of way, but more so in a “Yeah, I’m meant to be here” way. Adulting has served me some severe mollywops and while I’m currently on the other side, hindsight is 20/20. I also know that there has been and will always be wins and gains (all sizes included), necessary of observation in order to accurately describe the entire journey.

In posts about self-care and mental health awareness it is extremely important to me to come from a place of truth and at least some kind of lived experience, otherwise I’d be fabricating.

The truth of this year, so far? Self-care isn’t an excuse to drop the ball. It’s the recognition that by not putting systems in place to help you succeed, you forgo self-care and will therefore inevitably come up short. It is my responsibility to take care of my self in tangible and consistent ways and this means there is a duality between self-care and responsibility. With this being said, I’ve come to a few conclusions:

• Self-Care includes Time Management

• Self-Care includes Setting Boundaries

• Self-Care includes Extending grace while being grounded in reality

Stating these hypotheses doesn’t make them absolute nor does it mean I’ve mastered them, because I haven’t. It simply serves as a way for me to share my current journeys in a concise format while also continuing to test them.

Let’s expound. In some contexts “I” is synonymous for you/we.

Self-Care includes Time Management

The key element I’m taking from this observation is discipline. Whew! That has been a word I’ve struggled with for so long and quite frankly, I still do. I spend so much time critiquing the idea of conditioning to conform because it feels like a glass ceiling.

My current view is that the success I seek to attain is measured by results/evidence of the work. This usually lets me know if I’ve used my time wisely and also reminds me of the times where I should have made a more productive choice. Yes, sometimes we deviate, but if that’s my default it’s actually called procrastinating. And seeing as how procrastination can be an indication of a deeper rooted unsolved issue that means I’ve got work to do to unpack it if my desire is to do better.

Once I get better at managing my own time then I am clearer on how my time is allocated with people and by extension, institutions. This brings me to observation two.

Self-Care includes Setting Boundaries

I’ve written about boundaries before, but essentially the next step after taking responsibility for your time management skills is no longer engaging in things or surrounding yourself with people that don’t encourage that level of productivity. Be mindful of becoming an elitist (that’s not the goal), but instead focus on having strong and consistent control of yourself. This requires being firm (even with yourself), commitment, and a routine so you an attract to you what belongs.

Self-Care includes Extending grace while being grounded in reality

Now Samantha! After all of that prioritizing, cutting people off, and setting boundaries you’re saying to extend grace? How does that work together?

Remember, in the beginning of this post I mentioned duality. It’s the level at which two opposing forces meet and coexist in some sort of harmony, creating an existence considered an alternate. An alternate deviates from “the norm” and introduces “the imagined”, which is way more colorful than just black, white, or gray.

So while mastering time management and sticking to the boundaries you set you must extend grace to yourself and to others. To yourself first and foremost because you’re trying to do/be better and habits are hard to break. Not impossible but they take work, and if you were already great at it you wouldn’t be working at it. So keep going with the understanding that you will make errors along the way to mastery. Just don’t stop.

Now once you extend this grace to yourself you can extend it to others, especially the ones working at respecting your boundaries. You’d understand that just as it’s taking you some time to settle into this new routine it might take some time for them to respond accordingly. The important thing is that, just like you, they shouldn’t stop.

This is where reality comes in. You know who is deserving of you in this vulnerable place and trust that it’s not everyone. Take the information people give you when they show their true selves and move forward. The hope is that one moves forward un-jaded, un-compromised, and at their core, still them. But we’re humans who learn best by error, so that level of mastery, although attainable, takes time. The greatest part about it? The most worthwhile things in life usually do.

I got this! You got this! We got this! The most valuable currency is time, so that my friends is the treasure worth digging for. The moment one realizes this and realigns is the moment we discover purpose and begin living.

It starts with me, you, us.