I regularly encourage my clients to be more selfish. Some of them react strongly the first time because their gut reaction — especially if they grew up in a religious home — is along the lines of, "But isn't selfishness bad?"
Selfishness can be healthy or unhealthy. When you practise healthy selfishness, you can show up better and more fully more often for the people closest to you.
Unhealthy selfishness
Unhealthy selfishness keeps you stuck and sacrificing for other people. It often feels easier spending time and energy on other people, even if it runs you dry trying to keep them happy.
But even if you work yourself to exhaustion for others, it is still selfishness. Why do I say that? Because it is really still about you.
You don't want to feel guilty
You don't want to disappoint them
You don't want to deal with the backlash
You want to look good
You want to be appreciated
When you run yourself into the ground for other people it costs you — and the people closest to you — a massive amount.
What happens if you take the same amount of energy you spend trying to keep people happy and focus it on what you actually want? You will show up as the person that you want to be more often. You will become a person who is able to take big steps towards your big dream.
You can't become that person if you are constantly expending your energy on everyone else.
Healthy selfishness
Healthy selfishness means focusing on your true wants and needs and structuring your life in a way that you can achieve them.
Healthy selfishness means that you invest in becoming who you want to be and going after what you want.
And when you get what you want, when you become who you want to be, everyone around you benefits.
The people in your life deserve that you focus on what you actually want.
CONSIDER / TAKE ACTION
Where are you burning energy trying to keep people happy? What is one step you can take regularly to practice healthy selfishness?
Not sure how to escape your unhealthy selfishness or build patterns of healthy selfishness?
Join the Clarity Quest, my couples program or my next workshop!