Want to know what my brain considers selfish?
Making my iced coffee fun with different flavors and drinking it while sitting down. Washing my own laundry when there is laundry to be done for my husband and son. Buying organization supplies to get things organized around the house. Even working on this blog- which is my only passion project in life other than maybe binging YouTube mom life videos.
But really, none of that is inherently selfish. I’m just programmed to put everyone and everything higher up on the priority list and naturally, putting myself last. And I know I’m not the only one who does this as a mom.
Today during naptime I completed the last of the wall painting in my son’s future room. I’ll have to spend another two or so nap times doing the baseboards, trim, closet and doors. It’s not that I mind doing it but I was frustrated because I still didn’t get to the dishes and I had really wanted to go work on pulling the weeds in our backyard. My shower was treated as a “possibility” and I forgot to feed myself lunch.
While I painted, I listened to some episodes from one of my favorite podcasts, Organize 365. On a particular episode I listened to today the host Lisa talked about the concept of doing your best to declutter your whole house but not to get rid of anything related to your passion projects. This was something I’ve never heard before.
She talked about her daughter and all of her animal related items for guinea pigs, fish and more that they consciously kept because she loved having various pets over the years. I can think of practical examples of the passion projects of lots of people. My husband loves motorcycles, my grandpa loves all things geology, and one of my girlfriends is a wizard on her Cricut.
Just bringing up these hobbies/interests of others made me realize I don’t set aside any time for my own hobbies/interests. I’m so busy trying to be a good mom and wife and keep our household running that I stick myself at the bottom of the list. I’ve only recently made it mandatory that I get dressed for the day and put myself together.
Some of this is a mental roadblock a lot of you mamas face too. We think that by spending any time on ourselves that we are neglecting our more important responsibilities. I’m not sure if we’ve just conditioned ourselves to think this way since becoming moms maybe? There’s nothing like taking on the whole new way of life, different chores and providing care to someone who can’t do it themself. But somewhere along the way, we discover that we leave no time or love for ourselves. We can’t solely identify as simply moms and wives. We need to remember that we have interests and talents and activities we truly love that deserve a place in our lives and that place shouldn’t be the end of our chore list.
So as I kept painting in my maternity bra and pajama shorts, I realized that I won’t “come across” time for myself. I need to make it happen. How you do this is up to you but for me, I’m going to focus on giving more of my evenings to myself. And this blog is a big piece of it. I have wanted to do this for so long so why hasn’t it had a place in my schedule all this time?
I need to make sure I am well cared for for my own happiness, wellness and sanity and in turn I will be better able to care for everyone and everything else on the long long list.
