“True self-love isn’t about changing into somebody higher; it’s about softening into the reality of who you already are.” ~Yung Pueblo
One morning, I sat at my kitchen desk with my journal open, a cup of inexperienced tea steaming beside me, and a stack of self-help books unfold out like an emergency toolkit.
The daylight was spilling throughout the counter, however I didn’t discover. My eyes saved darting between the dog-eared pages of a ebook referred to as Turning into Your Finest Self and the neatly written to-do record in my journal.
Meditation.
Gratitude journaling.
Affirmations.
Ten thousand steps.
Hydration tracker.
“Interior baby work” … nonetheless unchecked.
It was solely 9:00 a.m., and I’d already meditated, journaled, listened to a private improvement podcast, and deliberate my “therapeutic exercise” for later.
By all accounts, I used to be doing all the pieces proper. However as an alternative of feeling impressed or mild, I felt… drained. Bone-deep drained.
When Self-Enchancment Turns into Self-Criticism
I didn’t understand it on the time, however I had turned private progress right into a job I might by no means depart.
Each podcast was a method assembly. Each ebook was an worker handbook for a greater me. Each quiet second turned an opportunity to seek out one other flaw to deal with.
And if I missed one thing, a day with out journaling, a skipped meditation, a exercise minimize brief, I felt like I had failed. Not failed on the job itself however failed as a particular person. I advised myself this was dedication. That it was wholesome to be dedicated to changing into one of the best model of myself.
However beneath, there was a quieter fact I didn’t need to admit:
I wasn’t rising from a spot of self-love. I used to be hustling for my very own price.
Someplace alongside the way in which, “self-improvement” had stopped being about constructing a life I cherished and had develop into about fixing an individual I didn’t.
Self-Progress Burnout Is Actual
We speak about burnout from work, parenting, and caregiving, however we don’t usually speak about self-growth burnout. The type that comes once you’ve been “engaged on your self” for thus lengthy it turns into one other obligation.
It’s refined, however you possibly can really feel it.
It’s the heaviness you carry into your meditation follow, the quiet resentment when somebody tells you a couple of “life-changing” ebook you have to learn, the way in which even relaxation feels such as you’re falling behind in your personal therapeutic.
The worst half? It’s wrapped in such optimistic language that it’s arduous to confess you’re bored with it.
While you say you’re exhausted, individuals let you know to “take a self-care day,” which regularly simply turns into one other checkbox. While you say you’re feeling caught, they hand you one other podcast, one other journal immediate, one other morning routine to attempt.
It’s exhausting to understand that even your downtime is a part of a efficiency overview you’re continually giving your self.
The Second I Stepped Off the Hamster Wheel
My turning level wasn’t dramatic. No breakdown, no grand epiphany. Only a Tuesday night time in early spring.
I had deliberate to do my traditional “nighttime routine” … ten minutes of breathwork, ten minutes of journaling, studying a chapter of a private progress ebook earlier than mattress. However that night time, I walked previous my desk, grabbed a blanket, and went outdoors as an alternative.
The air was cool, and the sky was streaked with smooth pink and gold. I sat down on the porch steps and simply… watched it change. No cellphone. No agenda. No attempting to make the second “productive” by mentally drafting a gratitude record.
For the primary time in years, I let one thing be simply what it was.
And in that stillness, I noticed how a lot of my life I’d been lacking within the chase to develop into “higher.” I used to be so centered on the following model of me that I’d been neglecting the one residing my precise life proper now.
Why We Maintain Fixing What Isn’t Damaged
Trying again, I can see why I received caught there.
We stay in a tradition that earnings from our fixed self-doubt. There’s all the time a “subsequent step,” a brand new program, a thirty-day problem promising to “rework” us.
And there’s nothing inherently unsuitable with studying, rising, or difficult ourselves. The issue comes when progress is rooted within the perception that who we’re right now is insufficient.
When each motion is motivated by I’m not sufficient but, we find yourself in an countless loop of striving with out ever feeling at peace.
How I Began Shifting from Fixing to Residing
It wasn’t an in a single day change. I needed to relearn how you can work together with private progress in a method that felt nourishing as an alternative of punishing. Right here’s what helped me:
1. I checked the burden of what I used to be doing.
I began asking myself: Does this really feel like assist, or does it really feel like strain? If it felt heavy, exhausting, or like one other type of self-criticism, I paused or dropped it fully.
2. I let relaxation be a part of the method.
Not “relaxation so I may very well be extra productive later,” however actual relaxation—studying a novel simply because I preferred it, taking a stroll with out monitoring my steps, watching the clouds with out attempting to meditate.
3. I finished chasing each “ought to.”
I let go of the assumption that I needed to attempt each technique, learn each ebook, or observe each guru to heal. I gave myself permission to decide on what resonated and ignore the remainder.
4. I practiced being okay with “ok.”
As an alternative of asking, “How can I make this higher?” I practiced noticing what was already working in my life, even when it wasn’t good.
What I Discovered
Therapeutic isn’t a ladder you climb to an ideal view.
It’s extra like a rhythm—one that features relaxation days, quiet seasons, and moments the place nothing adjustments besides your means to note you’re okay proper now.
I realized that typically probably the most transformative factor you are able to do is cease. Cease chasing, cease fixing, cease critiquing each a part of your self such as you’re a unending renovation undertaking.
As a result of possibly the actual work isn’t fixing your self right into a future you’ll lastly love. Possibly the actual work is studying to stay totally within the self you already are.
About Cristie Robbins
Cristie Robbins is a broadcast writer, speaker, and authorized psychological wellness coach. By way of The Wellness Blueprint, she helps ladies scale back stress and reclaim vitality with a root-cause strategy. Her books, together with Scars Like Constellations, discover resilience, therapeutic, and private progress, and could be discovered on Amazon at her Creator Web page. Join at The Wellness Blueprint. Yow will discover her on Fb right here and Instagram right here.