Self Care I Guess

For years I tried to to find it.

I tried to find it in a variety of ways.

For years I tried to buy it. I tried to buy it in clothes, in creating the perfect home, in the new protein shake or the next diet plan.

For years I tried to eat and drink it. I tried to find happiness in food — in numbing myself.

For years I tried to earn it. I tried to earn it in validation from others — be it a job, an Instagram post, an aesthetic, or perfectly maintaining every friendship I had ever had — often at the expense of myself.

For years I tried to plan it. I planned it with extreme and “perfect” goals and tactics and dreams that were never mine to begin with. I planned it by treating my life and my existence as a business instead of as a human.

For years I tried to find it. And as I tried to find it — as I failed to find it — I numbed myself instead.

I numbed myself from the fact that it was missing.

The fact that I couldn’t find it.

The fact that I didn’t even know what “it” really was.

For years I tried to find happiness.

I tried to find the happiness I had had my whole life.

The happiness I had lost sight of as I navigated “growing up” and stepping into the “real world” for the first time.

What’s funny now, is that those years spent trying to find happiness? Those years spent trying to buy it, earn it, drink it? Well those years were spent searching for the wrong things. Those years were spent searching for something that was right in front of me all along.

Something that was within me all along.

Something that wasn’t a “thing” at all.

Me.

—

I was recently lucky enough to spend an extended amount of time at home in Montana, in the house that I primarily grew up in, with my parents, siblings, and dogs all under one roof. Sidenote, this actually went really well, because as one of my friends put it — the Warren household is always in a “constant state of comfortable chaos,” where no one is actually upset but there’s always something fun / funny / fake melodramatic going down… but I digress.

During this time, I started doing a few things that I hadn’t been doing in my years of living on my own.

Through the help of my family and watching their consistency and balanced lifestyle, and through getting back to my roots and remembering what truly matters to me — I started doing a few things.

I started on a new path with new goals that were mostly about focusing on where I was at the moment and within the next few years, rather than where I’d be in twenty. I started reading (and believing) my goals every morning. I started working out. I started stretching. I started eating balanced. I started going to bed early. I started getting up earlier. I started tracking a few habits each day to remind myself of what I was working toward.

I started not giving a f*** if I didn’t accomplish any of those things for awhile.

These things happened over time. I started with one habit or mindset shift, then I’d lose it. I’d start back up, I’d lose it again. But somewhere along the way I stopped losing it, and I started adding other things that made me feel good on top.

And, after doing these things for myself and only for myself over and over and over again — one day I woke up and I looked in the mirror.

I looked in the mirror and, for the first time in a long time—years if you will—I realized that I liked the person staring back at me.

I realized that I loved who I was. I realized that I loved who I was becoming even more.

I realized that I was done searching.

Because I realized that I had found it.

That happiness I was searching for?

That was me — I was searching for me.

—

After coming back to Boston from my “sabbatical” at home, I struggled a bit. I lost a lot of those habits. I sabatoged myself a little.

I lost sight of that person I was growing to be.

I called my brother one day to ask him how he stays consistent in taking care for himself and “doing him” with his blinders intact.

He said, quite simply, “I don’t know, to me it’s pretty simple. Why would I want to feel like shit?”

Gotta love the male brain.

To me, that’s kind of what self-care — self-love — is.

It’s thinking before you do things. It’s taking the time to get to know yourself and what makes you feel like shit versus what makes you not feel like shit — it’s knowing what makes you feel good. It’s taking the time and putting in the effort (and sticking it out through hundreds of trials and errors) to learn these things, and then it’s thinking before you do them. It’s thinking “how do I want to feel?” “How do I want to show up?” “What do I deserve?”

And sometimes? Sometimes it’s not thinking at all.

It’s not about what you did last night. It’s about what you do today.

It’s about being consistent. It’s about throwing it out the window, having some beers, and messing up your sleep schedule or your fitness routine or whatever you’re working toward at the moment. It’s about picking it back up again.

See for years I tried to find happiness in perfectly crafted plans that would get me the validation I was missing. The validation I so badly craved, wanted — needed.

But that validation didn’t come in perfect workouts or diets or job titles or clothes or people.

That validation came from me.

That validation came from being the most me, me I could be.

And the most me, me I could be? Well that’s someone balanced. Someone consistent. Someone that knows what she wants but doesn’t put an insane pressure on herself to get it done by next week.

Someone who works hard, but plays hard too.

Someone who cares for herself.

Someone who loves herself.

Someone who doesn’t search for happiness.

Someone who creates it (ok, Karen).

—

Through all of this, through finding things that make me feel like myself, through thinking before I sabatoge myself, through living balanced and not beating myself up if I’m not perfect (and truly, not wanting to be someone who is perfect), through being completely honest with myself about who I am and what I want and what I still need to work on, through setting boundaries and putting myself first — I found it.

I found what it meant to be smart about saying “no” in order to protect my sleep, my wallet, and my mental and physical health.

I found what it meant to stop trying to force people to stay in my life if they didn’t want to be in my life. If things or people or jobs or dreams wanted to leave — if they didn’t fit — I let them walk away.

I found what it meant to be smart about the value of my energy and who and what I give that to.

I found what it meant to realize that sometimes drinking an entire bottle of wine DOES make me feel better. I realized that sometimes it doesn’t. I realized that sometimes simply drinking water, cooking a healthy meal, and washing my f***ing face is what I need to feel better—to think of myself and who I want to be tomorrow.

I found that I don’t want to feel like shit—that I want to feel good.

I found that I have the direct and complete power to control that.

I found happiness.

I’m not perfect by any means. I’m still addicted to Instagram and dopamine, sometimes I still struggle with mental blocks about balance and body image, I’m still a little psycho with my schedule from years of trying to live up to perfect expectations, of course I still want validation and recognition from others sometimes, and I still have shitty days.

But now I know what I actually need to be happy. Now I know who I am, and now I know what I’m worth.

Now I know that I’m doing the best I can with what I have. I’m focusing on things that make me feel like me, and I’m letting the rest fade away.

I’m not searching anymore, because, even when I lose it sometimes, I now trust myself to find it.

I now know that happiness comes from being content with who I am, and I now know that I have the power to change who that is at any time.

I now know that all the answers I’ve ever needed are within me, and I now know that in time — at the right time — those answers will find their way to me, and I know that at that time, I will have enough wisdom and faith in myself to believe them.