One day I was sitting down thinking of how we run around with mental or written ‘to-do’ lists all day. We may not be aware of the impact these ‘to-do’ lists have on us and how they control how we feel and act on any particular day.
Getting things done is important, there’s even a book by David Allen written on this by the title Getting Things Done, but we focus a lot on completing tasks that benefit someone else and not us.
It’s true, right? Whether you are a doctor, mother, father, lawyer, friend, athlete, employee or business owner, it is true.
We all want to help and that’s important because it’s what we should be doing — but there are a couple of questions we need to ask ourselves. Step back. Ask yourself…
“Is this the best version of “me” that is helping others?
Have I worked on creating this best version of “me”?
When I asked myself these questions it inspired an art piece that I drew back in the day titled “The Box”. It was a stick figure pointing at the wall where a big empty square check box was drawn on the wall with the words “take care of me” next to it.
At that moment in time I had realized that it was important to check off this box.
It’s not selfish when we check this box off.
It’s SELFISH when we don’t.
We can’t be our best version of ourselves to help others if we are not taking care of ourselves. We take care of ourselves when we focus on improving our mental and physical health. We do this through activities that we love which will keep us fit, happy, motivated.
This all leads to improving our skill set which in turn helps others!
We decide when we want this change to happen. We just have to check off “The Box” daily.
Have you checked yours off today?
I also don’t know why we say “ourselves” like if there is multiple of us. I think there is — to a certain extend.
Future post.