Scarves Style and Glory: 5 Practices of Tigress Self-Love

By: Priscilla A. Wainwright, Ph.D., CPC

Last Blog we discussed Forgiving Yourself, and Self Nurturance. Let’s move on to Number 3.

3. SELF-DEVELOPMENT

Here again, you could be developing Body, Mind, and/or Spirit. Self-Development includes anything that helps you improve and grow. It could involve learning, practicing to enhance a skill, strength or talent – anything from retreats to college classes, lessons, skill practice, art, or craft design and creation, and more. The list is endless.

There are two key criteria for Self-Development activities for Self-Love. The first is Self-Growth. The activity should improve you in some way developmentally. Learning a new skill, broadening your knowledge, expanding a talent, deepening your spirituality: these kinds of things qualify. As you do them regularly, you will see growth.

You also will develop the greater interest and passion for the subject that comes with increased exposure. The more you get into something, the more complex and interesting your knowledge about it becomes. You get “hooked” and your interest broadens and deepens. Then your pleasure increases. Soon you start to achieve greater mastery. With this comes greater satisfaction.

The second criterion is FUN. The activities you choose should be enjoyable in their own right. Yes, work and fine attention to detail may be involved, but the work is part of it. It’s what you have to do to get better, and it becomes enjoyable.

The purest joy and satisfaction comes when the activity is engaged in just for its own sake. It may be an individual pursuit, or done with others, such as playing softball or acting in a theater group. Consider for example a singer who takes voice lessons and sings at local coffee houses and open mics. Compare that with a similar singer who does the same thing but is angling for paid gigs and an ultimate career on Broadway.

The first singer draws innate joy and satisfaction from performing. The seconds is much more likely to be self-critical, stressed, and dissatisfied. For the first singer, the coffee house is the end in itself. For the second, the coffee house becomes a means to a greater end, and the work involved bcomes like a “job”.

Again, ends vs means is a critical distinction for the nature of the experience of participation. Comparatively, there is almost always more peace, joy and satisfaction from the former, and more stress and dissatisfaction with the latter.

4. BOUNDARIES

Healthy boundaries are essential to Self-Love. “Boundaries” are basically limits you establish to protect yourself in some way.

There are in essence 4 “types” of boundaries and boundary issues: (A) on yourself, (B) on others, (C) on time, and (D) on life.

Setting healthy boundaries is essential to quality self-care. They provide a standard and cut-off point for when to say “yes” or “no”. They also protect you from sticky individual decisions which might offend or hurt someone who is trying, albeit with healthy motives, to get you involved in a project, group, or service which would stretch you too far.

Think about your current lifestyle. Are you out of balance in some areas? Where are you stretched too thin? Where might you be over-serving or over-committed? By setting effective limits, you actually gain greater self-respect, as well as greater freedom.

With healthy boundaries in place, you’ll also have less resentment! How often do we find ourselves resenting others, ourselves, or the situation when we’re into a pattern of over-serving or are being pulled in several directions at once? We don’t like to admit those feelings, but they do occur, right?

When you start setting limits, you might get some pushback from those for whom you’ve bent too much. Most of us don’t want to make people angry. Too often we don’t set limits precisely because we feel afraid to upset people.

Well, Tigress, “Get Your Pecker Up!” as my British relatives would say. Muster your courage. How long will you hold yourself captive trying to please others?

Setting limits is healthy self-care. Those who love you may be inconvenienced, but they’ll get over it. They’ll respect you more in the long run (and actually may start “sharing the load” more, which they should have been doing all along). If you’re kind about setting your boundaries, you shouldn’t have much of a problem. If someone else gets or stays angry at you because of your boundary-setting, that’s their problem. Don’t let their crap stand in your way.

That’s it for today, Tigress. Between now and my next Blog, start thinking and planning. Assess which activities would be fun and interesting for Self-Development and get a plan in place.

As for Boundaries, look at where you may be stretched too thin. Also zero in on where you may be harboring resentments. That’s the area to attack first. Approach the people involved kindly. You might explain how stressed or tired you are. Ask their help and cooperation because you need their help because you need to cut back. This approach will work much better than springing it on them dictatorially.

Next time we’ll finish up with Self-Love Practice #5

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