The Check-up on Self (Value of Self-assessment)

The last quarter of the year is mostly a triggering time for me (mental health-wise). There is a light in this tunnel of a time-and that is in the awareness of my triggers. I am aware of what pulls me to the darkness. I know what I need to do and not do about this. Yes, I am still on about my mental health issues. I am very intentional about a lot of things during this time of the year when it comes to how I move. I also have been learning to actually live through the triggers as if they are sensors to how my Self-Care Investments are becoming more and more effective or not. If a trigger catches me off guard, I indulge on trying to navigate as best as I can. Also, I am not always successful.

Here are some of my triggers: The demands of my work and it’s irregular functionality. I have had a significant loss of my grandparents to death during this times of the year. It is a bit numbing. Even when the sadness is not so raw, my whole system tends to feel the weight of knowing they are no longer here and hearts need to go on. It is also the time in which someone I long to have met and shared life with passed on. I won’t say more than that since it is not my place to. My kid’s last school term of the year and the looming long holidays to plan, in balance with how I make a living. In other words, there is a lot of anxiousness going on. A lot of things come to play. Whether I’m actively studying and exams are approaching or family and friends have birthday celebration or important events that I wish to be part of _ it all gets too much as I expect a lot from myself. So, I have come to a thought of doing a self-assessment /check up.

"The most fundamental aggression to ourselves, the most fundamental harm we can do to ourselves, is to remain ignorant by not having the courage and the respect to look at ourselves honestly and gently." - Pema Chödrön

The best for you is not always likewise for someone else. This is why you must never put it to someone to get you through your Self-Care journey. The obviousness of that as a statement is notorious. Keeping it in practice unfortunately, comes with a lot more unflattering obscurity. This more so if you are practicing Self-Care from a healthier lifestyle point of view, not of being selfish. The need to learn to check up on self comes in every now and then. Simply, to try and recollect where your Self-Care Investments are working for you and where you might just need to focus with a different perspective. I will use motherhood to try and put some perspective to self-assessing since it is that life aspect that makes it a lot more challenging to put your needs ahead just as you do of others. Keep in mind, the Blog is all about building your Self-awareness around the fact that you too matter.

Straight to it, there are many different perspectives and reasons on why women keep Helpers/Nannies in their homes and it is always presenting very different need satisfaction. I have however noted that most mothers/women I know wish they did not have to rely on some else. This is mostly for young mothers who are career women and wives. It is really nothing we are ever prepared for (most of us anyways). I struggled like nobody’s business the time my first two kids were younger and having a Nanny was a must. I struggled mostly mentally. I couldn’t comprehend what motherhood entails as far as having to leave a crying child dependent on another woman except me( the person who put them into this position) . I say a crying child because I hardly thought of my child actually being okay without me most of the time. It also did not make sense that such precious gifts had to be entrusted to someone I’ve only just met and, at the beginning, most fragile stages of their lives. It is what was best for everyone at the time, but it did not feel like it. Being positive was far from me between 2014 and 2017. I did make it through. I am here aren’t I?

This has made me think of something, there are situations wherein we are just living, getting by, getting through, lacking inspiration, defeated and full of surrender. We are in them but not feeling our own presence. We question nature’s logic. We have an answer that it is what it is as the bottom line. I felt like that is what was happening in my life as my motherhood began.

What do you do when the best favors the rest but you? I have learned to acknowledge that I am not going to be in control of everything. Control is a damning need. If you are responsible for a household this is real talk you need to confront. As much as it is supposedly laid upon you to see to it things are managed, it sure does not feel like you ever have it under control does it? There is always something pending, off or missing. Well, here is a Release you might use, acknowledge you are just not in control of everything, ever.

The stretch is real, just as my stretch marks gained from my pregnancies . Motherhood is the thing that defies your limits while refining your will. You learn daily how being helpless never outweighs being hopeful. You become more gentle with self considering everything you are responsible for. As I am now in a journey of doing it all over again with my now almost seven months old, (6 years later from my second born), I am finding that my emotional capacity has improved. Things haven't gotten easier but I self-regulate better. There is less pressure exerted on self. I am somewhat more confident in my ability to nurture. I also don't get as intimidated and intense as I use to when other people get close to my children. This all I think and believe is owing to the years I have put in as far as Self-Care is concerned. Since I am more aware of my life and the things that have shaped me, the things that trigger me to a downward spiral as well as that which elevate my sincere thirst for growth - I am having a healthier space in mind, body and spirit. This benefits everyone and everything around me.

My goal in sharing this is in highlighting a need to pause and notice (reflect) your progress just as much as you do your needs to improve.

2 Corinthians 13:5

Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you—unless indeed you fail the test?

Your Mode of Praxis when you are invested on Self-Care needs you to always assess your ins and outs, how you are breathing through it all. This is what the build up of being more Self-aware is all about. This is how your character is building up for the better or worse. It Matters that you appoint yourself and make time to notice all this things, for yourself!

"Introspection is a form of self-management. You reflect. You decide. You change. You allow yourself to grow."- Raoul Davis Jr.

Regards

Livhuwani Tshikovhi