First step to getting your life back

Do you often feel that you don't belong to you? That everybody is getting a part of you and you are left with the crumbs. If you are ready to carve a piece in the buffet of life for yourself, but the idea frightens you because it seems too big to undertake, take heart.

Let's start with one step: STOP EVERYTHING. Cancel all activities, "should's", commitments that are not either work, or totally necessary for your survival like eating, bathing and sleeping. Yes, do get the kids to Scouts or ballet lesson if there is absolutely nobody who can do it for you, for pay or otherwise. But avoid as much as possible to commit to anything in return, at least not for the next month. So it means to cancel all social, volunteer or other activities, unless you are absolutely dying to go. This is necessary to give yourself some breathing space. Don't worry - it's not for a long time. Just enough so that you can si by yourself and ge to know your Self - really know who is behind all that activity. Simple isn't it? Easy? No. Then, how are you going to be able to do it?

First, you must decide if you really mean business to put yourself up there in your life. Because, until you actually decide to give your Self top priority, it simply won't happen. And to do this, you will have to do something you are probably not very good at: be Self-ish. See how I wrote that. Being Self-ish means to honour your Self. Selfish has a real bad reputation and rightly so. We have all met those types who only think of themselves, never consider other people's feelings or desires, seem to do a lot of navel gazing and are generally not nice to others, or pretend they are nice but don't care. We also have met other people, those who never seem to want anything, or have any opinion. They only want to please and be loved in return. Except that they also often become angly and resentful for they have done all that and nobody seems to be thankful. These individuals are not very attractive either.

So what is the solution? Making a commitment to honour your wonderful Self. Then taking one action each day to increase the way you take care of your Self: physically, emotionally, mentally, financially, spiritually.

Today, leave for work fifteen minutes early to avoid feeling rushed; tomorrow, go for a walk at lunch, avoid busy streets, listen to singing birds; next week, take time to take a shower and change before making dinner: a five minutes shower can refresh you like a 30 minutes nap (to do the next day). What is it all about: the trick is to learn to slow down. Once you have slowed down, you will be in a better position to know what you really want.