Taking a step to nurture me

So I am generally a selfish person. When I consider my life and my choices they are (for the most part) selfish and self-centered. My life has been a series of choices based around one fundamental question: what will bring me pleasure. If I am honest even my decision to walk the path that God has planned for me was a selfish decision, it started out as a quest for peace and happiness (ie all about me). Trust me when I say I am selfish. Anyway you would think that amidst all this pleasure seeking that I would have learned how to nurture myself, how to really look after me and feed my soul but I realised over the weekend that I hadn't learnt that at all!

I know what I like, I know what makes me happy but I had never stopped to say how do I actually look after and nurture me. What of all of these things that I have discovered that I love actually brings me peace, rest, healing, relaxation? When I am fragile (or "special" as my best friend calls it) what do I need? How do I nurture me in that moment? Do I even know what fragile looks like for me? And if I discovered I was feeling fragile what would I do? Would I admit it? Would you?

I was sat in my room at lunchtime on Saturday with my sister and my dearest friend and the topic of being fragile came up and in a moment of absolute freedom and honesty we were all like "yes! I feel fragile today." It completely changed our day, the freedom of saying I am fragile allowed us to slow right down and we did. We openly looked at what was presented to us and went I don't think my spirit can handle that right now or I can do this but we need to do it slower or right now I really need to sit for a minute. I have never felt so liberated in my life. It didn't mean we did nothing but it meant that we moved at a gentle pace. For me this is radically different from my usual life experience but I loved it and realised how important it is for us to realise where we are and make smart decisions that nurture our souls.

I am in the middle of a storm season and yesterday was a hard day. I could have come home, ate toast and went to bed but that wouldn't actually have nurtured my soul. Instead I came home, cooked myself a nice healthy dinner, had a long shower, washed my hair, read my bible and wrote in my blog. I took some time to nurture me. Then this morning when I woke up after a sound and peaceful sleep I was able to say there is so much going on and I need to look after me and my world this week and I can't do that while being pulled in 100 directions so I took a step that will allow me to nurture me. I've decided to stop being superwoman and to just let myself be a woman. For me today being a woman means taking time off so that I can nurture me and my family.

I pray that we take a moment to look at ourselves and be honest about where we are so that we can work out what we need. I pray that we all take a step to nurture ourselves xox