This is a Tricky One
I discovered something that totally surprised me
in the years since I began my business helping women heaI. I suppose it shouldn’t have surprised me, but it did. It shouldn’t have surprised me because of where I came from, and what I have experienced being a woman, a mother and female. I, like many women, (although not all) are very often caretakers. We are nurturers. We make sure everyone is okay. We have eyes that scan everything and see what needs to be done for all of it to run smoothly. It is instinctual and automatic. However, It is not at all instinctual and automatic for a woman, a mother, a female to be bold and confident, asking for what she needs, having the audacity to put her needs as a priority so that she thrives and her cup is full. I will go a step further. Perhaps to do so is unreasonable, selfish, feminist, unbiblical, (whatever term you want to place here)…overdone these days…?
I have a serious question for you? I really want you to think about it.
Do you, as a woman, as a human, have the right to pursue your own personal happiness? Maybe we should first define what we are speaking of when we say personal happiness. Google defines happiness as “in the context of positive or pleasant emotions ranging from contentment to intense joy. Also life satisfaction, well-being, flourishing”.
Do you have a right to go after that? To spend time and focus on it? To seek it out intentionally? What about to spend money on it if you have that luxury? The thing that I have discovered that so surprised me is that most women deeply struggle with this. And they don’t even realize it’s a block for them. They reach out, and come close, like a child looking in a toy store window. They look because they want the what they see on the other side of that glass (read the definition again) but somewhere deep inside they believe, or have been taught, its too much to ask for. So instead, they make fun of it, describe it as selfish, self-centered, ungodly, new-age, whatever. So many women reach out to me. I invite them to a free session where I wish to give them as much help as I can, to steer them where would be best for them to solve their issues, and they don’t even give themselves permission to take a free call. Even that becomes suspect, as if they might get too close to that window and then have to find out that “they can’t have it in the end.” And that would be more painful than never having hoped in the first place.
Here is why I know this:
I have a very biblical background. It was one that left me very VERY zealous NOT to look outside the words I was taught inside of church. I also witnesses the marriage of my parents (now 63 years along) and how my own mother lived. In that space I somehow picked up that happiness was not a thing God was much interested in. Joy was okay but happiness was anther matter. Happiness was perceived by me at that time as situational, external and based only in if things were going according to my liking. Happiness had a very superficial feeling to it. And it was completely off the table as a goal. I was taught to serve God, and others and be content with that.
Let’s look back at that definition;
-contentment
-intense joy
-flourishing
-well-being
If I might…I would like to add: thriving, bubbling with energy, aliveness, intense awareness of life’s goodness, eager to live each day.
Can we find these things serving God and others only? Oh I believe we can for sure! However, where I object is the lack of value placed on looking inward toward our own personal wounds, and healing ourselves as women so the above 4 adjectives are a resounding YES!
You see, I carried out the ‘serve God and others only’ program with everything I had, and unwaveringly so. I had six children that I raised and schooled at home. I placed myself last in line like a good obedient female. And inside, unbeknownst to me, while I muscled on at being a servant, something was dying inside me. There was a garden left untended that had filled with weeds and thorns for a couple decades. I had no idea that there was a unique soul there that I had muzzled and starved that was eventually going to throw a flag on the program at hand. She did! I did. We both (my soul and I) went down like a ton of bricks. My life went into a crash and burn tailspin which you can read about in another of my blogs called “Shame and Women. Enough is enough.”
I submit that when a woman is happy (see the list)
she is also filled with joy and deeply aware of and connected to the goodness of God.
And when a woman has NOT believed she has the permission to take care of her own needs as a priority, to seek her own highest healing she is at best mustering gratitude and limping along… perhaps just going through the motions (if I may be so bold.)
What I have discovered since I tiptoed out of my preconceived boundaries would fill a book. But suffice to say I had lived way too small and believed way too small. I didn’t realize the scope of joy actually possible when one tends to ones own needs. And yes, tends them even first. Gasp yes, I said that! I have found happiness to be the opposite of a selfish pursuit. It turns out it is the most clear path to service of others I have ever traveled. Actions I take are now rooted authentically in delight, not exhaustion. Resentment and unhealthy obligation are not ever near me. I get to act out of a vast freedom of abundance, out of garden that is blooming and tended. It is magnificent, to say the least.
Have I had to spend money? Yes. But it is not an absolute requirement. Time, focus, space, patience, are requirements however. I needed help to see the path, to get healed. So I did spend money getting that. I still invest in it these many years later. I would choose to invest in it more than a vacation, a new car, a new phone, or new clothes. In fact the delight I encountered and do encounter every day now, is what led me to change my line of work from a physical therapist to a life and health coach and holistic counselor. My own elevator pitch title is really Freedom Hunter for Women :)
In the end, only you can decide.
I will be here. I will be holding space for you as you think about what you could do with true inner freedom, happiness, contentment, and flourishing. My hand is outstretched. But you must take it.
