how to stop treating yourself like a project to fix
Do you know what needs fixing? A broken heel strap. Smudged lipgloss. A cracked phone.
Not you.
You’re not a task that immediately needs to be done. You’re not a daily assignment in school. You’re not a presentation you have to prepare for work.
Your life is not something that’s going to be graded based on how successful you were, or how put together you looked.
It can be okay to work on yourself every day, but you shouldn’t feel like it’s your job to have to constantly “fix” something about yourself. You shouldn’t feel like you have to always find a problem in your life that you have to solve.
Don’t put pressure on yourself by thinking your life isn’t perfect because of this problem, and that trouble spot, and this one fixable thing.
Your life isn’t going to be perfect, and that’s okay. You’re not going to be perfect, and that’s okay.
I can say you’re perfect the way you are, but it’s more important for you to believe that. It’s important that you believe that having a million things to “fix” on yourself isn’t healthy.
You’re not a project that constantly needs to be fixed. It’s not good to constantly think of the negatives in your life, appearance, career, relationships, etc. It’s not productive or sustainable.
related content: how to stop being so hard on yourself
how to work on yourself in a healthy way
There’s a difference between working on yourself to better your life and relationship with yourself, and criticizing your life and trying to find everything wrong with it that you can fix.
Give yourself grace, babes. There’s more to life than self improvement (and I know, I know! This is a self love brand that focuses on self improvement. But too much focus on improvement can be too much sometimes.)
Find a healthy balance. You’ll know when it’s a healthy balance when you feel good and excited about working on yourself. You don’t feel stressed, overwhelmed or discouraged about how bad things seem.
You don’t feel anxiety about all the little problems you find. You recognize that you’re human, and we aren’t perfect.
If you are feeling overwhelmed, let your self love overpower those feelings. That means accepting and loving some of the things you immediately want to fix.
Remember that your problems, trouble spots and whatever you else want to call imperfections, make you the person you are.
And I don’t want to sugarcoat the topic! Self improvement is a beautiful thing, and there are aspects of your life that you should want to fix.
But you shouldn’t treat yourself inhumanely to do that. You shouldn’t treat yourself like a checklist, project, boring assignment, etc.
ignoring the womanly pressure to be perfect
As women, it can feel like there’s this unspoken rule to be perfect, look our best, hide our imperfections and have it all.
Sometimes it even feels like we’re conditioned to be strong and tuck away when we’re struggling.
It’s important to remind yourself that while it’s nice to feel like you have everything on track and can fix little imperfections about yourself, it’s not your duty or requirement in order to be a “good woman.”
Oftentimes, we want to prove we can do anything and everything, which can cause us to get less done due to burnout or lack of time.
You can still be ambitious and successful if you rest. You can still be a great woman if you have imperfections and unfavorable qualities.
Everyone has their own take on what having it all means and the feasibility of achieving it.
Whatever it looks like to you, I imagine it’s a work in progress. I’m constantly dreaming of having it all, but one thing I make sure to include in my routine is reality checks and breaks.
It’s okay to not be completely on top of it all in life. Take advantage of the slow moments. Remember that you’re human, and you’re meant to enjoy this lifetime too.
You’re meant to enjoy the present, and you shouldn’t let the uncomfortable progress of trying to have it all bring you misery.
read more like this: it’s okay to rest and still have ambition
