WPR070: Why It’s So Hard to Put Myself First

Working Parent Resource

We’ve all heard the common air travel safety phrase: you need to put the oxygen mask on yourself before focusing on anyone else around you. In other words, you can’t help anyone else if you’re not taking care of yourself first.

So why can’t we do this in our everyday lives? Why are we all struggling so much with too many responsibilities and expectations? Why are we over-burdening ourselves without feeling like we can take even a few minutes to replenish and focus on our own well-being? What’s going on?

I truly don’t think there’s one explanation for us all. We’re all different people. We’re all motivated by different things. We’re all afraid of different things. But I’ve done a lot of personal development work over the years, and I’ve discovered a few reasons why I personally have a hard time putting myself first. I don’t see a lot of these reasons highlighted out there in the larger conversations around self-care and burnout and living a healthy life.

So today I wanted to share some of what holds ME back from putting myself first, in case one or two of these reasons resonate with you. These aren’t your typical “I don’t have enough time” explanations. We’re going to dig a little deeper today.