Self Love Is Not Selfish

People throw the word Selfish around as an insult, and that’s because the word selfish itself means lack of consideration for others, and chiefly thinking about your own interests. The “lack of” is what hits me, so it isn’t really a good thing. But, these days, it’s used so often, like people forget what it means. At the slightest thought about yourself, even when you’re the type to always put others first, someone somewhere will call you selfish. For the longest time, I saw “thinking about me first sometimes” as selfishness. I would quickly brush away the thought of doing something I wanted first, before doing something someone else wanted, because I didn’t want to be seen as selfish. I grew up with the mindset that I had to put others first, that is not a bad thing, but you should think about yourself only sometimes. I was a kid anyways, what could I really be selfish about; I wanted kids' stuff, some new slippers I saw my friend wear, snacks, and the like. So as a kid I will just say, I was obeying my parents, when they said I couldn’t have something, I'd listen.

Let's fast forward to when I was a teen with a bit of responsibility on my head, in my senior year of high school (secondary school) I was the senior prefect, I believe that would be the equivalent of the student body president in countries like the USA. That position put so much stress on me, I quickly learned that I had to cancel out what Chimdi (me) wanted when it came to doing my job, and even outside of that. Everybody was watching me, even when I did nothing, I had to take the blame for things. I went to a boarding school, so I couldn’t exactly go home every day and unwind, or talk to my parents, as no phones were allowed either. A lot of people didn’t like me, a lot did–thank God for those that did–and I speak of both students and teachers. I never did what I really wanted to for a long time, I considered everybody first before myself. But with time I slowly learned that I liked to have fun, despite being this face for the school, I wanted to have fun, I wanted to dance at socials and events, I wanted to be a normal student sometimes, instead of always carrying my head high. I did dance at one or two socials, did I get in trouble, YES! There were some other things I got in trouble for as well, but that’s a long story.

When I graduated high school, I still thought about other people first before myself, and I made quite a few not-so-smart decisions, because of that. I am still a considerate person now. But I did that right into my first long and real relationship. In that relationship I said yes to a lot of things, I didn’t really want. If he wanted it, fine I'll do it. I did this until I came to the realization that I had being doing this for people without thinking about myself for so long. I remember thinking to myself that I had to start doing things for me, for Chimdi, it was hard because it just wasn’t what I was used to. I had to start saying no to things, that quickly became arguments. What I'm trying to say is, in relationships and life in general, thinking about yourself sometimes, and doing what's good for you is NOT BAD, at the end of the day, if you are not really happy, there is no way you can make someone else happy. Sure, you should think about others. You can't be a self-centered person all the time, now that’s wrong. But it's okay to think about yourself from time to time; it does not make you selfish or a bad person, it just makes you a human being. The same way those people want things, you also want things, that's what makes you different. Sure, sometimes when you think about yourself people may get hurt on the way, but they can only really get hurt if they don’t try to understand you. You need to develop love, peace, and happiness within yourself to be able to spread that.