On many occasions when we say that we think of ourselves, the people around us may call us selfish, but what does it mean to be selfish? Perhaps we are using this adjective incorrectly and, above all, unfairly.
Let us reflect on this word, its implications, and how we can spend time with ourselves without feeling guilty.
- To understand what it means to be selfish I suggest looking in the dictionary.
- There selfishness would be an excessive appreciation that a person has for himself.
- And that pushes her to watch over his own interest beyond any measure.
- Without worrying about others.
Each of us has its own patterns (more or less fixed values and beliefs that serve to interpret the world and get an idea of how it works), and from there our thoughts begin. That is why it is not uncommon for each person to apply this word based on this previous experience and how they understand the word selfishness and its implications. In other words: each person has a different idea of what it means to be selfish.
For some people, being selfish can mean doing nothing for themselves or others, or, in the most extreme cases, not doing a favor they asked you for lack of time even if you were there whenever you could. the definition could be accepted, but what happens in the second case?
How do we feel when a person calls us selfish without regard to all the good things we’ve done for them?Desperately mean, confused and angry even though we know it’s unfair. Before we go any further, let’s be clear: if we ever did. something for someone when they asked us, doesn’t mean we’re selfish.
There is a situation that is repeated frequently: a person asks us to do something for it and we cannot give him what he needs when he asks us to do it; secondly, this person calls us or suggests that we are selfish and that we feel very bad, not only because we were judged negatively, but also because there was a crossroads of interests in which, in the end, the least favored were his own.
So who is acting selfishly?
There is a clear reality: we do not have enough resources to try to change the patterns of others, this means that if a person interprets that we are acting selfishly, without making an effort to understand our situation, we can ask ourselves two questions:
If both answers are yes, always remember this fundamental freedom: we have the right to reject an application without feeling guilty.
Also, it’s good to keep in mind that people make a big mistake if they extend the subjective quality resulting from behavior to their personality, for example, someone can act wrong and not be bad, someone can run into someone and you’re not clumsy.
To better understand it, suppose the following situation: imagine getting up at the same time each week, doing all the activities you had to do, and by the end of the day you would have done everything you should have done. that one day you take a 15-minute nap longer than you should have, imagine that for some reason you can’t do everything you should and, in the end, you haven’t done everything you should have done.
Are you a little disciplined? No, he just had a bad day and he may have acted in an undisciplined and irresponsible way, but be sure, the fact that you did it in a timely manner will not make you a person of these characteristics. you still want to do it this way, it doesn’t necessarily have these characteristics because the past is not always a good parameter for the present and the future.
Do you feel like you don’t have time for yourself, whenever something happens the people around you want your attention and divert you from your goals, do you spend too much on others?Do you feel a sailboat at the mercy of the wind? You must always keep a space for yourself and, for this, you have to acquire two skills essential for our well-being: learning to say?No guilt.
It is true that this is a complex and nuanced topic, so we cannot create fixed rules about how it should be done, but focus on the importance of working on it, if you are one of the people who has always been available to others and who have left their lives behind, you should know that:
In short, thinking about yourself is not selfish if you know how to maintain balance, if you really work that part of yourself without worrying about the concept and phrases that are deeply ingrained in our language about selfishness, you will achieve the right balance. between dedicating time and energy to others and pursuing your own passions, activities, and dreams.