[forgiveness friday] making room for you in the face of perfectionism & overwhelm

I don’t know about you, but I grew up in a household where overgiving was standard practice.

By that, I mean what was modeled for me was habits of never saying no, self-sacrifice for the sake of anyone else’s needs, and literally never making space for replenishment. The expectation was to be everyone else’s idea of perfection at all times and never tend to my own wants and needs. To wear a suit of armor of invulnerability.

This lifestyle made a people pleaser out of me, and I got away with it for most of my life. It’s actually the reason why I talk so much about the importance of self-care and spiritual nourishment today, because I ended up burning out — several times, and early.

I mentioned the other day that I’m currently in a very intense period of travel and transformational events, and the demands on my energy for something like this — frequently moving from place to place, taking care of my food, clothing, and shelter, not to mention the toll on everything else as I expand who I am — is consistently pushing the edges.

This type of thing will happen if you’re a pusher. (To the Mean Girls fans out there, no, I don’t mean a drug pusher; I mean the other kind. )

So though the movement for self-care is finally in full throttle these days in the wider conversation of our society, I’m here today to share how body forgiveness plays a significant role in self-care.

This is how it’s showing up for me today:

I have a lot of resistance to the task of packing my things to get on flights. Mainly, I’d rather just *snap* BE there already and not have to worry about having my stuff. Like, if we could just teleport everything I own into another plane and access that plane through a spontaneous magical vortex I could reach into like Mary Poppins’s handbag, that would be great, thankyouverymuch.

Today, I felt the anxiety rising in me around managing my time today and getting everything done — having all my shit together in a box with a pretty bow on it.

But miraculously, I received a spontaneous download: Spirit reminded me that I don’t have to overgive this time. Not only did any of this have to be perfect, but I could forgive myself and my body/brain (for all the times I was this exhausted and completely lost track of everything and ended up making tons of mistakes) and turn this experience into something nourishing, mindful, and even fun.

So I’m giving myself 15 minutes to write this post, another five to reconnect inward, breathe and be still, and then I can go back to my suitcase and choose the clothing that feels exciting *and* right for this trip (note: I’m going to be participating in a huge way next week in a professional setting and being seen in that context — i.e., there are triggers all over the damn place around showing up perfectly).

I’m going to forget it’s not about perfection, it’s not about me, over and over again. But the important part is to remind myself early and often to find myself again.

There’s certainly more to this conversation other than packing to go on a business trip. We’ll talk more about it, and soon — it definitely leaks into what happens around the holidays!! — but in the meantime, I’m gonna do me. (My 15 minutes are up.) And “doing me” only makes me all the more capable to show up in service to you all the more.

Much love,

Pamela

PS. Please share this with someone who needs to hear it today, and I’d love to hear what comes up for you in the comments.