Is Hygge selfish?

Oh, hello friends. I hope everyone had a lovely week. I’ll be honest, I was a little tired this week. Daylight Savings Time seems to get harder and harder every year. I find myself waking up later and by Friday, I thought it was Saturday. Ugh. I started the week feeling a little guilty for sleeping in an extra half hour, but realized I needed to listen to my body. I clearly needed some adjustment time and that’s ok. But is it ok?

I grapple with this question often, and have at times, found myself feeling selfish for taking part in things that are pleasurable. As a woman, we are engrained with certain principals, beliefs and responsibilities. Many of these are to ensure we are good mothers and wives, which for many years, have been the only roles we have been allowed to fully own. It has taken a very long time for women to begin to feel any semblance of equality to men and we’re not even close. One obvious way we are unequal is through the simple act of taking care of ourselves. I’ve often noticed women wear their exhaustion, selflessness, and complete lack of caring for themselves as a badge of honor. It shows that we care more about our husbands, children, families and friends than we do about ourselves. I know there are times when others needs come first, and I’m not saying that isn’t ok. But to never feel like we are allowed to focus on ourselves over others is a huge societal problem that we’re just barely skimming the service of. 2020 was a year of reflection and mental health awareness for me. I found myself tired, depressed and anxious. As awful as this year was, it gave me time to reflect and look inward at myself. I’m always looking to improve myself and to grow as a person, and last year I felt stuck and stunted. Quarantine gave me time to peel back the layers to find out why I felt so lost. I was able to determine that I wasn’t doing things that benefited me. The years of helping and mothering others had taken a toll on my mental, emotional and physical wellbeing. Please don’t get me wrong- I love my family with all of my heart. My husband and two sons are my people. I would die for them in a heartbeat and have unconditional love for them- but I wasn’t helping anyone by running myself into the ground. I’ll also mention I’m a complete and total empath. I absorb other people’s energies, for better or worse. I think this is a really positive trait for many reasons, but it’s also extremely draining. There’s no way I can be fully present and powerful if I’m not taking care of me.

This process of loving myself is where my love for hygge came to be. I never had a word for the feeling, but I knew it well. The feeling is home. That feeling of nurture, love, acceptance, comfort and security that we may know from our childhoods if we’re lucky, or from the home we’ve created for ourselves if our childhoods were less than secure. I remember when COVID began and quarantine started, my first instinct was to revert back to my childhood. I found myself eating Lucky Charms and listening to 70’s music on a daily basis. I let go of expectations, and focused on what made me feel right in this not-so-right world. And it felt good! I took this a step further and started to take baths, cook comfort food, read books, listen to self help podcasts, meditate- as well as binge on Netflix and eat Ben and Jerry’s… whatever I needed on any given day, I would allow myself that pleasure. This was a new concept and one I realized I had been denying myself for years, as I imagine most of us do. It’s this childhood innocence that I had lost in myself, and I wanted to get her back. I had gotten so far away from that little girl at the core of my being. I wanted to be curious again. I wanted to hide under the covers during a thunderstorm, and chase my kids around the house as the tickle monster. With time and practice, I’m slowly coming back to my most authentic self and it’s changing my life for the better. This week, let’s try to find that curious kid buried deep inside all of us- and never let them go. Happy weekend and cozy vibes only!