When I started Self Love Atlas, I did it because I noticed a harshness: a harshness in the way we talk to ourselves and the way we treat our bodies.

This harshness exists in our minds, and it appears as a whole lot of “shoulds” and “shouldn’ts.” 

We think to ourselves, “I should be working harder.” “I should have said something sooner.” “I should have spent more time on…”

One of my favorite coaches likes to say, “a lot of us have a bad habit of ‘should-ing all over ourselves.'” (That’s a lot funnier when you say it out loud).

And I too “should all over myself” A LOT. 

In the past, it was realllllllly bad. I spent so many hours, months, and even years running through my to-do lists over and over again, avoiding sleep, attempting to fulfill society’s highest expectations. I was thinking “I should…” “I need to…” and “I can’t take a break because I should…” 

When the exhaustion caused by that harshness started to coat the very fibers of my life, I (problematically) accepted it as a new normal.

I told myself exhaustion was a price I was willing to pay for the success and rewards I’d later receive as a result of my hard work (this too was harsh). 

But this approach put me in a constant state of stress, which eventually started harming my body. 

My attitude of “If I’m not there yet, I must not have worked hard enough” led me to work so hard that it weakened my immune system and (I believe) caused severe digestive issues. (Here’s an article from the American Psychological Association about a range of ways prolonged stress can horribly affect your body and health). 

It seemed like “hustle harder” had no limits, so I thought that was the only way I could get what I wanted out of life. This led to high levels of anxiety and a constant feeling of dissatisfaction. 

And instead of recognizing there was a problem with treating my mortal body like an invincible machine, I had screwy thoughts like…

“I should be able to do more than this.”

“There must be something wrong with me (as a person) because I don’t know how to make myself do what I used to.” 

And “I can’t function anymore, I must be broken.” 

So I repeated these thoughts until something snapped and I realized “Human beings aren’t meant to live like that.” 

We’re not meant to live with ourselves thinking like that.

The truth is, we’re not machines. We’re human, we’re imperfect, and like any other living thing, we need to be cared for (by our own selves, at bare minimum) to thrive to our fullest capacity.

So for a while there, I pivoted. I pursued self-care and self-compassion as aggressively as I pursued success, because I hated the way I was living.

And through all that effort, I got good at being kind to myself… sometimes.

Now, one part of my brain defaults to compassion and offers me permission to be human.

But there’s still a part that says “Keep going!” “You’re falling short!” “You need to… “You have to…

Right now, I’m admitting to myself that although I’m in a better place, I never won that battle once and for all. There’s still a long way to go.

Sometimes I fall back into my overworking perfectionist tendencies.

But I know that the more I acknowledge and am present with how it affects my mood and stress levels, the more likely I am to give myself what I need to heal, and the more likely I am to get to a place where harshness is no longer a habit and self-compassion will slowly but surely take its place.

Choosing to offer yourself love and compassion is an act of bravery.

Most of us were raised in a culture where pushing ourselves harder and harder was rewarded and encouraged. So it takes bravery to choose another path, and it takes practice to make this choice consistently.

Over time, we can get better and better at this skill.

I have no idea how long the road to pure self-love and self-compassion is, but we can walk this road together, one step at a time, and all end up in a better place than where we started.

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Cheers, 

Morgan Rita Barbret