To care for yourself

Audre Lorde wrote,“Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.”

I am an avid fan of Audre Lorde. As I go back and revisit her writing, I see that importance of caring for myself. As women, we are often the ones who care for everyone else. I don’t think I’m alone in struggling to discover my needs and find my voice when it came to articulating what’s important, what’s life-giving.

For so many people life is an endless cycle of stuffing our emotions deep down. Emotional stress leads to disease, despair, depression and in some cases, death. My marriage that ended in divorce taught me a very important, albeit painful, lesson: I have to care for myself first and foremost, because doing so allows me to be in healthy relationships with others.

This message is adapted from “To care for yourself” written by Rozella White that first appeared in the July 2014 issue of Café magazine.