I recently read a very helpful book called The Life Organizer: A Woman's Guide to a Mindful Year - a book that has an ambitious title but breaks things down into step-by-step, gradual tasks to help get things in order. But instead of telling you about the book, I'm going to let you read the author's own words. If you find it help, I highly encourage you to get the book!
I define over-providing
as giving more than is sustainable for you and often for the wrong reasons. Accurate but kind of
bland. A better definition comes from my
friend Jeanie, “Over-providing? That’s when you pouring everything into growing
everybody else while withering yourself.”
Withering yourself. That’s what you do
when, instead of bringing the requested two side dishes to the family holiday
dinner, you show up with five sides,
a salad, two pies, gravy and a ham. Withering yourself is hosting a
fund-raiser, hand-crafting the food, the decorations and handling all the
details, then ending up in bed with pneumonia. Withering yourself is inviting
your elderly mom to move in with you, even though she has a support system and
enough money for good care, and find yourself gaining weight, neglecting your
creative passions, and cultivating a big ole’ grudge.
Obviously, over-providing is not in your best interests
and yet we all do it, at least some of the time. Why oh why? Here are a
few of our compelling reasons:
- You were raised in
a culture that still proclaims good women give endlessly and good men provide.
- Your biology –humans
are hard-wired to belong. Over-providing keeps you in the tribe.
- You’re empathetic.
You want to help.
- You may believe
what you want to give isn’t
worthwhile enough so you gush like a broken fire hydrant lots of other
things – money, advice, time - to make up for what you perceive you lack.
- You forget you’re
a human with human limits of time and energy, easy to do in these uber
speedy times.
- You haven’t
learned (yet) to trust your self, to trust your body and heart when it
says, “Enough.”
Also, over-providing can be very difficult to recognize.
Look for signs like:
o A hollow feeling of
never getting enough done
o A jittery compulsion to
fix people’s pain, to do something to make it better
o Resentment – everybody
else gets what they want but you
o Rarely focusing on your
own dreams and desires
o Hearing yourself say
things like “When I finish ____ then I will” and “I just had to do ____ for
_____ who else would?” and “If I don’t do ______ I will be a big failure, get
fired and end up homeless and…”
Clearly over-providing is not the best choice for your
health, your career, or your sanity. Now what to do? Sample these simple balancing antidotes:
o Write down everything you do for others in a 24 hour
period.
Hard but so worthwhile.
Hard but so worthwhile.
o Start the day with five minutes of extravagant
self-praise.
Imagine this praise in the form of hummingbirds streaming into the back of your heart.
Imagine this praise in the form of hummingbirds streaming into the back of your heart.
o Navigate by desire.
Make a practice of asking, “What do I want?” or
“What would I really love to do here?” Learning to know what you want, even if
you can't have it, is a life changing practice and one I teach in more depth in
my book The Life Organizer.
o Deputize a few beloveds to check in with before you say
yes to something else.
Hearing yourself trying to talk yourself into something can be very enlightening.
Hearing yourself trying to talk yourself into something can be very enlightening.
o Get used to saying, “Let me get back to you.”
Make a list of all the reasons you must do this. Then go down the list asking, “Is that true?”
Make a list of all the reasons you must do this. Then go down the list asking, “Is that true?”
o Deepen your practice of self-trust.
When faced with a decision or choice, ask yourself before you ask anyone else, “What do I think? What do I want?” We develop self-trust by checking in with ourselves (a key part of the Life Organizing practice from my book and app), taking action on our best guess, and then asking, “What do I know now?”
When faced with a decision or choice, ask yourself before you ask anyone else, “What do I think? What do I want?” We develop self-trust by checking in with ourselves (a key part of the Life Organizing practice from my book and app), taking action on our best guess, and then asking, “What do I know now?”
o Forget hard and fast rules.
Some situations call for over-giving for a period of time. When my dad was
dying, it was important to over-provide for him. The guideline? Are you
checking in with yourself? If you want to give more, are you capable of doing
so without hurting yourself?
o Yes, avoiding over-providing is a privileged problem.
And that isn’t an argument for you to be a martyr. Instead, become a
force of love and balance in the world in hopes that one day all people can
choose an emotionally and physically sustainable life.
It's tempting to get your kicks from being everything to
everybody. It can be hard to believe there is another way and yet, once you see
your pattern, you also see how over-providing is a less than truthful existence.
It keeps you from giving birth to your truest life. Seeing that, painful as it
can be, will motivate you to listen and choose the middle way – a little me, a
little them – more often.
Jennifer Louden helped start the
self-care movement with her first best-selling book The Woman's Comfort
Book. She's written 5 more books including The Life Organizer, just
out in paperback. Visit JenniferLouden.com/lifeorganizer to get your free app
and four more super useful gifts.
# # #
Based on the new paperback edition
of The Life Organizer: A Woman’s Guide to a Mindful Year © 2013 by Jennifer Louden. Printed with permission of New
World Library, Novato, CA. www.newworldlibrary.com
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