Freud said we are all born selfish. A lot of people have hard time with this.  Being selfish is seen as bad because people connect it as non caring towards others.  When we describe selfish people, we often mean that they are just that.  They don’t care about others at all.  Selfish boss doesn’t have a genuine care about her/his staff as long as they produce.  Selfish parents don’t care about what their children really care about as long as they make the parents look good, and so on.

At the same time, we do hear a lot about self care.  We also hear things like ‘if you don’t know how to love yourself, you will not know how to love others.’  So, how do we supposed to care and love ourselves without being selfish?

I use the word “self full”.  If I imagine myself as a car, when I have a full tank, I can run 300 miles without having to stop.  As a person, when I am full of energy, I can be a caring person and I am more capable of giving.  If my tank is empty, I will break down as I force myself to keep giving. 

It is my responsibility to keep my tank full so that not only I don’t break down, but also I am happy to love and to give.  I am the only person who knows how full or empty my tank is.  I don’t have to make excuses about taking the time to fuel my tank. Instead I can communicate that I am taking necessary time to be self full.