Role Reversal
Have you ever gone to a social event, or a meeting and you skim through the agenda for the event and you see the words “Introductions” ,or “Ice Breaker?” Typically that means that’s the part of where you get to tell everyone about yourself. Now this is not the case for everyone, but I know for myself my introduction usually sounds like “ Hi, my name is Sa’de (or Sa’diyah depending on where I am), I’m 33, I’m married with 2 children, I am the Program Director at my agency, and my interests or hobbies are (insert my family’s interest that I engulf myself in). The crazy part or maybe not so crazy part is that it flows off of my tongue effortlessly.
Don’t get me wrong, I love my family dearly, and I absolutely adore spending time with them and making memories with them however, I am so much more than the titles and roles ascribed to me based on my family. Lately, I’ve been focusing more on myself, and working extremely hard to tap into my interests and speak my own love language(s).
Over the course of the last few months, I find myself trying to tap into my interests and be more present for myself outside of my roles and titles. I guess you can say that I’ve been searching for authentic “Me Time". There are days when I’m kid free and I am trying to find something to do besides lay in the bed, or run errands. Majority of the time, I end up running errands, and laying in the bed.
Last night, while I was laying down trying to fall asleep I thought about my day to day in depth to the point that I decided to grab a sheet of paper and write out what a typical day looked like for me, and then I thought about my hobbies and interests and although it was no surprise that my typical day doesn’t include my hobbies or interest it made me a little sad. I finally fell asleep, and when I woke up the “Hobbies & Interests” question was still on my mind. Instead of spending my morning doing my usual routine, I used that time to think about my past and what I did before I had all of these roles and titles. So I decided to break out my trusty friend, my bff, my Note to Self Journal, and I drew a box with 4 sections. The top two boxes contained my roles/titles and my daily actions dedicated to those roles/titles. The bottom two boxes contained my hobbies, and interest along with my actions dedicated to those hobbies and interests. After I looked at all four boxes, I wanted to go back and change some stuff inside of all the boxes because I had a few “ah ha” moments. But, in an effort to be honest, I left it alone.
After I filled in the boxes, I decided that I was going to reverse the roles, and put myself first intentionally. That’s right I am making a conscious effort to be Sade/Sa’diyah first and then let all the other roles and titles afterwards. I know for a fact that this is not going to be an easy task, and I do not have a strategy on how to do this. The only thing that I can say is if a necessity or emergency is not present, I may not be available to fulfill the expectations of all the roles that I have. Sorry, not sorry! I am trying to catch myself before my cup runs empty. So, here’s to intentionally caring for myself first mentally, religiously, physically, emotionally, financially, and any other -ally’s that I may have forgotten.
To the moms, wives, daughters, sisters, friends, aunts, cousins, etc, how do you feel about reversing all those roles to intentionally being “you” first? For the women who are themselves first, how do you do it? What advice can you offer because most days I struggle with it.