From the outside, I hold myself to high standards. Work needs to be excellent. My body needs to be in shape. Relationships need to be handled perfectly. But only I know this isn’t gentleness. It’s cruelty. I was like a refrigerator that never gets turned off, humming nonstop, but no one ever opens the door to check if something inside has gone bad.
When I made a mistake, I would replay the scene in my head over and over, cursing myself for being so stupid. When I was tired, I would tell myself to force myself to push harder. Everyone else can push through, so why can’t I? When I was sad, I would swallow every emotion because I thought I had “no reason to be sad.” The things I said to myself, I would never say to any friend. If my friend made a mistake, I would say it’s okay. If I was tired, I would say just hold on a little longer.
Then, on an ordinary Wednesday afternoon, I took a half day off to see the dentist. When I came out, it was raining. I didn’t have an umbrella. My car was parked two blocks away. I just stood under the eaves of the dental clinic, watching the rain pour down, and suddenly felt extremely tired. In the past, I would have run straight into the rain.
But that day, I didn’t. I leaned against the wall, slowly squatted down, and put my hand on my chest. I said one sentence to myself, so quietly it was almost not there: “No rush. Wait for the rain to lighten up a little. It’s okay.” No one saw me. No one noticed.
In that one minute, I wasn’t rushing against time. I wasn’t blaming myself for forgetting an umbrella. I wasn’t thinking about how many things I still had left to do. I just squatted there. Keeping myself company. Like a person who had walked a very long way and finally sat down to rest. I don’t remember when the rain stopped. But I remember that version of myself squatting under the eaves. That was the first time I didn’t treat myself like a tool. I treated myself as someone in need of rest.
The world won’t ask you if you’re tired. It only asks if you’re done, if it’s good enough. No one will say “okay, stop here for a moment” for you. So you have to say it yourself.
Listen to me. Stop cursing yourself out. Like I did, put your hand on your heart. Like that day under the eaves. Say to yourself: “I’m here for you.”
Outside, the wind and rain are wild. But I have a place to go back to. That place is myself.
