Self-Sacrifice: An Ego Problem

 

My therapist told me, “What is best for you is best for other people.” Initially, this seemed like a selfish belief to live by. The logic also didn’t hold up. And when she told me this, I had been living my life in the completely opposite way; I thought what was best for other people was what was best for me. So, I didn’t believe her. I had spent a lifetime collecting evidence and being taught the exact opposite. But I sat with it and asked myself, “What if?”

What if my worth did not come from pleasing other people?

What if my worth came from simply being a human?

What if I prioritize my needs?

What if prioritizing my needs is actually better for the people around me?

What if helping myself allowed me to better help others?

What if people still appreciate me even if I must disappoint them to meet my own needs? What if that actually brought me closer to them?

What if people do not need or want me to fix them or save them? What if trying to fix or save them is actually damaging to myself and the other person?

What if sacrificing my needs is actually a defense mechanism I use to protect myself from getting hurt?

What if ignoring my needs is actually harmful to the people I love?

These questions arose from situations surfacing in my life that helped me see I needed to take care of myself. I began to see I was hurting people around me by trying to sacrifice myself for them. My view of self-sacrifice as virtuous and idyllic shifted. In reality, self-sacrifice led me to depletion and resentment; that certainly isn’t what is best for others. 

I have started to see that sacrificing myself for others isn’t fair to myself or other people. Helping others operates kind of like a bank account, where spending represents giving to others and money represents our wellness. When I am taking care of my needs, I am building up “money” in my account. For me, this looks like running every day, being in nature, being with people I love, socializing, eating in a way that makes me feel good, laughing, doing something creative, connecting with my spirituality, etc. With this available balance of money, I can choose to spend it on helping other people and not experience additional costs; I may actually experience benefits. This is a sustainable practice. If I, however, give more than I have the “money” in my account for, or, even worse, I am already in debt, then the giving experience will come with costs for myself and the person I am trying to help. I will accrue further debt (aka more stress on my mind, body, and spirit), and the quality of my helping is compromised. Just like actual money, too much money in the account can also become an issue; a life focused solely on one’s self is destructive, lonely, irresponsible. However, this means selfishness cannot exist unless one has available resources (perhaps what we call “selfish” is just a depleted “account”??). With this new understanding of helping others, I was able to understand more clearly why I was causing myself to accrue debt so frequently.

As I started to peel back the layers of learned self-sacrificing behaviors in myself, I found that self-sacrifice was actually part of my ego, a defense mechanism built to protect myself. Having and addressing needs can feel vulnerable and messy, so ignoring needs is an easy (in the short-term only) way to shut all of that away. If I don’t have needs, then I don’t have to tell my partner what they said was hurtful, ask my boss if I could leave an hour early, be the only one speaking up in disagreement, or ask for help. 

I also had to uproot the belief that helping other people is what makes me good. I can see that this belief was planted long before I even existed. Self-sacrifice as the highest ideal is touted throughout religions and our society, especially to people of color and women. They say you must sacrifice yourself to be good; what a convenient way to ask marginalized groups to disappear. 

Reversing my belief, from “what is best for others is best for me” to “what is best for me is best for others,” allowed me to see how one of my most fundamental beliefs was not only based in ego and fear, but hurting myself and other people. I’m living a little more free and a little less in fear each time I choose my needs. I have needs. I have emotions. I have a voice. I hope I can keep taking up space, even when awkward, uncomfortable, and scary, to continue to free myself and maybe others in the process.