What are the three areas of life, and which one ignored will cost you the most?
I was once asked this question, but I didn’t have any knowledge about it at the time. Ignorance wasn’t bliss; it cost me a lot of grief and unhappiness. I went through severe depression and felt sad, angry, and frustrated because I didn’t pay attention to this knowledge.
Let’s discuss the three areas of our lives. The first is self-care, which involves taking care of our outer and inner selves. The second is relationships, which include our intimate relationship with our spouse and other relationships with our kids, parents, work, and others. The third is our work, which provides for ourselves and our family and allows us to contribute to others by making an impact.
All three areas are crucial, and we must take care of all of them. Sometimes, we may need to spend more time in one area than others. However, most of us put too much emphasis on work, followed by relationships and self-care.
What are the consequences of this? You may be successful in your work and earn a lot, but it could come at the cost of strained relationships with your spouse and family, along with health issues like lack of sleep, hypertension, and diabetes. You may also feel sad, frustrated, angry, lonely, and restless. Is it worth it?
I went through this in my life as I was focused on my work and neglected myself and my family. I did not exercise or eat right, and I was often reactive and frustrated. This affected my health, and I couldn’t work for six months.
I was later interviewed by —– about the importance of self-care, and I implemented those things in my life for the last five to ten years. As a result, I’m much healthier and happier.
Let’s consider another scenario where someone spends a lot of time on relationships, then work, and self-care last. The consequence of this is that this person will make all efforts to take care of everyone around them, neglecting themselves to keep others happy. This could lead to burnout and frustration, and they may not get the appreciation they expect. This could result in neglecting their personal emotional and physical needs. Whatever energy is left goes to work, and very little is given to self-care.
The lesson I learned is that self-care is crucial and should be the most important area of life to take care of. The second is relationships, and the third is work and mission.
When we focus on self-care, we work on providing proper nutrition, physical workouts, meditation, journaling, spending time in nature, reading daily, and spending time on personal growth every day. We become more resilient and grounded, which is called self-love.
We should make self-care a priority and take care of this area. The second focus should be on relationships with others. What good is life if we have all the trinkets and luxury, lots of money, but our relationships with our spouse, kids, and others are strained and not properly groomed? The answer is obvious. Lots of very successful people have committed suicide as they ignored relationships and self-care.
My final takeaway is to make self-care a MUST and prioritize it. Invest time and effort to cultivate and build great relationships with your spouse, kids, parents, people at work, and friends and relatives. Prioritize which relationships are more important and will bring long-term happiness and love, and schedule time for them in your calendar. Sometimes you may need to spend more time on work or relationships, and that’s okay. However, make sure to come back to the proper order, which is self, relationships, and then work.