How Your Wellbeing is Being Sacrificed Through Social Media Manipulation: Division and Chaos is Not Natural- It's Manufactured

Author: Juliane Volosky

Photo Taken by GWVproductions: Pine, Colorado

I feel a strong need and desire to write on the negative impact of social media and screen time on our overall wellbeing.  A lot of the division and chaos going on in the world has been manufactured by media manipulation, and we have been fooled by it. 

Over the last few years, I’ve noticed the divide and hate in the world deeply growing due to differing beliefs on politics, religion, human rights, and cultural norms. As great as it is to live in the USA (the land of the free) with complete freedom to express our beliefs, values, and opinions; media is benefitting off these differing beliefs by spreading manufactured content targeted at creating division, hate, and separation.

So many world events and political discussions have been influenced by media and overly broadcasted to fuel hate and division throughout the human experience. Intuitively, I’ve felt so much hateful and divisive energy in the world over the last 8-10 years, and the energy continues to become more and more divisive the more time we spend glued to our screens.

This division in recent years has sounded an alarm in my head that our thoughts, values, morals, and belief systems are being controlled and manipulated by media influence. Rather than living in a world that nurtures connection with others by respecting each other's voices, perspectives, and views; media holds the throne, and thrives off selling hate and division for ultimate control, views, power, and money. At the end of the day- division sells.

This constant access to media, television, and news at the tap of a finger continues to leave everyone in constant fight or flight and a fear state. Faith and fear cannot coexist- so the dread a lot of us are feeling in our everyday lives is because we aren’t present in the moment and feel chaos and fear for the future because of what the news and screens are telling us. The average American spends 7-10 hours a day on their screens, so of course our screens are the biggest influence on our beliefs, views, societal and cultural norms, and decisions.

To make matters worse, more recently Facebook, tik tok, and other social media platforms have been able to formulate an algorithm that feeds the biases of any individual scrolling on their phones. Even the news stations today have been designed to lean more towards the right or left. So we tune into the news stations that align with our political beliefs and refuse to watch the news stations that oppose them. The media and news stations feeding into our biases are what is creating chaos and division. We begin to box our views, morals, and values into black and white thinking, rather than recognizing that our collective should be allowing grey thinking to exist too.

When we only seek comfort and validation through our biases, we fail to realize two things can be true and exist at once. Instead of recognizing that grey thinking exists, black and white thinking persuades each and every one of us that only one side or point of view is morally right and acceptable. When you believe your cultural, political, and economic beliefs are the only beliefs that can be morally right and true, you will villainize and scrutinize anyone else for having differing values and beliefs.

Anytime the media validates your own beliefs and views, it gives your ego a boost and strengthens your sense of self. So that when we encounter someone in the real world who doesn’t have the same views and belief systems as us, we see this person as a threat to society or an attack on our identity. When we feel like our identity is being threatened, we would rather protect, react, and defend our own ego, than being open minded and trying to see the other persons point of view.

Over the last few years, I have seen the division in politics, religion, human rights, and cultural norms tear relationships apart, ruin family dynamics, and deteriorate people’s wellbeing. Division and rage continue to control our collective and block us from feeling balance, peace, joy, and happiness in our day to day lives.

As important as the media is and as helpful as it can be to keep us up to date on current events, we also need to realize that media does an equally good job at spreading content that distracts us from our best selves by selling division, outrage, and fear-based messaging. Division sells, outrage sells, and in order for these platforms to do well- they need engagement.

I want to share today some ways to disconnect from media outlets and reconnect with your inner self. It's important to remember that all humans are different due to their childhood upbringing, culture, and trauma. We should learn to respect all views even if they differ from our own. We all have unique life experiences that shape us into who we are, and this collective is meant to shine together not apart. The more we focus on connection in this physical world to each other and away from our phones- the closer we become to feeling connected to our authentic selves' mind, body, and spirit.

If you feel media has been or has ever negatively impacted your overall wellbeing, these tips for finding better alignment with your authentic self may serve you. I have found these tips to help me reground, balance, and bring me back into alignment with my happiest and healthiest self. Feel free to implement the tips that resonate and leave behind what doesn't.

Tip #1: Disconnect from Your Screen and Practice Intentional Time With Yourself Every Day.

Set designated times throughout the day where you are not on your phone or attached to a screen. Find ways to connect with those in your physical world. Rather than being home glued to a screen. Spend quality time at dinner, on a walk, or in the morning with your loved ones, and with yourself. You can't connect to your higher self through a screen; you connect to your higher self when you spend intentional time alone.

Tip #2: Create a Morning and Night Routine with Yourself Not The Media World.

Your morning and night routines should be sacred and spent connecting to your inner self. You should prioritize starting and ending your day alone, or with loved ones so that you can begin and end your day in a good place mind, body, and spirit.

Tip #3: Use Your Phone to Fuel Your Higher Self Not Distract It.

Who you interact with and follow on your social media platforms can either pour into your cup or drain your cup. Make sure you follow people that inspire you on a spiritual level. Influencers and experts who promote fear mongering, black and white thinking, division, hate, and slander do nothing but stunt your personal and spiritual growth. If you are going to spend time on your screen, make sure it is to benefit your overall wellbeing. You can learn a lot through your screen if you are following the right platforms.

Tip #4: Get Involved in Your Own Community and Focus Your Time and Energy on Things That Are In Your Locus of Control.

If you are getting involved in your community, you are creating and establishing face to face connections. Scrolling on your phone and watching the news can give you dopamine and instant gratification, but it is the face-to-face connections that fuel your mind, body, and spirit. The more you get involved in the community the more you can connect, serve others, and grow in areas that are in your locus of control. Many current events on the news that have a negative impact on our overall wellbeing are out of our locus of control. So designate more time and energy in your own community by donating your time where you can truly make a difference.

Tip #5: Be More Open Minded.

Follow experts with differing views and beliefs on topics that matter the most to you. Seeing experts provide facts and perspectives from both sides of the coin will help you see that both sides both can be right and "wrong" at the same time. However, there may be a side you spiritually align with more, and that's okay. Being able to see different perspectives and staying open to different points of view will help you grow and develop as a person rather than constantly nurturing and validating your own ego. The more time you can spend staying open minded, the better your chances of pursuing a life with joy, empathy, compassion, and growth.

Tip #6: Practice awareness, and make sure that you are challenging your own biases and belief systems.

If you listen to react or respond, rather than listening to understand beliefs and views outside of your own, you will continue to stroke your own ego. It is important to spend more time listening to understand, and to see things from another person's perspective. This is how you build trust, connection, and respect from others. Try to be curious about differing views and beliefs outside of your own, rather than controlling the narratives so that you always are right.

Tip #7: Lead with love, light, and respect even if that isn’t being received on your end.

As a Christian I try to follow the teachings of the bible. However, leading with light, love, and respect is practiced in many religions. We should always forgive others, choose kindness over our own pride, and be generous to others with our hearts. When we get in fights or constantly create division with our family members, friends, or loved ones because of differing views and beliefs- this is not leading with light and love. As hard as it is to forgive or be kind to someone who has beliefs different than your own. This does not mean they are attacking your identity. This just means they may see the world through a different lens due to their own life experiences. If the person has always approached you with kindness, respect, light, love, and compassion- don't let their views and ideologies villainize or divide you from each other. There may be other areas of your life that you connect deeply in. You can still acknowledge their views and respect them without allowing hate, division, and chaos to win.

Tip #8: Be honest with yourself, and lead a life with morals, values, integrity, and beliefs that your higher self would be proud of.

If you are a keyboard warrior behind the scenes and say things you would never say to someone during a face-to-face encounter, you are living a life out of alignment with your authentic self. Treat others on the internet the same way you would treat others in person. Who you show up as on the internet should be who you show up as in real life. Period.

After reading this blog, I hope you remind yourself that screen time and social media can make a negative impact on your overall wellbeing. We live in a world that profits off of division, chaos, and hate. Try to remind yourself to be different. Choose to lead with light and love, respect differing beliefs, and learn to spend time disconnecting from your screen so that you can reconnect with your highest, healthiest, and most genuine self.

Much love and Happy Habits,

Juliane Volosky

Happy Habits Health and Wellness Blog

Five Practices of Self Love to Build Inner Peace and Confidence

Photo Taken: Rickets Glen State Park Benton, PA

What is Self Love?

I believe that self-love is acknowledging and taking ownership of pouring into your own cup, and creating healthy boundaries so that you do not allow others to define or determine your worth.

Self-love is a vital component to improving your overall wellbeing, confidence, and happiness. Practicing self-love should be prioritized each and every day of your life.

Humans tend to train their brains to focus on finding happiness through external validation. Rather than trying to improve our overall wellbeing through our own pursuit of passions, talents, hobbies, and behaviors, we continue to chase societal norms, post achievements, hide failures, hyper-focus on materialism and consumerism, and chase social status to give off the illusion that we fit in, are successful, and happy.

We ignore achieving internal validation through self-love when we focus on external validation. When you choose to tie your worth to how others in society view you, you lose sight of what success means to you.

The holy spirit perfectly crafted us to not only serve others selflessly, but to live a life in alignment with our truest and most authentic self. The Holy Spirit wouldn’t want you to do what everyone else is doing, the Holy Spirit would want you to follow your heart and pursuit the things that bring you peace and joy when pouring into your own cup.

Pouring into our own cup by practicing self-love will take years to prioritize, and decades to master.

When you learn to fall in love with who you are, what makes you happy, and how you define success; you stop looking for approval and validation from others, and start training your brain to pursue the things that bring you confidence, peace, and joy.

Practicing Self-love and building inner confidence will always result in people formulating their own opinions about you. The real superpower of self-love and inner confidence is you choose to believe the only opinion about yourself that matters- your own.

When you begin having a strong sense of self by pursuing acts of self love, you will not allow other people’s opinions of you to hold power over you and your worth. When you don’t allow people’s opinions to hold power over you this is how true confidence and inner peace is discovered.

Self-love practices should be a main focus of each day, even when we are in bad head spaces due to negative self-intrusive thoughts.

The point of today's blog is to share 5 acts of self-love that have really benefitted my own overall wellbeing, confidence, self-worth, and internal peace. You can take from this blog what resonates and leave behind what doesn't.

As a wellness coach, I have learned that not every wellness tip, self-help book, self-improvement blog, or mindfulness practice aligns with me. As I continue to heal and grow, I adopt the self-help practices that resonate with me and my routine and let go of the ones that don't. I hope one or many of these acts of self-love I am sharing with you today resonate and work for you the way they have abundantly worked for me.

Self-Love Tip #1: Feel ALL the Feelings

30 years of my life were consumed by hiding, minimizing, or straight up ignoring any negative emotions and feelings I had when I was going through a challenging life experience. Instead of processing how I was feeling in the moment, and sitting with my feelings, I would choose to become avoidant with my feelings and distract myself with work, social media, drinking, the gym, gossiping about others, or fixing other people's problems so I didn't have to focus on my own.

Humans can spend an entire lifetime avoiding negative and uncomfortable feelings. Choosing to face these uncomfortable feelings is a vital part to growing, healing, and learning about ourselves.

Each and every one of us is full of flaws, traumas, and insecurities. When we are trying to seek validation from the external world we try to shove any negative feelings, flaws, insecurities, and traumas down so that we appear like we have a picture-perfect life, and are successful. Sometimes hiding feelings can also be a trauma response to not feeling seen and heard as a child, and that is how you continue to manage your emotions as an adult.

Practicing and trying to implement Tip #1 gives you permission to acknowledge and heal through all your feelings, even if you used to be avoidant of them in the past. The positive, negative, uncomfortable, and sad feelings are okay, and I encourage you to feel them all. Acknowledging your feelings, along with your strengths, shortcomings, insecurities, and flaws allows you to process, grow, and heal towards being a better version of yourself in the present and for the future.

To truly appreciate joy is to fully understand and embrace what the abstinence of joy feels like. 

Self-Love Tip #2: Monitor The Energy in Your Environment

The second act of self-love flows from the first act. It is not only important to feel all your feelings, but also monitor your energy in the environments you are spending a lot of time in.

If someone is making you feel uncomfortable, tearing you down, or criticizing you in a way that is not constructive but demoralizing, monitoring your energy around this person helps you realize what rooms you don’t belong in, or at least certain environments you need to set healthy boundaries in for future interactions.

It is a true act of self-love to pay attention to your energy after spending a prolonged amount of time with different individuals in the environments you spend a lot of your time in.

There is your work environment, home environment, social environments, family environments, church/religion environments, and networking environments.

You can be around individuals and environments that recharge you and make you feel refreshed, while other individuals and environments will make you feel drained.

If you don’t spend time monitoring your energy, and practicing awareness around the people you interact with, you can become drained and have constant feelings of burn-out.

The more often you self-reflect and check in on your energy, the better you get at protecting your peace.

As Newton liked to say, “Energy can not be created nor destroyed.” It’s important to remind yourself and reflect on where you are depositing your energy. Some environments will take your energy without any reciprocation or return, while other environments the energy that you give is reciprocated back to you in some capacity or even more.

Tip #2 is so important to practice daily. Just like finances, you should monitor what you spend when it comes to your energy. If it feels your only spending and not receiving, a healthy boundary needs to be created to protect your peace, and overall wellbeing. Protect yourself from the environments that drain you, and relish and find joy in the environments that recharge you, and bring you peace.

Energy can not be created nor destroyed. Monitor your energy.

 Self-Love Tip #3: Create Healthy Boundaries to Protect Your Peace

The third act of self-love can be very hard for most individuals to implement, especially if you suffer from chronic people pleasing, and seeking acceptance of others.

A boundary is defined as an imaginary line that limits access or marks the edge of something. In tip #2 we talked about monitoring your energy around people and environments. When you become aware that certain people or environments are not improving your overall wellbeing and costing you a sense of peace from expending too much of your energy, that is where a boundary needs to be created.

Boundaries (when it comes to your overall wellbeing) are simply a way to limit the energy and access others have to you. If you are surrounded by a person who criticizes, makes fun of you, is chronically negative/complaining, or brings you down; most the time you can just stop associating with this person. BUT... Life has a way of getting challenging if this person is a colleague, a family member, part of your friend group, or a roommate.

A healthy boundary limits the access of energy that you are investing into someone else, so that you can preserve your overall wellbeing, inner peace, and continue to live a life in alignment with your true and authentic self.

Life does like to hit us with challenging circumstances, and cutting off complete access of yourself may not always be possible, but setting a healthy boundary would be the next best thing.

Tip #3 has helped preserve my overall wellbeing and confidence since adopting healthy boundary setting. If you utilize tip #1, # 2 and tip #3 together you really have the tools to continue fostering acts of self-love for yourself, while preserving your inner peace and confidence.

Healthy boundaries when it comes to your overall wellbeing limit the energy you are investing in someone else so that you can maintain your energy, inner peace, joy, and happiness. 

Self-Love Tip #4: Positive Investments Into Your Daily Diet and Exercise

Your physical health and nutritional health play a role in your overall wellbeing. The foods that you eat, and physical activity are two ways to model treating your body like a temple.

The food you eat impacts not only the energy you have to physically move your body but also plays a huge role on your brain health.

Have you ever had a small period of time where you eliminated and minimized sugar, and focused on healthy whole foods? When you do this in your daily routine you feel more energized, have less brain fog, and feel in a happier state mentally. The issue with processed foods is that they are hyperpalatable and super addicting, which creates a chronic addiction for the need, want, and desire of processed foods. When you eat highly processed foods your brain does trigger a dopamine "happy" response, but most of the time after this quick dopamine jolt has ended, you are faced with regret for not prioritizing the right foods to fuel you body with.

I am not saying never eat the things you love and enjoy if they are highly processed, but learning moderation, and prioritizing whole foods is a true act of self-love.

The same principle applies to movement and physical activity. Strength training not only sets your aging body up for success, but it has shown in research to make a positive effects on your mental health and mood. As a wellness coach I have never come across someone who regrets working out, but I have come across many individuals who tell me that they "wish they would have made the time." Self-love for yourself would be adopting diet and exercise as a high priority, and making time for it.

It is important to consume proper foods to fuel your body, and prioritize strength training and cardiovascular exercise. These acts of self care ensure that you are creating a health balance mind, body, and spirit. 

Self-Love Tip #5: Positive Investments in Your Spiritual Health

Tip #4 talked about developing healthy diet and exercise habits to sustain a healthy mind, body, and spirit. I wanted to dive a little deeper into the meaning behind "spirit." A person's spirit is made up of who they are at their core.

Our core could also consist of fears, traumas, and insecurities that we may need to discover about ourselves and better understand.

A spiritual journey helps us to uncover these deepest darkest secrets about ourselves, and gives us the power and opportunity to continue loving ourselves through it all.

Although diet and exercise can help connect our mind, body and spirit. Other spiritual health deposits can look like:

• Moments of silence in nature reflecting on your life's purpose

• Allowing yourself to feel negative emotions, but processing and reflecting on what could be causing them

• Prayer and meditation

• Deep Breathing

• Gratitude Practices
  

Choosing to nourish your spirit is an act of self-love because it will help you develop a strong sense of self. Your purpose is often times deeper than showing up at a 9-5 job, and then going home to sleep. We find ourselves in robot mode at times by only doing the things we have been conditioned to do. True discovery of self can only be unthethred through spiritual and reflective practices.

You may find fulfillment by working a 9-5 job to pay the bills but spiritually feel charged when you donate your time caring for animals at a shelter. You may feel encouraged or dedicated to spreading the word of God. You may feel a strong desire to teach and guide others on their fitness journey because of how much living a healthier lifestyle has positively impacted your life.

Pouring into your spiritual health is a great way to develop a stronger sense of self and find your higher purpose. It takes an entire lifetime to grow down into who you are at your core. When you pour into your spiritual health, you can start living a life more authentically and true to who you are. Self-discovery through spiritual health practices is also a great act of self-love to develop more peace, balance, and confidence, and abundance in your life.

A healthy person nourishes not only the mind and body, but also the spirit. 

Thank you for tuning in today to this blog post, and I hope you adopt and practice the acts of self-love that resonate with you.

Much Love and Happy Habits,

Juliane Volosky

Author of the Happy Habits Health and Wellness Blog

The Unfiltered Truth About Self-Preservation: How It Can Expand or Limit Personal Growth

Self Preservation

I used to look at this term for all the positivity it brought into my life.

Self Preservation is defined as a natural human instinct to protect oneself from danger, discomfort, or harm.

Self preservation is very beneficial when it comes to having the instinct to run when being chased by a lion, or choosing to avoid or disassociate from a negative environment where you feel insignificant or undervalued.

However, self-preservation can make a negative impact on your overall wellbeing when it is being practiced through the wrong lens of thinking. Self preservation can be misused just to keep an individual feeling safe and complacent with their everyday actions, behaviors, and habits.

Humans are born and encouraged to evolve and transform throughout their lifetime, and with their daily habits, behaviors, and lifestyle.

Even though we are encouraged to evolve and grow as humans, our brains can tell us otherwise. Through learned behavior patterns and experiences, our brains can become wired to keep us “safe” and “protected” at all times. This response to constantly feel safe, protected, and comfortable can be the byproduct of unprocessed trauma, negative experiences, low confidence, and low self worth.

Today the human civilization is more safe, secure, and protected than ever before when it comes to modernized technology, housing, food, transportation, clothing, and shelter.

BUT

The Unprocessed trauma, deep insecurities, substance/alcohol abuse, and hiding the deepest and darkest traits of ourselves can cause our brain to subconsciously go into self-preservation mode to protect our pride and ego.

When we are subconsciously self preserving due to our own insecurities, lack of self worth, and unprocessed trauma- our brain will tell our body that we are unsafe, in danger, and uncomfortable at all times. Due to this- we will want to self preserve and protect ourselves from feeling any type of discomfort- even in environments and experiences that could benefit us longterm, and teach us valuable life lessons, tools, skills, and knowledge for the present and future moments.

Once we learn to live in our ego to protect ourselves, it’s hard to let our guard down, and own up and take accountability for our past mistakes, shortcomings, and flaws. Instead- we live in a state where we fear rejection. At the end of the day we want to be loved and feel worthy, but many of us fear that we are not enough, so this continues the spiral of living in your pride and ego rather than from a true and authentic space. Using self preservation to hide ourselves or protect ourselves is ACTUALLY preventing us from growing, healing, learning, and changing as an individual.

Recognizing the moments you are living in your ego and having fear of rejection is the only way to get grounded and present in the moment, and to overcome instances where self preservation is being used for the wrong reasons.

When we avoid or refuse to confront our own trauma, actions, behaviors, conflicts, disagreements, differences in opinions, negative experiences, or misunderstandings- this is where self preservation can be used in a negative way. Our brain tells us in order to feel safe and protected we need to isolate and avoid all experiences and situations that feel unsettling. Rather than facing or confronting a situation to see things from the other persons perspective or for our own internal flaws and insecurities- we avoid this discomfort entirely as a protection mechanism. This does nothing but hinders our ability to grow mind, body, and spirit.

Instead of taking accountability for our actions and behaviors, we use self preservation as a tool to shift the blame on others rather than taking ownership of our own mistakes and actions. Helping us feel “safe” and “comfortable” even when we are wrong or should be taking responsibility for our shortcomings.

There is a time and place where you use self preservation to protect your overall wellbeing and health by setting healthy boundaries for yourself when you are in a negative environment or relationships with individuals that don’t value your time and energy.

BUT… there are some circumstances where your ego will tell you lies in order to protect itself. If you don’t regularly do inventory on your own actions and behaviors, it’s easy to fall victim to using self preservation in a negative way and as a protective mechanism. This will feel good short term and leave you feeling safe in the moment, but long term creates a byproduct of negative feelings of oneself such as resentment, anger, jealousy, comparison, and frustration.

It takes a lot of willpower and strength to surrender in moments of discomfort, and recognize when you need to take partial or full accountability of your own negative actions, behaviors, mistakes and shortcomings.

Let’s breakdown some

ways in which we self preserve for the wrong reasons:

• To avoid personal growth. We self preserve in a negative way at times when we are challenged to grow as an individual in environments that initially feel “new,” “unsafe,” “different” and “uncomfortable.” We create excuses or narratives to avoid new experiences so that we can keep ourselves safe, complacent, and comfortable, even if long term embracing the discomfort would make your life better. Recognizing and reminding yourself that real growth will only occur when you expand outside of your comfort zone will help you avoid and overcome practicing self preservation in a negative way. It’s important to remind yourself that just because something is new and a little bit out of your comfort zone doesn’t mean it is unsafe or bad for your overall wellbeing. Our brain will ALWAYS choose familiar pain over an opportunity for joy that’s unfamiliar. So remind yourself of this.

• To protect the ego. We will subconsciously shift blame or criticize others to preserve our own ego and the deepest insecurities we hide not only to others, but our ourselves. It’s easy to self preserve our ego by criticizing or placing the blame on anyone but ourselves. When we are feeling emotionally heightened or uncomfortable in an environment with other people, we struggle to see things from any perspective but our own. This prevents us from the present moment and acknowledging our own flaws, traits, behaviors, and imperfections. People who self preserve their ego love to provide positive constructive advice and feedback to others, but often struggles to accept any form of constructive feedback from others- which is a huge indicator that you are protecting your ego or hiding parts of yourself. When humans can finally start recognizing the moments they are practicing self preservation to protect their ego, it gives them the power and courage to finally open their hearts to a path filled with more light and love, and seeing things from a different perspective outside of your own. When you live in alignment with your true and authentic self rather than in protection mode of your own ego; you recognize that everyone has their own trauma, shortcomings, characteristics, traits, and experiences that they are working through. This recognition can change your heart for the better, and help you realize that we are all imperfect beings on a life journey to learn and grow from each other. This also can help ground and center you when facing new experiences or situations. Feeling heightened emotions doesn’t necessarily have to create a byproduct of negative feelings all the time. Choosing to lead with light and love in a world that often chooses darkness can be hard. Choose different. Choose love. Choose to feel uncomfortable at moments, and accept that this is okay and only temporary. Sometimes- stopping the negative act of self preserving for safety and protection will help you lead with a more compassionate, empathetic, kind, and understanding heart. It can unlock true peace, joy, love, and abundance for yourself and others. Once you do the personal inventory and make conscious efforts to not lead with your ego you start growing, and better prevent yourself from self preserving. By facing our biggest fears, self doubts, insecurities, and unprocessed emotions and traumas- you will start leading a life that is true and authentic from the inside out.

• To Avoid Looking Like a Failure. We fall victim to using self preservation in a negative way when we want to protect ourselves from feeling like a failure.

  When we face roadblocks, mistakes or setbacks that cause outcomes we didn’t foresee, we self preserve to protect our image or how we want to look to others. Lets say you got fired from a job for showing up tardy several times over a five month period. Using self preservation in a negative way would be done by the employee placing all the blame on the employer. Instead of the employee taking accountability of their shortcomings and actions- they make excuses that the employer is the problem. When we make mistakes in life, it is important to take responsibility when needed rather than self preserving our negative actions and behaviors. When we learn to acknowledge, accept, and have awareness of our mistakes, insecurities, flaws, and shortcomings- it gives us the ability to grow, learn, improve, and forgive ourselves for our past mistakes, and prevent them from reoccurring in the future.

To sum up todays blog on self preservation- it is important to recognize when it needs to be practiced to improve your overall wellbeing vs practicing it to for the sake of keeping you safe and complacent. Being in negative environments, surrounding yourself with non-supportive friends, or choosing to pour into others over yourself are reasons to implement the practice of self preservation so that you can continue living in a healthy space and environment that encourages you to feel safe, true, and authentic.

BUT.. it’s important to recognize that the practice of self preservation can be a double edged sword, and can be used for the wrong reasons as well to protect yourself or isolate yourself from growing and living life authentically.

I encourage you to practice self preservation when needed, but to monitor and have awareness if self preservation is being practiced for your own personal benefit to stay safe by protecting your ego and insecurities.

How do you view the term self preservation after reading todays blog post?

Much Love and Happy Habits,

Coach Jay