Being selfish isn’t the most terrible thing you can be. In fact, if you’re a bit of a doormat it may be the best thing you can do for yourself.
Good boys and girls aren’t selfish. Good boys and girls have stress-induced heart attacks before the age of 40 or run off and abandon all the responsibilities they’ve kept up for years once they hit middle age. Be bad.
Imagine that there’s a fisherman who sells his catch off the dock. A pretty girl walks by and asks the fisherman if he’ll make a present of a fish to her. The fisherman, being a red-blooded straight male, agrees and gives her two for good measure. While he’s busy chatting up the girl, a seagull swoops down and nicks two more of his fish before he can stop it. An old man comes by, criticises the state of the fish and asks for a discount of 50%. As the day is getting on now and the fisherman has yet to sell a fish, he agrees to a 50% sale. The man only buys one small fish. The fisherman doesn’t have much of his catch left by now but just as he gets ready to holler out his wares, a man with a knife runs up to the dock, threatens the fisherman and steals the rest of his catch. The fisherman is left with nothing but the pathetic 50% sale of a small fish.
Did you like my metaphor there? Tortured, wasn’t it? Well, there’s a serious point behind it. While we’d like to believe in the abundance of the universe, the fact is that we are temporal creatures, bound to this space–time continuum, and time is a finite commodity in our world. Your quest for inner peace will be seriously derailed if you let time bandits steal away your catch. Whether you overindulge in socialising (the pretty girl), extra unexpected chores (the seagull), family commitments (the old man) or work (the thief), you leave nothing but a tiny pathetic sliver of time for yourself – most of which you’ll spend sleeping.
So what can you do about it? Get selfish. This is almost impossible for some as we’ve been brought up to believe that only very horrible people put themselves beforeothers. Now I’m not suggesting that you leave for a golfing holiday just as your wife goes into labour or that you choose a spa break over a relative’s funeral but I do believe that if you don’t factor in some time for yourself, you will explode like a pressure cooker. And nobody wants to clear up that sort of mess.
Women are usually the worst for this one as those evil little pod people, sorry, I mean ‘children’, can make you feel very selfish if their needs don’t come first. Naturally when sprogs are babies, you shouldn’t leave them with a dirty nappy and no food while you go get your nails done. I hear that sort of thing is frowned upon. But you should definitely come to an arrangement with the gentleman who provided 23 of those chromosomes that make up your little bundle of joy so that you can both enjoy at least one evening a month away from the demands of the petite dictator. And if you can rope a willing relative into looking after Junior so you can both escape together, so much the better.
Adopt a similar policy with regards to housework. Paid work is harder to get selfish about (unless you’re the boss and can delegate things) but you can certainly ensure an equitable division of labour at home. But don’t be rigid about it. If you love ironing but hate hoovering and your partner loves hoovering but hates ironing, you have the makings of a beautiful partnership. If you both hate doing everything, spend Junior’s college fund on a cleaner. It’s not selfish, it’s sensible.
Here’s an idea for you…
Borrow a film that only you want to watch. Hog the TV and DVD player and watch that film that only you want to watch. If your partner or family protest, stick your fingers in your ears and go ‘la-la-la-I’m not listening-la-la-la’ until they get fed up and leave.
Defining idea…
‘I am a greedy, selfish bastard. I want the fact that I existed to mean something.’
HARRY CHAPIN, the musician and humanitarian philanthropist.
How did it go?
Q If I stop doing all the things I do for my family, they just won’t get done. I don’t want to live in a hovel – what’s the solution?
A Create your own oasis of calm. Choose a room that you will primarily be in and keep it spotless and perfect, while the rest of the house goes to pot. Eventually your family will realise that they have to pitch in. Or alternatively giant rats will infest the house and eat your family. Either way, problem solved.
Q I’ve forgotten how to have fun doing things I enjoy – will my pleasures always hinge on other people’s?
A Don’t worry, I know how you feel; the first time I went off on a break by myself I felt so bored, I felt like going home. But by the third mini-me-break, I was having a fantastic time. You have to retrain yourself to enjoy your pleasures.
Q I did carve out ‘me time’ this month and went out to dinner with my best friend. My husband accused me of being selfish because it coincided with the night he wanted to invite his mum round. Now both of them are acting like I’m devil spawn; how do I get over that reaction?
A Well done! If you’ve never been accused of being selfish and one month of doing a couple of things for yourself gets you the accolade of being ‘selfish’, you’ve come far, kid. Develop a thick skin. You don’t have to always put yourself first but when you do, don’t let anyone bully you out of it.