My Value vs. Our Value…

I follow a really interesting hospital chaplain named JSPark300 on Instagram. He recently shared some information from Dr. Stacey Altiam and it talked about how self-care doesn’t work for people who come from communal societal frameworks.

The West is built on the values of individualism, and in other countries built on communal values, these individualist values don’t translate.

For example, in the West, our emphasis is on “YOU” becoming something, building your own life, you graduate out of your parents’ home, start your OWN family, buy your OWN house, have your own problems, and work through it all on your OWN.

This is the way our society works. If you are still living in your parents’ home after a certain age, it is not acceptable behavior, and we are supposed to stand on our own two feet. And build our OWN life.

In other cultures, your identity, YOUR own life, is built around the family or the community. You have a role, or place within the family to play, and this is your job, your contribution, your place.

For example, in Peru, often families live in several-level homes with multi-generations. There is a support system for preparing food, taking care of children, roles, and life. The ultimate goal is not “capital”; the ultimate goal is placed around relationships, love, family purpose, meals at a table, and taking on life together.

Is one of these models the “right” one? No, when it comes to culture and humanity, we all need to learn from each other. There are pieces of health, pieces of THE way or truth in every culture.

Let’s learn from each other.

I was thinking about this idea and what Dr. Altiam shared about how our Western culture’s ideals for health don’t translate, and it made me pause and think about what we need to glean from more communal cultures.

I am passionate about teaching girls about their self-worth. And it is important to understand your value and the gifts you possess that were instilled in you from your creator. Yet we can’t stop there. We can’t stop at SELF.

You can walk around all day, saying and believing, “I am valuable, I am loved, I am beautiful, I am priceless, I am talented, I know who I am, etc.” This is right and good. But we can’t stop there.

The next piece is you have to express yourself and be in proximity, in community, in family, in a job, in a place where you express who you are and where the people around you value you, love you, know you, see you, and where you bring your gifts to the table and they are needed. Your gifts and your personhood; they contribute to something MORE than you.

It is one thing to know you are valuable and you can walk around all by yourself in that knowing, but it is in the community where you experience that “you are valuable.” Where who you are is NEEDED.

So yes, we need to understand our value but then we actually “KNOW” it or experience it through others. When we ARE valued. When we ARE loved.

Self-love will never be enough. Self-care is needed, but will never be enough. We have to move toward one another and create spaces for us to thrive, give, serve, care, love each other, and experience the glory and grace of the divine through each other.

Our trauma, our pain, our scars, our wounds are created from relationships, and we also are healed and receive our healing in relationships. The most beautiful paradox.

My dad has a saying, “Go where you are celebrated, not tolerated.” My Dear, you need this place. A place where you share who you are, to contribute to something, and to experience how who YOU are uniquely contributes to our families, our community, and our world.

You are so so valuable, my dear, and I want you to have the beautiful, amazing opportunity of giving yourself in a place where you get to experience the TRUTH. To experience how your life makes the world better, brighter, and makes ALL of us more whole.

From My Heart to Yours,