It’s easy to forget one simple fact: real self-care doesn’t always feel good in the moment. 

You see, it’s not just about comfort, it’s also about capacity. Real self-care is the deliberate act of tending to the roots rather than painting the leaves. It’s the choice to invest in what sustains us, even when the return isn’t immediate. 

At its core, real self-care builds resilience. Not just by protecting us from discomfort, but by preparing us to meet it with presence and integrity. 

There’s a myth that I want to address immediately too: self-soothing as self-care. Much of what we call self-care today is actually self-soothing. There’s nothing wrong with rest, indulgence, or temporary escapes because we all need moments to just exhale. But when these become our primary forms of self-care, they can quietly erode our resilience. They teach us to flee discomfort instead of building the inner trellis to meet it. 

If you’re wondering why I’m using so many gardening references, well, it’s Spring. It’s time to tend to every garden. 

Real self-care is the boundary you hold even when it’s hard. It’s the early bedtime, the difficult conversation, the journal entry that you resist writing. It’s the therapy session you keep showing up to. And it’s the daily physical exercise when your mind tells you that you’re too tired, but the spirit reminds you to move the energy through. 

Resilience Isn’t Resistance

There’s a big difference between being hardened by life and being honed by it. 

Resilience doesn’t mean pushing through at all costs. That’s endurance, and endurance alone can burn us out. Resilience is adaptive. Resilience bends but doesn’t break. It knows when to pause, pivot, persist. And it’s cultivated through practices that anchor us, not distract us. 

True self-care builds this adaptability. It widens the window of tolerance. It makes space for our emotions instead of suppressing them. It allows us to meet grief without crumbling, to sit with uncertainty without rushing to fix it, and to hold complexity without falling into simplicity. 

The Practice of Real Self-Care

The most resilient folks that I’ve met on my life’s journey have rituals, not routines. They know that resilience isn’t something you have. They know it’s something you do, daily. Real self-care looks different for everyone but:

• Saying no so your nervous system can recalibrate
• Eating whole foods because your body is a site of wisdom, not just a machine to fuel 
• Calling a homie instead of scrolling
• Attending group therapy or spiritual gathering to remember the spirit 
• Turning off the noise and choosing stillness, even when it feels like you should be productive 

Notice how they’re not glamorous acts, and how they’re often inconvenient. But they’re sacred. They’re the soil from which strength grows quietly. 

A reminder of the paradox: real self-care often asks us to lean into discomfort. But it does so NOT to punish us, but to prepare us. Because the more we practice being with what’s hard, the less power it has over us. 

Resilience isn’t forged in moments of ease. It’s revealed when we choose integrity over impulse, connection over avoidance, and growth over comfort. 

The Final Reflection

Ask yourself this: does my self-care comfort me, or does it nourish me? Does it help me avoid pain, or does it build my capacity to be with it?

Real self-care may not be marketable and it won’t look good on the ‘gram. But it’ll hold you when life gets hard. And when the winds get heavy, as they always do, you’ll find yourself rooted. Rooted, not because you avoided the storm, but because you learned how to stand in it. 

So, friends, let self-care be your training ground. Let it be your prayer. Let it be the way you show up for yourself and say: I am worth the effort, and I’m building something stronger than survival, I’m building a life that can hold me. 

With love, 

Gurmukh 

P.S. This is Part 3 of the Rediscovering Self-Care, here’s the link for Part 1&2