Choose yourself

Do you struggle with complaining when you receive bad service? You don't want to get the person that is giving you below par service into trouble, right? Or you think you may be overreacting, after all, whatever happened is not that bad, right? If your answer is yes to one or all of the above questions keep reading.....

I struggle with the above quite often and I am learning to not compromise myself to make others feel comfortable. I have been, for as long as I can recall somewhat of a people-pleaser, always wanting to be agreeable and take up as little space a possible. I tolerate bad service more often than I should. I endure things/situations I have no business enduring.

A few days ago I went to get my nails done. This is one of the few things I do for myself and by myself. Every few weeks I make an appointment at my favourite nail bar, get myself a butterscotch latte and for an hour and a half or so, I enjoy someone working on making my nails look pretty. Anyway, I was due a new set so as usual, I made an appointment and got myself to the nail bar. Because of my schedule, I usually make an appointment with whichever nail technician is available so I do not have a specific technician that does my nails all the time. When she was done, I said thank you, paid for the service and walked to my car.

Something was different this time around. I set for a while trying to figure out why I felt uneasy and why I was not driving away. I realised that I do not like the nails. Then panic...what am I going to do with this information? Do I go back inside and let them know that I am not happy? Do I drive away and hope that the nails will "grow" on me? Also, if I go back inside and "complain" what am I going to say? What is wrong with the nails? The truth is that the nails were just not perfect! I felt that they were rough around the edges and I just did not like them!? I really had two options, walk away and for the next few weeks live with knowing that I betrayed myself and chose the comfort of a stranger over my own needs OR risk being labelled a b!tch and go back and ...complain..

I have been working on this for a while, practicing saying "no", speaking up when I am uncomfortable and complaining when the service I receive is not to my satisfaction. I admittedly do not always get it right but it is a work in progress. One of the things that has stuck with me in doing the work, is a quote from Untamed by Glennon Doyle:

“Every time you're given a choice between disappointing someone else and disappointing yourself, your duty is to disappoint that someone else. Your job throughout your entire life, is to disappoint as many people as it takes to avoid disappointing yourself.”

I reluctantly went back inside and told them how I felt and we came up with an amicable solution.

Why am I telling you this? Because if you do not prioritise yourself, no one else. Walking away is easy but the downside is that once again, your needs are secondary. How strangers perceive you takes priority. I am writing all this because I want to us practise saying that I matter, my feelings matter, and I will not disappoint myself anymore. I do believe that every time we accept situations and treatment that we should not be accepting, we are not only disappointing ourselves, but we are betraying ourselves.

"Choose to put yourself first and make you a priority. It's not selfish, it's necessary." Keysha Jade

Next time you are not happy with the service or treatment you receive, speak up. Let's get comfortable with asking for what we deserve. Let's accept that even the most agreeable people still have people that do not like them. You only have yourself, choose her, always.