When life gets busy, we tend to ignore our own needs. 

We meet deadlines, attend birthday parties, stay on the phone way too long with our moms and completely neglect any kind of self love in the name of being a good person.

And while some of us can parade around without an emotional outlet for longer than others, but no matter how busy you stay, life — and all of it’s ugly feelings — will catch up to you.

And the longer you wait, the uglier it gets. 

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We’re people. We go through shit.

We get our hearts broken and stay quiet about it. Our feelings get hurt, and we tell people we’re fine.

We ignore our own negative emotions because we don’t want to bring people down, and we want to move on from the sad chapter of our lives.

I mean, who wouldn’t, right? 

It seems like spending an afternoon or even a full day to focus inward and make sure you’re processing everything would be a huge waste of time. We've got busy ass calendars and even though we're still hurting inside, we'd rather spend our time on a fun night out than a depressing night in. 

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Well what if I told you that doing so every now and then — especially after going through something like a breakup — could save you from mentally breaking down at a bar later on? 

If you don’t feel through your feelings, they will come out in some way or another.

And in my personal experience, that's usually after a few drinks. Alcohol does this wonderfully awful thing where it lowers your filter and destroys all semblance of your self pride and respect until your sobbing in your bathtub eating a PB&J. 

Self love is typically thought of as this beautiful and delicate process where a girl takes bath with rose petals and artfully journals her inner most thoughts for an hour or so and she's somehow magically wiped clean of all of her repressed emotions. Uh, no. 

Maybe that's worked for some of you, but for me it's never been that easy or pretty enough to Instagram. 

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How you practice self love doesn't matter. It's more about is about taking action to get out all of the crap that's been building up inside of you before it gets out on it's own, than creatively expressing your feelings on a canvas that you hang above your mantel. 

It's not fun, but it's more proactive than hoping and praying it doesn’t happen in at a work function in front of your boss. 

While it's probably best to recommend journaling, therapy or some other sober method of getting in touch with your emotions, I have personally experience a good ol fashioned, get drunk alone/with close non-judgey friends and cry session and it was kind of life changing.

Some serious shedding went down and I woke up feeling kind of like a new person, well a new person with a serious headache. 

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I have little to no answers when it comes to being a fully functioning adult, but what I do know is that you’re thinking will remain clouded and your motivation will stay at dangerously low levels if you don’t take care of yourself. 

So whether you're processing process includes a fountain pen and a bath bomb or just a big glass of chardonnay, make you make time for it.

Giving yourself a night to yourself is the best way to close this sad chapter and move on to the next one.