It wasn’t a big production. No makeup chair, no racks of borrowed clothes, no team buzzing around me. Just me, a (brilliant!!) photographer, and the streets of New York during fashion week. People rushing past with their own agendas while I paused in front of brick walls, crosswalks, scaffolding. A low-key shoot, nothing glossy. Except for the feeling: this one was mine.
No one had asked me to do this. No one wanted me to do this. No one cared. Just me.
And that made it feel almost indecent—because I couldn’t frame it as productive. It was pure desire, pure choice. Documentation of a person I’ve worked hard to become.
We’re taught early that a “good woman” is endlessly giving. Share your time, your softness, your calendar. Be helpful, be accommodating, be low-maintenance. The problem is, when your worth is measured by what you give, you can forget how to choose. You become a supporting character in your own life. Excellent at logistics, allergic to desire.
This isn’t a manifesto for cruelty. I’m not arguing for meanness or for hoarding. I’m arguing for a different definition of selfishness: centering your aliveness without asking permission. Sometimes that looks like a street shoot you don’t need. Sometimes it’s a two-hour window where you are unavailable to anyone but yourself. Either way, it’s a reorientation. You move from proving to choosing.
What keeps us small
I don’t think most of us wake up and decide “I’ll abandon myself today.” We get there by inheritance. Wuiet scripts we absorbed so early they feel like truth. Here are a few I’ve met in myself (and heard echoed by friends), plus how I’m trying to rewrite them:
1) The likability loop
If you believe being chosen depends on being liked, you’ll sand down every edge. Assertiveness starts to feel like a liability.
Rewrite: likability is weather; integrity is climate. I can be warm and direct. If someone confuses clarity with coldness, that’s information, not a reason to shrink.
2) The martyr problem
We’ve been taught that sacrifice is proof of love. The emptier you are, the better you’re doing. On Indian Idol I remember every mothers day they would talk and talk about how many sacrifices all their moms had made. I couldn’t help but wonder these same women who were the daughters today would also lead their lives making sacrifices. Where does it stop?!
Rewrite: depletion isn’t devotion. If I want a generous life, I need something to give. That means resourcing myself on purpose.
3) The productivity alibi
Self-care that exists only to make you better at work is still… work. The bath that earns you more output tomorrow is a business investment with bubbles.
Rewrite: fun counts when it leads nowhere. Pleasure with no ROI is not a moral failure.
4) The external audience trap
“If it isn’t posted, did it happen?” When you live on an invisible stage, it’s easy to perform instead of experience.
Rewrite: choose your witness. Sometimes it’s the group chat; sometimes it’s no one. Private joy still counts as joy.
5) The money guilt
Spending on yourself can feel frivolous or irresponsible, especially if you learned thrift as a virtue.
Rewrite: I keep a “Self-Celebration” line in my budget. The number can be modest or wild; the point is that it exists, and it doesn’t require a footnote.
6) The perfection trap
If you can only show up when you’re flawless, you’ll never show up.
Rewrite: be beautifully eighty percent. Go as you are, take the picture, book the thing. The moment doesn’t need to be a masterpiece to be meaningful.
7) The time scarcity story.
Women still do more unpaid care work; the hours we give away are often invisible.
Rewrite: schedule your time with the same seriousness you schedule everyone else’s. If it’s not on the calendar, it’s not real.
8) The age policing script.
We’re told visibility has an expiration date. Dress your age, mute your boldness, aim for tasteful quiet.
Rewrite: visibility is not a phase; it’s a practice. Every year I’m in this body is a year I’ll dress it like it’s alive.
But can we really solve this systemic problem on an individual level?
I have complicated feelings about women’s magazines, social media, and the larger media machine because they’ve been both a ladder and a labyrinth. On the good days, you see an honest essay that names something you felt but couldn’t articulate. You see body neutrality make room for the days you don’t “love” everything, and yet you still go outside in a tank top. You see fashion framed as play, not performance; beauty framed as care, not correction. Some publications have even questioned the obsession with “anti-aging,” nudging us away from treating time like an enemy and toward treating it like a collaborator. More of that, please.
And then there’s the other current: empowerment sold back to us. For a while, the “girlboss” aesthetic turned liberation into a shopping list—buy productivity, wear hustle. Wellness turned into optimization in soft lighting. You can end up believing that if you just buy the right serum and the right smoothie blender and the right planner, you’ll unlock a life that finally feels allowed. Worse, algorithms can make visibility feel risky. The louder you get, the more commentary invites itself in.
So how do you consume all this without losing yourself? I don’t know if I have a solution, But here is what I attempt to do: Treat media like a mood board, not a manual. Borrow what expands you; mute what shrinks you. If it’s nourishing, keep it. If it’s instructing you to become palatable, press the little X.
What the NYFW shoot gave me (that had nothing to do with pictures)
Back to that day on the sidewalk. Here’s what I actually bought with that “selfish” choice:
Time that wasn’t negotiable.
Attention from someone whose job was to hear and amplify my vision.
Taste—the relief of saying, “This is how I want to look,” and not apologizing for it.
Memory—photos for an audience of one, future me.
Authority—the right to say “that’s the shot” and trust myself.
Joy—stupid, grinning, fizzing joy. The kind that doesn’t need a caption.
None of that required anyone else to gain anything else from it!
Your turn?
If the word “selfish” still makes your shoulder blades tense, try this:
Micro (10–20 minutes): Take a phone-free walk. Order a coffee and stare out the window. Put on lipstick at 3 p.m. for no reason.
Mini (1–2 hours): Book a local portrait session. Take a class you’d never monetize. Go to a museum alone and skip the plaques that bore you.
Major (half day): Build a mood board and do a styled self-shoot; take a day trip with a “no favors, no errands” rule.
Maxi (weekend+): A solo retreat with a theme: rest, curiosity, craft, or pleasure.
Add a Self-Celebration line to your budget or your calendar. Money tight? Make it time. Overbooked? Make it visibility—share one thing you’re proud of with one safe person. And practice the No-Justification Script. When someone asks, “Who’s it for?” try saying, “Me,” and end the sentence there. Full stop is a muscle; it gets stronger.
A note about reality: identity and context matter. Not everyone moves through the world with the same safety. “Taking up space” doesn’t have to mean maximum exposure. It can mean choosing a space where your nervous system can exhale—private, small, protected. You’re not less brave for tailoring your visibility to your life.
I keep thinking about that moment—not the camera shutter, but the quiet click inside me. I booked the shoot because I wanted to see myself the way I feel: vivid, particular, unborrowed. The pictures are beautiful, but the practice is better. I stopped auditioning for my own life.
If you’ve been waiting for outside permission, consider this the slip. Book the thing. Wear the drama. Take up space that doesn’t need to be explained. Let celebration be data: when I choose myself, I feel more alive. That’s enough.
And if you do something “selfish” this week—micro, mini, major, or maxi—tell me. Or don’t. It still counts.
Photo Credit: Karya Schanilec
I teach my kids that the most important person they need to love isn't their mama, it's themselves. And they see it in the way I do self-love - when I leave the house for my regular dance class, or my solo trips abroad, or when I get a manicure just for me. Your photos are fantastic, just like you ❤️ I hope you never stop taking them
YES to all of this! This is so good and so important for women. And the pictures are fantastic and you will cherish them forever! Loved starting my Saturday with this reminder to myself to be “selfish”. Thank you.