Outreach Is Outrageous Self-Care

People often ask me why I say outreach is outrageous self care – it peaks people’s interest enough that they will often call me to explain this philosophy. 

The answer is simple: outreach changed my life. 

Relationships felt confusing and beyond challenging for me since I have endured many decades of relational trauma. I struggled to tell safe people from unsafe people because the people I loved and thought loved me didn’t help me. After starting ACA, I realized the people I was asking for help could not help. They could not even help themselves let alone me. 

I spent years trying to prove myself. I made other people my higher power.  I was lonely, and lived in the quicksands of overthinking, overcaring, and overfunctioning. These characteristics kept me stuck and distracted. 

I felt isolated.
I felt scared.
I felt alone.

While I had done outreach calls all along, it wasn’t until this year (year 8) that I decided to do something different: Make calls even though I was not in a panic. And make a lot of them. I picked up a phone list at a meeting and started dialing. Name after name. One conversation at a time. Some people didn’t pick up. Some did. It didn’t matter the outcome, it was about my action. Dialing those numbers implicitly signaled that I was worth having good relationships. I was worth getting out of my default characteristics. I was worth taking up space and letting people know I existed. 

The month of April I had 161 outreach calls and texts. And my world opened up. I started saving people’s numbers in my phone and got to know some really fantastic people who I can call to say hello or when I am in a panic. 

I was unemployed when I started doing this level of outreach. Within a week, I had a full-time job offer. 

With every conversation, the critical voices in my head became quieter. Every call helped me understand myself a little more. I began to recognize patterns I couldn’t see on my own. 

Time after time, someone would say, “I’m so glad you called. I’ve been needing to talk, but I couldn’t bring myself to reach out.”

In those moments, I realized I wasn’t a burden. I was helping someone else while they were helping me. I just went first; someone had to right?

Recovery became less about figuring everything out by myself and more about allowing myself to be seen, heard, and understood. Every outreach call reminded me that healing happens in connection.

I think of it as one of the greatest acts of kindness I can offer myself—and others.

Outreach is outrageous self-care.