Reflections on Self-Care

"Self-care" is a term that I hear more and more. Since the 2020 pandemic, a time when many of us had the opportunity to capture moments to perhaps finally really sit with ourselves, assess who we are, and take care of ourselves, questions of what's important and what it truly means to practice self-care took on a whole other complexity for many. I know it did for me, and as the years continue to march on, my exploration continues to grow.

Indeed as someone who is interested in aesthetics, makeup, skincare, bodycare, and fragrance I put a lot of enthusiasm and energy into both loving and researching the physical products and items that play a part in these disciplines. For me, beauty is important, but these things, are only ever just creative, colorful, smell-good fun. There is nothing wrong with fun, and fun has a value in and of itself that can be underrated in an ever-busy, ever- stressful world as the one in which we live. However, I see a disturbing trend of these superficially fun aesthetic items being conflated with the concept of self-care, but of course, we know self-care goes beyond what we can perceive of ourselves and each other with our physical senses. It is just hard to remember with the bombardment of overly-doctored images of celebrities, and even our fellow companions, plastered all over magazines, movies, and especially on social media. Yet, there is something else I find even more disturbing than the seemingly pervasive notion that sometimes self-care may only truly be skin-deep. It is when self-care actually makes us feel bad. I feel a quote by actress Sarah Jessica Parker really profoundly touches the surface of this:

"I think the concept of self-care makes people feel terrible and lousy and isolated that they can't afford access to or even dream of self-care."

If even this famous, successful actress can bring up this point, I think this shows that self-care really needs not just a better and broader definition, but also a more honest one. When I imagine what self-care often alludes to in our modern world, I think of things such as people talking about getting massages or getting regular work done by their chiropractors, not as a medical therapy, but purely for stress relief. I picture people shopping at Whole Foods or perhaps taking a photo of a bookshelf filled with volumes on transcendental meditation, world religions, or energy healing that they post on Instagram with all the trending hashtags related to mindfulness or simple living or "doing the work". And while taking care of one's body, eating well, and learning about ones inner life are important and arguably much closer to the whole and truer definition self-care, the over-glamorization of even these things really belittles the point and backfires on essentially everyone. It makes us feel guilty, frustrated, less than, envious, lazy, and that we are basically doing life wrong.

For one thing, so many of these popular or talked about self-care practices or resources cost a lot of money, especially to take on or indulge in regularly as we have bills to pay, people to feed, and futures to save for, relatives to care for, the list goes on. But it is not only money that is compromised with trying to ape the lavishness that seems the pinnacle of self-care but also our time. And these two resources alone are a struggle for most of the population of the world and for many completely unattainable at a given moment. For another thing, these pseudo-traditional means of self-care sometimes might not be interesting or just don't seem to "work" for someone however hard they try. Again. a lot of this could be a limitation of time, but it also could be an over-commitment to what we think self-care SHOULD be or what being fulfilled is SUPPOSED to look like. What if you hate yoga? What if after doing all the clay masks in your drugstore aisle, your face is STILL breaking out? What if you backslide on your diet? What if you finally stop your chattery brain to meditate for more than a second before your alarm beeps and makes you jump out of your skin and then you're completely un-relaxed. What if by comparison, your life doesn't seem to measure up, to any of the do-it-all moms you see blogging or the celebrities with their endless array of skincare and jetted tub bathrooms that are featured in articles? You are left to feel like you are failing, and then what is the whole point of self-care anyway? So does this mean we should let ourselves just go because "self-care" is the contemporary form of transcendence, attainable for only the pure, enlightened, and above all elite?

The answer for me is no. No to all of it. No to giving up first of all, but more importantly also no these narrow, glossy, overly-perfected definitions of self-care. The answer instead is giving yourself what you can and what is truly needed in the moment and defining things in your own, achievable terms of what works for you. You don't need the latest over-priced micro-green seaweed salad for every meal, a serving the green vegetable that is on sale in your produce section will do your body good. And if you have macaroni one day as a comfort, so be it. Sometimes to do what feels good and what we can without reserve or stress is the best medicine. You may not join a gym, but taking a walk around the neighborhood is a great, fun way to get the body moving. It is not a prescriptive lifestyle that is self-care. Nor is it a competition of chicness and luxury or about having the best of the best of everything at every turn or having some inconsistent, fake, and frankly unattainable vision of "balance".

True, genuine self-care is giving yourself grace, and from there, being in tune with what you need in the moment and what you can do for yourself in any context. Sometimes that's working hard. Sometimes it's doing something playful or adventurous. Sometimes it's studying. Sometimes it is resting. Sometimes it is sitting and just breathing. It is in and of itself LIVING and embracing all modes within life. But doing any of these things doesn't necessarily require any one specific item or behavior to be meaningful and certainly not one that disenfranchises you, feels fake, or leaves you feeling bad about yourself, or that you are not doing it right or doing enough. Or worst of all, that YOU are not enough. Perhaps to get to its core self-care is caring about the self. No green juice required