Re-examining self care: The new conversation around personal wellness
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There is a new conversation starting around self-care. And it’s a powerful game changer.
The term ‘self-care’ pops up everywhere on social media. It’s a booming industry. But the curated posts with the hashtag ‘self-care’ have become cliché and superficial, divorced from the real and important function self-care is meant to serve.
These days you would be forgiven for thinking that self-care was all about moments of indulgence like bubble baths and expensive retreats, but the concept is rooted in powerful social justice movements and psychiatry, and the new conversation around self-care is re-examining and refreshing this concept.
In her new book, Real Self Care; A Transformative Programme for Redefining Wellness, psychiatrist and best-selling author Dr Pooja Lakshmin defines genuine self-care as a means to create real and lasting change in one’s own life for a more manageable lifestyle with space to enjoy life and thrive. This is contrasted against faux self-care, a product of a consumerist society that is more interested in selling a product than improving the lives of women.
Dr Lakshmin isn’t against the comforts of bubble baths or retreats, and neither am I – I love them and consider these helpful tools in our tool kits. However, Dr Lakshmin applies a new level of nuance and notes that we need to recognise that faux self-care can be a source of further guilt and burden for already exhausted and overly busy women, when the problems that self-care is meant to address are over simplified.
For instance, if you’re working 60-hour weeks with no end in sight and you’re feeling undervalued and taken for granted, a bubble bath isn’t really what you need. Dr Lakshmin outlines the four elements of real self-care that would be more useful than a bubble bath in this scenario; boundaries, compassion, getting really clear on what matters to you, and embracing your agency, AKA your power.
The elements Dr Laksmin outlines have the potential to create meaningful and lasting change that can bring sustainable relief and real improvement to the challenges and struggles we experience. But they require more effort than merely drawing a bubble bath.
When I read this, I asked myself; are we still talking about self-care? Something deeper and more important seemed to be rising to the surface, and that’s where the conversation around self-care is evolving.
To be prepared to take this bold approach to self-care, which might entail difficult discussions and brave choices, we need to be really clear on why it’s worth the effort.
It is worth the effort because your unique spirit is meant to unfurl, and it can’t do that if every ounce of your energy is dedicated to serving the expectations of your boss, your family, and society. That’s when we experience burnout and deep dissatisfaction, and when we lie awake at night with the question “Is this all there is?” on loop in our mind.
The fire that drives real self-care is self-respect and self-love. Respect and love for our one precious life and the wonder that it is.
When we bring the concepts of self-respect and self-love to the fore, there is space for each of us to make unique decisions that are right for ourselves. We have space to listen to our soulful self and to be led by our inner wisdom.
From here we can enact real self-care, because what else is self-care if not truly answering the question “What do I need in this moment?”. For too long, women have been told to look outside themselves for this answer. The new conversation around self-care is reminding us how to create space for finding better answers within ourselves.
I remind my clients that this is a process of unlearning and reconnecting. Unlearning the old habits that have served us well but now leave us empty, and reconnecting to the wisdom within. Baths, retreats, and yoga are beautiful and lovely things, but when we buy into the idea that they alone will be the salve to balance out the overwhelm and burden crushing women, we’re gaslighting ourselves.
So, enjoy these moments, but also get curious about what small changes you need to ease the pressure in your life, and from a place of deep self-respect and self-love, consider a small action you can take in the direction of that change.
