Self-care: Away from Productivity and Towards Leisure

Have you heard of self-care?

Self-care. SELF-CARE. SELF-CARE.

The Internet is awash in inspo-posts on the importance of self-care, on how to breathe properly, relax properly, prepare for bed properly, and love oneself properly.

From my perspective, it sounds like another chore, another benchmark to be made if we’re not careful. In addition to worrying about deliverables at work, I’m now expected to meet mental health deliverables in my home.

And for whom? My boss?

I recently read an article that asked: “Is your self-care practice fueling your burnout?”

the commercialisation of self-care can mean big profits for brands, but what also must be unpacked is how individual practices of self-care may also benefit capitalism in another way. More than simply taking basic good care of yourself so you’re fit and healthy enough to work, this is optimising yourself so as to life-hack your way to performing ever better under a value system that holds work in such high regard. We might turn to self-care to sooth our stresses and also to boost our productivity, but, as the rise of burnout might suggest, self-care does not actually seem to be fixing burnout.

Self-care must move away from being an individual pursuit that puts the responsibility of maintaining one's mental health squarely on overworked and overburdened people. Instead, we must move towards a more interconnected way of interacting in homes, at work, and in public, where it is not an individual duty to be healthy, but a social responsibility to provide conditions that promote health.

That means revitalizing our work spaces to induce less stress. Which ultimately means those most directly effected by working conditions must be the ones most loudly heard and in control of those spaces.

Self-care is not a destination we go to when burnout settles in. It is a process we’ve enacted to avoid burnout altogether. It must discontinue existing for increased productivity at work, and instead be a social tool to keep our homes, hearths, communities and environment whole.

Therapists must challenge our social and economic system that creates mental health issues if they want to continue treating people experiencing its pitfalls.

We must be careful for who self-care exists for, and for what ends.