The Self-Care Mindset

CHAPTER 1What If We Have Self‐Care All Wrong?

“Self‐care is not something we do after work to recover; it's how we work better all day long so we don't have to recover.”

In 2019, the self‐care industry surpassed $10 billion in revenue and is still growing steadily. Since the COVID‐19 pandemic, online searches for self‐care‐related topics and products have increased by 250 percent. The market is booming and apps, hacks, snacks, creams, bath salts, diets, juices and a mountain of other products and services entice people looking for help. Most of us are looking for answers to help us survive our lives a little better, avoid the burnout and exhaustion we feel, or discover diet options to lose the COVID‐15 we put on during lockdown. As conversations about mental health have increased, there's been a rallying cry to care for our physical, emotional, and mental well‐being.

But it's not working, is it?

Instead, we have an entire population feeling burned out, frazzled, and thinking spa treatments, bubble baths, and aromatic candles will somehow make our problems go away. Prior to COVID, we were already experiencing a public health epidemic. We have to ask if taking time off to pamper ourselves to recover from work is really sustainable and how we really want to live. After all, many of us feel like nothing has changed after taking a few days off; within a day or two of returning to work, our vacation often feels like a distant memory.

It took me two burnouts and losing both of my ...