We Need to Stop Our Obsession with Self-Care. Here’s Why.

This is what to do instead.

Photo by Anthony Tran on Unsplash

The self-care business is booming.

Everywhere I look, there are tips, products, TED talks and social media posts about the importance of self-care, and the consequences of not getting enough.

I have nothing against self-care, per se. I took a recent quiz entitled “How High Maintenance Are You?” and scored almost embarrassingly high. Truth is, I like my massages, my freshly manicured nails and my complicated lattes. I enjoy my boutique barre classes and my afternoon walks.

I’m here, however, to share an alternative, possibly divisive, viewpoint, which is this:

Let’s focus less on our increasing need for self-care, and more on creating lives we don’t need to escape from in the first place.

What Are We Running From?

I truly believe that our increased obsession with self-care stems from our over-full, increasingly stressful, never-enough culture.

As our lives becomes more chaotic, we try to compensate with fancy chocolates, buying a new outfit, or taking a bubble bath.

As a society, we’ve lost the art of taking our emotional and psychological temperature, of knowing when we need to take…