If you’ve been on social media or even just checked your Geneseo email, you’ll see tons of people preaching that we all need to engage in self care right now. It’s always described as “easy” or “simple” things you can do but we need to be honest with ourselves, self care is hard.
One of the main reasons engaging in self care is so difficult is because it feels selfish sometimes. Taking care of yourself is not selfish, it is okay and necessary to prioritize your needs. This does not mean you’re not caring about others and their needs, it just means that for a bit you’re prioritizing yourself to make sure you’re physically and mentally healthy.
Right now it feels like it’s necessary for us to constantly be on social media or watching the news to stay informed about all the bad things going on, but it’s okay to take a break from it all for a little while. I personally find this incredibly difficult as if I take a short nap I wake up to 40 notifications from either social media, news outlets or clubs I’m in and it feels wrong to ignore it all. You can acknowledge these messages while taking care of yourself, though.
This is when you’d send a message to your friends or colleagues saying “hey I’m currently taking a mental health break and will get back to your message soon”, so they know you’re not ignoring them, rather you just need some time for yourself. During this time you should also try deleting your social media completely, because it’s hard to ignore notifications from apps and not engage with them.
The other reason self care is hard is because it’s often not fun. Society has framed self care as doing a face mask or taking a bubble bath, but in reality it’s often cleaning your room and doing all your laundry so you have a neat space to live in, or making yourself leave your apartment and do some kind of physical activity.
For you to be in a good headspace, especially right now, you need to give yourself a good, clean place to do work and make sure you don’t just become a lump that sits in your apartment. I understand how hard these things are because I often become a human potato and don’t move for entire days from my bed, and I can tell you that it makes me feel awful.
This is why it’s important to at least go for a walk once a day, or even just go sit outside somewhere and get some fresh air.
What I recommend is just doing whatever makes you feel healthy and happy in the long run, even though it may be something that is annoying to do in the moment. It can be as small as drinking some water or as big as taking a weekend off to go camping. It’s all about what you need, because self care is personal to everyone.
But seriously, go drink some water and take a nap.