Episode 4: Self and Structural Care

At a time when self-care has transitioned from meaningful acts of self-preservation and rest to capitalised notions of practising a skincare routine involving exclusive products or taking an expensive vacation, it becomes imperative to examine whether self-care continues to be helpful. Lakshana, Jyotsna and Anjali discuss how structural care, through the institutions and systems that are in place, in addition to self-care and community care, could provide a more sustainable and effective solution to nurture in the way that self-care seeks to do in isolation.

About the hosts

Anjali is currently a student pursuing Master’s in Counselling Psychology at IIPR, Bengaluru. She has been a part of the juvenile justice system, curriculum development, project coordination and community-based research projects at various organisations. She identifies as an Intersectional Feminist in the making and aspires to specialise in Narrative and Feminist theories of therapeutic approach.

Lakshana is a lawyer and currently practices at the Madras High Court. She graduated from National Law University, Delhi in 2021. Lakshana is interested in minority rights, juvenile justice and the intersection between gender and education.

Jyotsna is currently a student, pursuing BSc Psychology Hons at Christ University. Her primary interest areas include neuropsychology, music and art in the form of books, mandalas and acting. She’s a mental health advocate and has also been running a non-profit called The Period Society Rajasthan to put a period to the period stigma.

Content warning: Systemic oppression, Sexism

Transcript

Welcome to “Explorations on Feminist Leadership by #One FutureFellows2022”, a podcast by the 2022 cohort of the One Future Fellows, where we discussed, examine, and learn about all things feminist leadership. 

 

Jyotsna

Hello everyone, I hope this reaches you well. I’m Jyotsna here today with Anjali and Lakshana and we’re going to talk about a very important topic that you might have heard a lot on social media or even from your friends and it is self-care. And to be more precise, today we’re going to talk about self and structural care. So before we get started, I think it would be a great idea to introduce ourselves real quick.

 

Jyotsna

So hi again, I’m Jyotsna, I’m 18 and I recently graduated from high school. I’m a major psychology enthusiast and a proud mental health advocate. I absolutely love reading books and creating mandala and just experimenting with different forms of art. And I’m the kind of person who likes taking long walks in the evening and just watch the sunset.

 

Lakshana

Hi, my name is Lakshana. I’m 24 years old and I live in Chennai. I graduated from National University Delhi last year and I started working in a law firm in Bombay right out of college till I realised that that’s really not something I wanted to do. I currently work in the Madras High Court and my job brings me a lot of joy. I work in family law, juvenile justice and gender justice. I’m hoping to one day transition from the legal sphere to the social sector. I want to open a crisis prevention and rehabilitation Center for victims of domestic violence amongst the urban poor in Chennai. I’m presently trying to be a fully functional adult and try to do as many things as possible every day that bring me joy.

 

Anjali P

Hello everyone, I’m Anjali Pillai and my pronouns are she/her. I’m currently a student pursuing my masters in Counseling Psychology and I’m super excited to be here with Lakshana and Jyotsna talking about something that is very important to our everyday life. So before we move on, I was wondering if we could, you know, talk about some of the ways in which we take care of ourselves. You know, the popular bus word which is self-care routine. So if we could discuss and we could share with each other what those are for each one of us. For example, for me, self-care is just getting a good 8 or sleep or spending some time in a park just sitting, not worrying about all the assignments that I have pending or of any of the work that is left to be done. So yeah, that’s that’s self, that’s self-care for me and I was wondering how it looks like for you both.

 

Jyotsna

That’s a very interesting question, Anjali. So I do have one specific activity that I’d like to share whenever I’m stressed, I solve math questions. Yeah, so as someone who has hated math for the majority of her life, I recently discovered that it actually might be beneficial for me. So whenever I’m solving a question, it distracts me from everything else and allows me to focus on one thing, one problem at a time. So I find that very interesting. Like solving math, but other than that I feel like I can relate a lot to you. So even for me, self-care means getting a good night’s sleep or talking to my best friend, getting my favourite snack, reading my favourite book or watching my comfort movie. Or just listening to some calm music, spending some time with myself, maybe journaling, but just allowing myself to understand what I’m feeling and giving myself enough space to create.

 

Lakshana

I think for me, it took me a while to realise that the things that I was doing for self-care, for acts of self-care, it’s just that. I mean, they just used to be things that I used to do to feel better, but now it’s like they have a name and they mean something. So I’d say that, you know, like yoga for sure. Just like stretching and like feeling the tension leave my body is big for me. My slightly overpriced skin care routine is something that I do for self-care. Taking a really, really hot shower, just lighting up a candle, sitting down and like reading a book that I’ve read many, many times and forth that I know I’m going to enjoy. I’d also say that dancing is self-care for me. Talking to somebody that I care about. You know, just like listening to that talk about that day that is too and spending time with my parents.,

 

Jyotsna

Moving on, we would like to discuss the rationale or the reason why we chose this particular topic. So we’re at a time when self-care has transitioned from meaningful acts of self preservation and taking rest to just capitalised notions of practising the expensive skin care routine involving exclusive products or taking expensive vacations. And it becomes imperative to examine whether at all self-care continues to be helpful and whether it is enough. Structural care through institutions and systems that are in place in addition to self-care and community care, could provide a lot more sustainable and effective solution to nurture and protect in the way that self-care seeks to do in isolation. So the idea is to understand how self-care is being perceived right now, how helpful it is, and if it is becoming something that one feels obliged to keep up with. And then we explore how structural care comes into place and how it gets integrated with the values of feminist leadership.

 

Anjali P

Some of the themes that we’ll be exploring in this episode of the podcast is going to be how self-care looks like at the moment, not just for ourselves but also in the media around, and how it has been redefined, the problem with the present isolated idea of self-care, how structural care comes into the picture and how does feminist leadership help in bridging the gap between structural and self-care.

 

Lakshana

So before we speak about self-care, I guess that we have to first define what self-soothing is. So I’d say that self-soothing includes activities that we, you know, sort of turn to for relief when we’re stressed or worried. They’re not necessarily things that, you know, we schedule and take time out for, but more things that we sort of naturally gravitate towards for comfort in an uncomfortable or distressing situation. It may be something we do to relieve ourselves from just generalised stress or something that’s specifically caused because of the trigger. I’d say that self soothing isn’t exactly a preventative measure that you’re taking to prevent stress, but more something that you’re doing to cure the stress that you’re experiencing.

 

Lakshana

Self soothing behaviours are often developed at a very young age as soon as we start to acknowledge our mental and physical feelings and start realising that we’re experiencing discomfort. Self-soothing behaviours themselves can be sort of negative and positive in terms of the impacts they have on you and the way that they’re perceived. Journaling for instance, or going for a walk or just like holding yourself and rocking yourself, listening to music or squeezing a stress ball could all be classified as positive self-soothing behaviours, things that have a positive impact on you and for instance let’s say substance abuse or self harm, are also self-soothing behaviours for some, but they will be viewed as negative because they’re harmful and dangerous to the person who practises them. I feel like this is a good time to sort of segue into self-care and what that means Jyotsna.

 

Jyotsna

Okay. So what exactly does self-care mean? If I had to describe it to someone, I would probably define it as a group of practices or activities that we do to just look after ourselves, to feel better. So for example, it could include taking frequent breaks while you’re working on something, or just trying to indulge into activities that make you feel calm, such as painting, journaling, listening to music, watching your favourite childhood movie again, or just hanging out with a couple of friends. It truly could be anything that makes you feel lighter and just improves your mood. So self-care, if you think about it, has always been a part of our lives. Let’s roll back to our childhood for a second. Remember when we were kids and we would try our best not to study on the weekends and just relax and just roam around the house from one room to another without having any particular task to do?

 

Jyotsna

Or when you would just lie down after a long day of homework, especially in the summer vacation in front of the cooler as a preference. Or when you would just ask your parents or your guardian or your caretaker to buy snacks or order something at home on a Sunday or any other day simply because they didn’t seem to feel like cooking? Yeah, exactly. So all of these are different ways of self-care that we see around us. But another part of it is that in recent times the main temperament with this idea is being done by focusing more on things such as expensive skincare products or things that are, you know, told as essentials. And the idea of spending large sums of money on aesthetic products gets really enforced by trends such as that girl or ‘hot girl summer’. I know that these were very trending specifically in the summertime. So these trends would highlight or would portray this image of a girl who wakes up at like 5:00 AM and journals, meditates, does yoga, works out every day, has a very clear skin, drinks really green smoothie, eats healthy and is always productive.

 

Jyotsna

Now we all have different days, right? Not all of not all five days look the same. So this idea that you need to have your life together every single day is just not something doable because we’re humans, we feel a variety of emotions. If we are feeling the emotions of absolute euphoria one day, it’s OK if we feel like we don’t want to get out of bed the next day because that’s part of our life. So the idea of looking after yourself should not be attached to some sort of luxury or even expensive products. And these trends also set unrealistic standards when it comes to self-care. So when you see these videos or you see content on social media promoting having some sort of aesthetic or must have essentials or like fifteen step skincare routine, this just sets an idea that you need to have a certain number of products so that you need to spend a certain amount of money to be able to feel comfortable in your own skin, which isn’t actually true.

 

Jyotsna

So with the growing influence that social media has on us, the idea of self-care becomes like a bare minimum and a burden instead of something relaxing because it puts so much pressure on the individual to perform certain activities in a certain way that they kind of shift their focus on what actually makes them feel calm to what they think might make them feel calm after coming across them certain content online.

 

Jyotsna

One more aspect would be the different forms of self-care. So for example, we have seen a lot of romanticization happening. We have seen a lot of reviews which are targeted to an audience who’s trying to romanticise their life no matter what happens. So while romanticising your life may seem like a good self-care practice to some people, submitting those assignments on time so that don’t feel anxious the next day is also a part of it. Resting is a part of self-care, but so is waking up early to study for that upcoming exam to build your confidence. The best way to go about with it is to determine what matters to you. Maybe talking to a friend works better for you than a full-fledged skincare routine, or even vice versa whenever you’re feeling low. A very important and often overlooked part of self-care is the ability to become comfortable with yourself and your feelings. You may not always feel or look put together, and that is a way, that is exactly where the process of looking after yourself, also known as self-care, steps in. And that is exactly what makes us human.

 

Anjali P

So then, what is community care? Community care is when the community that we are a part of comes together to support each other in whatever capacity that they can. These can also be of different forms, ranging from sharing a bowl of sugar or tea leaves to people in the community sitting together and sharing their sorrows and victories in life and celebrating and supporting each other by holding space, sharing resources, or being there for them however they can.

 

Anjali P

Now, community care is driven by empathy, compassion and accountability. For example, if a little boy from the community finds it difficult to pass his board exams, people who can come and help him in studying effectively, make it interesting for him, give him the kind of support that he needs and also hold him accountable for his actions while also being compassionate in helping him to do and feel better.

 

Anjali P

Now structural care is the support and accommodation of the systems and structures that we are directly and indirectly a part of. For example, if the same little boy who is facing problems in passing his board exams is being supported not only by his family and teachers but also by the management of the school by say, facilitating a different method of evaluation and then that design being accommodated by the State Board of evaluation, that would be structural care. Now lack of structural care is often one of the main reasons why self-care and community care become challenging aspects to integrate into our daily lives.

 

Anjali P

So why does self-care not exist in isolation? While self-care can sound and look like something everybody can do and might help in terms of coping and sometimes thriving in one’s life, that’s not exactly how it would work. So self-care cannot exist in isolation. For example, if I have symptoms of burnout and would like to take two days off to do nothing, what happens when I come back from my work, from my break when not all of my deadlines are being met, when my colleagues and the authorities in place start being bitter with me. What happens when I come back from my leave to more work which is going to do more harm than good for any of my symptoms of burnout?

 

Anjali P

So now going back to that previous example, the little boys example, what happens? What happens when the child is not able to pass his exams because his capability mostly lies in other forms of evaluation. What happens when domestic workers don’t get enough days of leave? And even if they do, it affects their salary and then they have to choose between self-care and their earnings because the structure in place is not accommodative of the individual’s or the community’s needs. This also stems from the culture of hustle, right from the lack of awareness of how important self-care is and how it’s possible to be able to practise it only if there is structural care in the form of support and compassion. And how it is perceived as a problem only by a minority of people or how it is not faced by people in power are some of the reasons why when there is a lack of structural care, what also emerges is systemic oppression.

 

Lakshana

So I’m trying to understand why structural care is the right solution to sort of combat structural and systemic oppression. It’s important to sort of internalise that self-care and community-care are not the solution, like Anjali just pointed out. So systemic oppression can only be combated by a form of care that is also systemic, something that’s put in place within the structures and the institutions that form our community system.

 

Lakshana

So for instance, mental health leaves, let’s say mental health leaves that are offered to students and employees and various institutions can be a form of structural care. These allow not only for an individual who’s availing the leave to take care of themselves, but it is also sort of a way to inform the community. It’s a way to let this community that this individual belongs to, let’s say the student community or the community that they have with their co-workers to understand that one of their own needs care and that space needs to be made and support needs to be provided for them to sort of get better. It also allows for this institution that they form a part of to be cognizant to the needs of their members and to accordingly adjust that structure if it’s required to give them the nurturing that they need.

 

Lakshana

I’d say that structural care would also empower individuals to take time to care for themselves without the fear of repercussions or let’s say, you know, think about how they’re being perceived and how their community would view them. In terms of implementation of structural care, I’d say that it could be put into place in the form of policies or agreements between the members of these structures and institutions that form our society. They could be in the form of promises that are made by those that are leading these institutions to the members to sort of like assure them that they will be taken care of and that they are a priority. I’d also say that structural care was a really long way in reasserting the importance of an individual as a member of a community, which specifically in a country like ours where groups are sort of put ahead of individuals, it’s very it’s almost like a radical act to say that the individual is important and deserving of care.

 

Anjali P

Now, all that being said, how does feminist leadership help in bridging this gap? Feminist leadership aims to advocate and take action in bridging this gap by addressing and collectively working on the root causes and certain immediate actions at different levels of the system, while also effectively listening to the stakeholders and gathering resources to take necessary steps to bring about the long overdue change.

 

Jyotsna

In my opinion, feminist leadership helps understand structural self-care as well as community self-care with a holistic lens. So it helps one understand their own values and how to implement them not only in their own life, but also in the community that they’re a part of. So in simple words, feminist leadership helps you look at yourself and the people around you as humans of multifaceted identities and aids you to tailor the resources and tools accordingly.

 

Lakshana

Thank you for that. I’d say that feminist leadership seeks to sort of use the methods of self-care and mould them in such a way that they’re systematised and can be included as a part of structural care methods. I’d probably just add that when it comes to self-care and structural care and feminist leadership, it’s sort of hopeful that institutions will be created where you know these feminist leaders themselves will be able to take care of themselves within the structures that they create.

 

Jyotsna

Thank you so much for that, Lakshana. And with that we come to an end and wrap up this conversation around self and structural care. I hope that some of these ideas helped you reflect and ponder upon a few concepts or questions or even beliefs that you might have had before. And we hope to have more of these conversations to do our part and learn more as we go through. Thank you

 

(Added to transcript, not present in episode audio)

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