‘Self-Care’ Isn’t the Fix for Late-Pandemic Malaise

If years could be assigned a dominant feeling (1929: despair; 2008: hope), 2021’s might be exhaustion. As the coronavirus pandemic rumbles through its 20th month, many of us feel like we are running a race we didn’t sign up for, and it’s getting longer every mile we run.

With this slog has come a renewed focus on mental health. During the pandemic, universities have poured money into psychological resources. Corporations have hired chief health officers and invested in wellness services. In 2020, the mindfulness app Headspace saw a 500 percent increase in corporate-subscription requests. Alongside these efforts, a worldwide conversation has grown around “self-care:” anything pursued for the sake of one’s own wellness, including practicing goat yoga, bingeing Ted Lasso, and old-fashioned napping. Self-care has been popular for decades, but during the pandemic it has gained new cachet. Google searches for the term more than doubled from March to April 2020. Countless organizations, including mine, implemented “COVID days”—time off meant for employees to center their own needs.

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