When Did Self-Help Become Self-Care?
Unravel the intriguing evolution of self-help into self-care. Explore the journey from a focus on self-improvement to a more holistic approach towards mental, emotional, and physical well-being. Discover how this shift has influenced our understanding and practice of personal growth.
Wellness has come to encompass our latest dominant sociocultural obsession – how to take care of ourselves in the world
It may, at one point, have been understood as an extension of self-help, a category of literature and speaker circuits that is devoted to personal optimization
- However, under the potent influence of millennial values, wellness has been positioned and marketed as self-care
- This wellness is softer, gentler, more forgiving, and more fun.
Authority vs. the Me-Archy
Wellness might currently be code for “thin,” but it’s also a superstructure for those who feel ignored or condescended to by Western medicine
- Many of the newer wellness products are direct-to-consumer
- The individualization of self-care wellness includes custom vitamins from subscription services
- Self-care-specific wellness is an easy sell for women on a heroine’s journey with their bodies and feelings
The Marketing
While self-help-oriented wellness products were straight out of the health-food store with utilitarian or medicinal packaging, the aesthetic of self-care wellness branding is often minimalist, sans-serif and streamlined
- Dosist, a brand that sells pens with precise doses of CBD and THC, pitches itself as health-adjacent, appealing to a new market with a clean, high-tone look and feel
The Literature
Self-help seeks to categorize and instruct
- It might be temporarily comforting, and even galvanizing, to engage in “The Subtle Art of Not Giving a ____” or “Un____ Yourself.”
- The literature of self-care-informed wellness lives much more iteratively and personally on Instagram, in inspirational quotations and super-long captions, and on lingering blogs.
- Much of the wellness content of the internet is performative, metaphorical or gestural. Self-care seeks less often to fix and more often to understand and to soothe.
The Leaders and Vendors
The authorities of this new wellness movement sell a specific program to live by and complain about
- Jillian Michaels, Billy Blanks, and Melissa Hartwig of Whole30 are among the authorities
- Audre Lorde conceptualized self-care as a form of protest
- Gwyneth Paltrow sells products at exclusive price points
- Other wellness entrepreneurs serve the kinds of seekers who want spirituality and connection and self-awareness along with, say, great skin