Reading, by Louis Tiffany (1888)
Comfort was commoditized in our culture before we even realized it was happening. Millennials who had to weasel their way to stability after the 2007-2009 recession eventually burned out and, as a result, recognized a need to focus on health and wellbeing. Enter "self-care."
But capitalism knows no limits, and all resources must be extracted and sold. As a result, self-care quickly became a commodity. Advertisements prey on our desire to feel better. For my generation, Instagram seems particularly suited to pinpoint our vulnerabilities and sell us things to address them. The entire internet excels at that game. Around the clock, the world promises that if we buy this, subscribe to that, or travel somewhere new, the peace we crave will be within reach.
The truth is, the self-care we need doesn’t require buying a thing.
This year, we've been invited to reframe our relationship with comfort. As the world shut down and those who were able to stay home went into quarantine, we had to recalibrate and lean into simple pleasures. With distractions minimized — nowhere to go, less to do, and reduced income for most — we were given a chance to return to the sweetness of everyday moments. By doing so, we reclaimed self-care from the realm of consumption. “Retail therapy” was still available online, but it suddenly came with the burden of endangering warehouse and postal workers. Many of us explored, with a new lens, comforting ourselves without spending at all.
For some, comfort arrived in the form of daily ritual: meals cooked, walks around the neighborhood, time with a beloved pet. Many sought refuge in nature. Others found it in the forced pause itself — the way the world gave them the permission to slow down they had never been able to offer themselves.
"Did the birds always sing this much?" I found myself asking almost every day on the porch.
There’s comfort in music, comfort in the sound of a friend’s voice, comfort in the people who care enough to check in. There’s comfort in rhythmically chopping vegetables and turning them into a meal. There’s comfort in sitting on a blanket in your front yard, or having time to chat with neighbors. There’s comfort in the spaciousness of a forest trail. There’s comfort in experiencing adversity, together, and finding threads of shared experience and support.
I don’t know exactly what comfort looks like for everyone, but it almost certainly shifted this spring. The time and space to reconsider comfort is a privilege in itself; marginalized communities, for the most part, had no such opportunity. After decades of under-appreciation, essential workers kept going to work, facing exposure and increased stress, which weakens immunity. We saw death rates spike in black and brown communities, our history of institutional racism and flawed systems playing out in horrific, expedited ways before our eyes. Vulnerable populations are more likely to have preexisting conditions, which stem from disparity in healthcare and food insecurity, among other things. They are less likely to have sick leave. They were not adequately equipped to fight off a threat like the coronavirus. As Jamil Smith says in Rolling Stone, “[But] we are seeing this extremely dangerous disease behave much like racism. It may get black and brown first, but the monster will ultimately kill us all.”
Self-care wasn’t popularized in mainstream consciousness until this past decade, when burnout surged, especially among millennials, and capitalism, having depleted natural and physical resources, looked towards intangible, personal ones. As a result, the wellness industry boomed. There is always a new frontier to conquer. But the idea of self-care originated decades before it became a hashtag and was influenced largely by feminist writers of color like bell hooks and Audre Lorde. In her essay “A Burst of Light,” Lorde famously said “Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.”
Intentionally preserving the self in a framework that is built to profit if we remain numb, accept its egregious imbalances, and reduce our powerful voices to something deemed palatable by the system itself is indeed a political act. This is especially true for vulnerable populations without the reserves of nutrition, medical care, and living wages some of us have enjoyed our whole lives, but it becomes so for everyone who decides all members of our communities should have access to health and the simple comforts we’ve explored in quarantine. Comfort itself, then, is political.
Though comfort comes in all shapes and sizes, especially this spring, one thing is clear: For many, it is simpler than we'd ever imagined. For others, it always stays just out of reach. I, for one, hope our refreshed perspective and ability to pause is here to stay. But we can’t truly rest until it’s offered to everyone.
Between you and me—
I have news! One afternoon this week, I was inspired by Krista Tippett’s interview with Ocean Vuong and Dave Isay’s claim that “a conversation about life’s big questions is the very definition of time well spent.” I’ve always loved Krista, and Dave is the founder of StoryCorps. Those kinds of conversations are what inspire and keep me going, and I suspect that’s also true for many of you. Even our About Page references “life’s big questions.”
I’ve always craved conversations about the inner, important parts of life, and I realized I can facilitate more of them in this space. So I’m working on a new series called “Let’s Talk.” Don’t worry, I’m not starting a podcast, but audio will be involved. “Let’s Talk” will be a series of conversations exploring the impact of the pandemic with some of the most thoughtful people I know. I’ve been buzzing about this since I thought of it, which tells me it’s the next right thing. Honestly, I’m so excited, and I hope you enjoy them. Let me know in the comments if you have ideas.
Thank you for being such a bright spot in my life each week; if you enjoyed today’s piece, click the tiny heart and forward it to a friend. See you next week.
"Intentionally preserving the self in a framework that is built to profit if we remain numb, accept its egregious imbalances, and reduce our powerful voices to something deemed palatable by the system itself is indeed a political act. This is especially true for vulnerable populations without the reserves of nutrition, medical care, and living wages that some of us have enjoyed our whole lives, but it becomes so for everyone who decides all members of our communities should have access to health and the same simple comforts we’ve explored in quarantine. Comfort itself, then, is political." Thank you!!