Radical self-care is often a priority when workplace demands run counter to your mental health.
In a recent World Health Organization (WHO) and International Labor Organization joint policy brief, mental health guidelines were outlined for the working population as an estimated 12 billion workdays are lost annually due to depression and anxiety, costing the global economy nearly $1 trillion (U.S.). Still, many business leaders continue to practice old hat tricks from the dark ages. They believe self-sacrifice, iron-fisted leadership and criticism build the organization and the company’s bottom line. And they believe when the company requires employees to work longer and harder, it gets a bigger bang for its buck.
What Is Radical Self-Care?
In the face of these types of extreme work challenges, sometimes employees must go to extremes and take radical steps to protect their mental health to get people’s attention. Radical self-care involves going beyond merely saying no and setting boundaries. It entails going against popular opinion or refusing to appease others, even when they call you selfish or weak.
At the 2021 French Open, for example, Naomi Osaka was suffering from anxiety and depression. After openly sharing her vulnerability with the powers-that-be, the tennis great refused to talk to the media. The head honchos at Grand Slam Tournaments demanded she face the media or be disqualified. Refusing to comply and further traumatize herself, the tennis champ did a courageous thing. She put her foot down amid scathing public criticism that she was spoiled, weak and selfish and pulled out of a job she deeply loves instead of sacrificing her mental health. Public reactions showed that workplace mental health continues to be a divisive topic that doesn’t get the same billing as a broken arm or sore throat.
When the spotlight is on famous people, we often perceive them as superhuman, immune from the struggles of everyday hard workers. But mental health struggles are universal. Fame and fortune don’t inoculate us from these challenges, and speaking out whether you’re a judge or janitor is a strength, not a weakness. We all have a responsibility to protect our mental health from exploitative work cultures. Osaka’s treatment has implications for all workplace conditions for employees everywhere facing punitive demands without regard to human well-being.
Tennis champ, Naomi Osaka, is a role model for employees everywhere to put their mental health over ... [+]
Radical self-care is caring as much about how you treat yourself or allow yourself to be treated as you do about the expectations of others and being willing to take drastic steps—going to unpopular extremes if necessary—to take care of yourself and protect your mental and physical well-being at all costs. Radical self-care includes these key elements:
- Radical prioritization of your own well-being—the airplane analogy with the deployed oxygen mask—over the well-being of others
- Extreme boundary management and balance between work and life
- Radical selection of your friends and support network (energy creators versus energy suckers)
- Sharp awareness of emotions and triggers and ability to nip strong reactions and escalations in the bud
- Priority commitment to proactive mental and physical health (mindfulness, exercise, breaks, hobbies, and eating habits)
- Hard-nosed ability to ditch your concern of disappointing others
- Willingness to go against popular opinion
- Drastic ability to say no even when it’s not easy and inconvenient for someone you care about
- Mindful awareness to choose your heart over your head when your mind says yes and your heart says no
- Self-acceptance that it’s impossible to give one hundred percent to everything
Seven Ways To Practice Radical Self-Care
After the pandemic and with the onset of the Great Resignation, the American workforce is no longer willing to turn off the lights in their offices and cower behind a potted plant to protect themselves against toxic workplace demands that compromise their mental health. And no longer are they willing to pay the price of burnout as a “normal” side effect of hard work. Work should not burn us out or make us sick. Here are seven healthy strategies to put make your mental health a priority at work:
- Make your mental wellness a top priority and take steps to protect it daily, even if your company doesn’t. Practice “me time” regularly, throw people-pleasing out the window if it conflicts with your mental health. What Osaka did wasn’t selfish or narcissistic; it was radical self-care. She’s the only person on the planet who knows what actions to take to protect and sustain her own emotional well-being.
- Maintain control over your career. Speak up if you feel mistreated at work, and don’t make career decisions that compromise your mental health. Advocate for your wellness, no matter the pressure from your employer, and don’t back down when your mental health is at stake.
- Set healthy boundaries. Follow Naomi Osaka’s example of being willing to say no when companies make unreasonable demands that run against the grain of your mental health. Saying no more than you say yes is a trait of healthy and successful people.
- Avoid self-shaming. You are not weak or selfish when you refuse to subject yourself to unhealthy workplace demands. You’re a normal person responding to an abnormal situation. Some employees are born with pit-bull determination, while others are more vulnerable to the slings and arrows of workplace pressures.
- Maintain a close, strong support system. Enlist family, friends and coworkers you can lean on in times of turmoil. Serena Williams and Michael Phelps came to Osaka’s defense and supported her decision to take care of herself.
- Exhibit a professional attitude. Tennis champ Naomi Osaka released a statement expressing the hope that both parties can find solutions to this controversial ordeal in the future.
- Consider leaving the job. No one can tell you to quit your job without knowing the intimate details of your work and personal life. It might be worthwhile to consult with HR or a counselor to weigh pros and cons of leaving a job that doesn’t provide meaning and purpose, that is toxic or that requires you to sacrifice your mental health and well-being.
