Catalina Ronzon discusses how self-care continues to be a hot topic and how College life can help us enhance our emotional wellbeing.
If you spend any time at all on Instagram or other major social media platforms, it is likely you will have come across the concept of ‘self-care’, over and over again. This usually takes the form of advertisements for whatever product is currently trending on the Internet: bath bombs, candles, face massagers, weighted blankets… Treat yourself by giving us money – we all know the drill.
Our generation is obsessed with ‘self-love’: an interesting phenomenon, since we also purport to be significantly unhappier than our millennial predecessors. Perhaps this explains – at least in part – why we are constantly turning to material goods in an attempt to fill the void.
This article does not aim to propose any definitive answers: instead, the goal is to suggest how we might combat the individualistic and ineffective standards for self-care that have become so insidious in our culture.
Human beings are social creatures. However introverted or extroverted any one of us might be, this truth remains.
In 2023, almost every person you know can be reached through a few taps on your smartphone. Yet this way of connecting with others is subject to the limitations of text message lingo: a parallel reality with its own stylistic and conversational rules.
We all have social anxiety, and our collective mental health is nothing short of disastrous. Social media gives an impression of connection, but this is not often carried over into our ‘real’ lives.
We should not denigrate social media in its entirety. It can of course be a valuable tool: for example, to communicate with those who live far away from us.
Indeed, we can find out about events taking place we may be interested in or locate people with common interests and values. The problem comes when social media is understood not as a supportive tool, but as the main arena in which to conduct ourselves socially.
Studies have shown virtual relationships, while potentially meaningful, are not as helpful as face-to-face interactions. This can create or worsen feelings of anxiety, isolation and loneliness.
So, what to do?
College life – especially life in a friendly, vibrant community like John’s – provides us with a very unique, convenient antidote for these issues. Being a Johnian means you are part of something bigger.
Why does this matter? It matters because being part of a group in and of itself can help us feel grounded and improve our mental health. We have a place, and a community that we can turn to and be involved with as much or as little as we like. We are not simply drifting from one place to another: we already are and will be Johnians.
There is, of course, so much that comes with this. With an almost endless number of activities on offer – anything from choir to rowing to nighttime movies in the SJCR – there is likely to be something you feel drawn to.
Within John’s itself, there are also several communities: LGBT, faith, College representation, and sport, among others. While there is certainly room for improving student diversity within the College, for example via more support and integration for postgraduates and livers-out, there is already a good mix of national, religious, political and other identities to engage with and learn from. Certainly, the overarching theme remains: all of us are Johnians, and all of us are welcome here.
This is not about making fifty new best friends: it is about having the opportunity to move away from egocentric understandings of self-care, and towards a more community-oriented definition. In a community, people take an interest in each other, listen to one another, and try to make the overall environment better for all: no matter their differences. When you join a college like John’s, you are saying: I am going to care about you, and you are going to care about me.
College identity is not the be-all-end-all, but it can and does present an opportunity to take up activities you haven’t before, meet people you wouldn’t have otherwise met and improve your own self-esteem by being useful to others – the latter in particular having the potential to improve our own emotional wellbeing on an individual level.
Mental health is a communal effort: in looking out for each other and the environment around us, we foster an atmosphere in which we can be cared for also. We encourage you to make use of what John’s has on offer, and to be curious about the people around you. Fides nostra victoria is our motto, which we all hope to live by. So, let’s have faith in each other, and in our ability to make St John’s a college to be proud of.
Image: StockSnap via Pixabay
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