what I’m learning about (self)care
“Self-care is revolutionary.”
Maybe you have heard this phrase and you may even have some self-care practices that you do to feel like you actually care about your well-being, state of your nervous system and how you are able to resource yourself when feeling depleted (too often for me). Is it just a moment of time-out, or a pause to go into the void of nothingness? Because that is not enough, and certainly not revolutionary.
Self-care has been packaged and sold to us in pastel boxes selling us face masks, scented candles and bubble baths. While none of these are inherently wrong(?), something sacred has been stripped away. Self-care didn’t begin here… We know this, right?
I was once of the belief that treating myself was self-care. As in booking myself a massage when I am feeling overwhelmed and stressed, switching my phone on DND and taking a full day (or 2) to immerse myself in media (watching series), buying something I’ve wanted for a while a felt I deserved… You know what I mean? All are valid, but not entirely understood. (I still do these things though)
It is important to note that self-care didn’t begin as an indulgence - it began as a survival strategy. Especially for those who were never given the luxury of ease.
“Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare."
- Audre Lorde
This quote is a declaration born from the body of a black, queer, chronically ill poet and activist who understood that care, for those whose lives are constantly devalued, is survival work. When Lorde wrote this, she was challenging a world that demanded her labour over her life. Political warfare here in this context does not mean violence of any kind, it means radical resistance through care.
Her words remind me that tending to my body, mind, and creative spirit in a world designed to exhaust and erase is resistance. This understanding of self-care is intentional. Radical. And very, very necessary.
It didn’t compute until I found myself tired in ways I couldn’t name. As someone whose work has always been rooted in service, problem solving, translating visions into product, emotional, communal and technical support… People come to me for my labour, it’s beautiful and I’m grateful. But also: it’s exhausting. Being a creative (service provider) in the world of digital noise and clutter is not for the tender-hearted people at all… It is soul-crushing. I had to find myself whilst still in the noise and clutter.
“We are socialised into systems that cause us to conform and believe our worth is connected to how much we can produce. Our constant labour becomes a prison that allows us to be disembodied. We become easy for the systems to manipulate, disconnected from our power as divine beings and hopeless. We forget how to dream. This is how grind culture continues. We internalise the lies and in turn become agents of an unsustainable way of living.”
― Tricia Hersey, Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto
To arrive at the conclusion that my creativity itself is the resource that both drains me and sustains me was incredibly uncomfortable. I sat with this for a while. Recognising it and being able to name it was frustrating, but helpful. I had to journey my way back in time, through many years of how I had abandoned myself and chose otherwise in the name of career advancement and/or job security. In a world that constantly demands I be productive, available, and useful, I found myself pouring out way more than I was ever pouring back in. And I began to ask: who am I outside of what I give?
That’s when I realised I needed to reclaim self-care and learn to embody what it really means for my creative spirit. Self-care as remembrance, deep nourishment and divine inspiration. It’s not always easy. But again, very necessary.
I started making art and sharing it incognito (more on this to come). I felt into the tender, vulnerable spaces within myself… My childlike self. She who is inspired, curious, explorative, dreamy, risky, quirky… She who is self-sustained and incredibly resourceful. I could sense that this has always been what nourishes me.
Because this life, this creative life - it’s not sustainable unless I tend to the one doing the tending. My care can’t wait for time off. What resources me now is what I am defining as creative care.
“You were not just born to centre your entire existence on work and labour. You were born to heal, to grow, to be of service to yourself and community, to practice, to experiment, to create, to have space, to dream, and to connect.”
― Tricia Hersey, Rest Is Resistance: A Manifesto
So, what is Creative Care?
It’s about making space for feeling, for processing big emotions, for reclaiming joy, for reimagining self and society. It is not at all about making ‘nice’ or aesthetic art.
For me, it is using creativity as an offering. I do this by reframing through collage as sacred play, crafting meaning through poetry and journalling, DIY zines as emotional processing and community work that uses creative process as relational healing. Art is a space for grief, joy, rest, and resistance. Including everything in-between and all around.
Creative Care challenges dominant systems that prioritise productivity, perfection and profit over process and presence. This is how I tend and mend the parts of myself needing my attention. It’s how I metabolise big emotions, how I connect to memory, and how I move through the world with more (internal) clarity.
If you weren’t so busy… what would you do?
Let yourself go there…
What have you been saying you’ll do when there’s more time?
What’s been calling you quietly for years?
What lights you up but also feels almost too tender to admit?
What have you always felt was too indulgent, too slow, too much?
Where do you keep putting yourself second? (or last?)
To deconstruct self-care means to separate maintenance from nourishment, question what you've been taught it should look like, notice where guilt shows up, reclaim creativity, rest, solitude, pleasure, and slowness as care, and realise that not everything needs to be productive to be valid.
This is what I want to share, not as content, rather as process documentation and archival.
Not to perform, but to practice.
My newsletter will be a mix of:
Personal writings on grief, creative recovery, and slowness
Reflections on self care and community care through an anti-oppressive lens
Notes from my facilitation work and art practice
Collage, poetry, zines, and artistic explorations
Creative prompts and gentle invitations
Resources, rituals, and tools for those walking parallel paths
I’ll be posting 1–2 times per month, maybe more if something moves me.
If you’re a sensitive soul, a curious maker, a tired healer, or just someone trying to move through the world with some care… you are most welcome here.
With love and care,
Julia Joy
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