Four Tips for Self-Care when You're (Still) Working from Home
By Aasha Foster-Mahfuz, PhD., Miklos Hargitay, PsyD., Peggy Loo, PhD & Eleanor McGlinchey, PhD
For some of us WFH has come with perks, for others it has been an unbelievable challenge we are barely surviving. None of us were expecting to WFH (or have loved ones WFH) for this long, and all of us need self-care.
Our psychologists answer the question: What tips do you have for self-care when you’re working from home?
Tip #1: Personalize your self-care strategies
Dr. Hargitay: Trying to add self-care strategies to your life can feel like another thing that has to be “checked off the list”. If you’ve ever tried to start a new hobby or new practice with an already busy schedule, it feels as if you should be doing it, rather than you want to. Ironically, we can be disconnected to the “self” part of self-care. Especially when working from home where routines feel redundant, adding activities that aren’t experienced as meaningful is even less appealing. What can be helpful is to connect the reason why you’re engaging in a self-care activity with the value that is relevant to you. For instance, exercising daily may be more successful if it’s connected to a specific physical health value (e.g., It’s important to me that I can be active with my kids). This bridge with values may not make your self-care strategy form overnight, but it will put into perspective why it matters personally to you, which is a great motivation we can often forget.
Tip #2: Plan now so you won’t have to later
Dr. McGlinchey: When working from home, I find it is too easy to respond to the day ahead with ambivalence. I often let the remote meetings dictate what I do with my day and barely plan anything else. Even when I do make “healthy” plans like going for a walk with a friend or practicing good sleep hygiene, the pervading blah feelings usually make me feel far from cared for. Therefore, one thing I’ve found which ensures that I care for myself (and practice what I preach) is to set up my days and environment so that “happy habits” can occur without needing to plan very much. It might take a few days (or weeks!) of disciplined, intentional planning to get to this point, but then the positive benefits of self-care take over to make the new habit an easy one to fall into. When covid hit, I felt pretty discouraged about losing my exercise routine at first. But then I found an online version that I enjoyed, figured out the space in my apartment that I would use, and mapped out the best time to do it. This ended up being a happy habit that I am still benefiting from today. The process of resetting my routine is one that I must do often. It usually isn’t fun or enjoyable at the beginning but honestly, neither is feeling ambivalent and blah day after day! The other side of this is that I also have to watch out for the happy habit becoming a marker of my success for the day. Beating myself up over not attaining my self-care goals for the day is not going to improve my health. Tomorrow is another day, and I will seek to continue to extend grace to myself in order to truly experience care.
Tip #3: Learn how to set boundaries
Dr. Foster-Mahfuz: While I spend most of my day following a typical not-from-home work schedule, I do live with someone who works from home. The biggest issue I've observed is knowing when to draw the line between work and home life. Sure, there are times when you need to be on the computer a little longer because a Zoom meeting ran long or the dog insisted on playing with you for half an hour so you need to work another half hour. But working well into the wee hours cuts into TLC time for yourself and quality time for loved ones. So, if you can, have a "cut off" time and stick to it. Since I'm the one coming home, my partner uses my arrival home as his cut-off time (though I'm pretty sure he sneaks in more work after I go to sleep!). This way, we can have time together and decompress.
Tip #4: You might need to try something new
Dr. Loo: Humans are wonderfully paradoxical. We want familiarity and spontaneity, we want our routines and new experiences. We enjoy resting yet love feeling energized, we need time alone but crave connection. Working from home has emphasized all of what I call the “quieter” needs we have to flourish in life, like predictability, structure, and solitude. But we also need novelty, challenge, and stimulation to be healthy. Before covid, my self-care needs were usually in the “quieter” lane. Being a full-time psychologist where no two sessions are the same and I am constantly oriented outward towards others – unwinding activities with plenty of unhurried space to myself felt like self-care. That is, before covid and 18 months of working from home. Even though I’m still providing therapy now, the experience of doing so online and at home has (unexpectedly) changed what feels like taking care of myself. While I still need my own space, what I do with that time has changed. Now I gravitate towards things (that I used to intentionally avoid after work) because of their activating effect – from high action tv shows and suspense novels to taking on random, small new projects with lots of steps. My advice is – if what you used to do for self-care doesn’t feel additive anymore, be open to changing it up! Maybe even in the opposite, paradoxical direction because of how WFH has changed your life or your lifestyle with someone who is WFH. Since I’ve had the “calming type” of self-care habits for years, it took me awhile to recognize that it wasn’t doing that much for me - because I simply kept trying what worked for me in the past, pre-covid. Try something very different and see!
About the Therapists: Drs. Foster-Mahfuz, Hargitay, Loo, & McGlinchey are licensed psychologists at MTC who have been part of the WFH social experiment for the last 18 months via teletherapy. While we are incredibly thankful to be part of a profession that allowed a seamless transition to online sessions - we look forward to supporting your full in-person self (beyond your head and shoulders on video) one day soon.