What's On Your Happy List?
Anything is self-care if it makes you feel good.
Self-care can be a fraught topic, in that many of its practices come wrapped in capitalism and sealed with a kiss from the makers of your favorite high-end seaweed sheet mask. And even “free” versions of caring for ourselves—such as taking time to nap or meditate or go for a long walk—are tied to the inherent privilege of having that time to spare in the name of self-care.
I can’t argue with any of that, but I do believe that anything counts as self-care if it makes you feel good, and that proactively identifying those things and figuring out how to manageably incorporate them into your life is one of the best investments you can make in your mental and physical wellbeing.
You could start by making a Happy List.
It worked wonders for me.
When I was thirty-one, I had my first panic attack. It happened at work and was followed closely by my second panic attack—also at work, and this time during a Very Important Meeting. A few weeks later, I found myself in a small wood-paneled office, hooked up to a biofeedback machine and cataloguing all of my triggers for my new anxiety doctor as we watched the screen go beep-boop-beep.
After we ran through all of the bad/stressful/panic-inducing stuff, she asked me to name three things that reliably make me feel GOOD.
I call it my Happy List, and at the time it looked like this:
Bubble baths
Scented candles
Burying my feet in the sand
My doctor advised me to try to incorporate each item on that list into my daily life, both to help disrupt my stress response and just generally engage in some regular and proven-effective [for me] modes of self-care.
This seemed like as good a plan as any for “no longer constantly feeling like the giant worms from Beetlejuice had colonized my chest cavity,” and I was eager to give it a shot. However, because my specific goal was to nip anxiety in the bud at work—and my workplace at the time contained zero tubs and many ceiling-mounted sprinklers—bath bombs and candles didn’t seem like the right place to start. Adding insult to injury, I was fourteen floors up in a midtown Manhattan high-rise not known for its sandy shores.
So, I went out and bought myself a litterbox.
Yes, you read that correctly: in the name of self-care, I, a human woman, rolled up to PetCo one afternoon to purchase an animal toilet for my personal use.
Next, I visited the DIY crafting mecca known as Lee’s Art Studio and acquired ten tubs of “all-natural art sand.” I would have preferred real beach sand, but there were no dunes within reasonable striking distance and taking the subway to Coney Island to steal dirt on my lunch break seemed like a bridge too far. (And potentially illegal.)
Then I smuggled my spoils back to the office, closed my door, knelt under my desk, and poured one container of primo art sand after another into my covert cat lavatory.
And finally—I kid you not even one little fucking bit—I sat in my chair, slipped off my shoes, buried my toes in my makeshift beach, and checked item #3 off of my Happy List.
It felt good.
Totally ridiculous, but good!
I availed myself of my new self-care strategy several times a week, and for what it’s worth, I never had another panic attack in that office. I’m not saying a litterbox full of craft sand under the desk would work for everyone, but for me?
MAJOR WIN.
FYI: Paid subscribers get tips like these EVERY Monday—on topics such as setting boundaries, time management, motivation and productivity, building confidence, problem-solving, and more.
If you’re interested in a weekly dose of no-nonsense, no-fucks-given inspiration to help you live your best life, you can upgrade at any time and I will be delighted to provide.
A bit about me: I spent 15 years as a book editor in NYC before quitting that career to pursue a freelance life (a decision that involved a lot of red wine and a lot of tears). In 2015 I had the idea for my first book, The Life-Changing Magic of Not Giving a Fuck. And people loved it, so I kept writing! Today my sweary self-help series includes Get Your Shit Together, Calm the Fuck Down, Grow the Fuck Up, and more, with 3 million copies in print all over the world. You can also find me on Instagram, where my content skews tropical (in addition to quitting my job, I quit New York entirely and moved to a small fishing village in the Dominican Republic), plus food, cocktails, travel, and cats. So many cats.
Any window with direct sunlight, stretch out on the floor and chill. I had a window at my job and a lock on my office door. Could change my mood drastically...I need sun.
I like it. Very creative way to give yourself what you need. And much easier than buying a kiddie pool and pilfering a couple of those big blue water cooler jugs.