International Self-Care Day: Love the Skin You’re In

Let’s face it: Stress impacts us all. And with the stress that many people face in their daily lives comes a laundry list of damaging side effects ranging from sleeplessness to mood swings to chronic anxiety. So, how do people manage their daily stressors and anxieties? In many cases, self-care is the answer.

But what is self-care, really? It’s easy to think of self-care as nothing more than a luxury, a fleeting example of self-indulgence. However, self-care as a practice is a vital foundation of health and well-being that extends far beyond a temporary solution.

In honor of International Self-Care Day this week, we asked several of our GoHealth team members to share their own relationships with self-care, dissecting and analyzing the many nuances of this practice as a means of reducing anxiety and creating more balance and greater resilience in personal and professional situations.

Finding Balance Through Self-Care

When confronted by the stresses of everyday tasks, it can feel like an unattainable, almost Sisyphean task to find balance in our lives. Balance, for all intents and purposes, requires a constant and deeply thorough reflection of self. From physical health to mental health to personal hygiene, self-care touches all areas of our lives. As we identify our own needs, we must also accept that these needs and our relationship with these needs are in constant motion.

Aurora Walker, a Senior Manager of Learning & Development, insists that, from her perspective, a person’s self-care journey is something that is constantly evolving. She shares: “Finding out what self-care meant to me took many years and attempts, and it’s something I am still working on. To me, self-care means being in tune with my body, listening to it, and making plans to address how to make myself feel at ease.”

The path to balance through self-care practices is driven by intuition and the ability to listen to what our bodies are trying to tell us.

Member Services Agent Shelley McArthur shares this sentiment, believing that self-care is about paying attention to the body’s reactions to things throughout the day and adjusting each action accordingly.

As someone who admits to having many sensory sensitivities, Shelley says self-awareness is critical when navigating self-care practices. Through her own experience searching for a self-care plan that best suits her needs, she has discovered a routine that addresses many of her sensitivities. Specifically, sensory diet videos, breathing and sleeping exercises, and meditation have all allowed her to discover her own balance.

Self-Care Fuels Resilience

Self-care plays a vital role in fostering resilience by maintaining and enhancing physical, emotional, and mental well-being. From activities designed to reduce stress like mindfulness exercises and meditation to physical health routines centered around proper nutrition and regular exercise, there are a host of ways that self-care practices fuel a person’s resilience.

During a particularly challenging time in her life, Senior Team Manager Tammy Nunley shares how, in many ways, her relationship with self-care gave her the strength she needed to support herself and her loved ones.

“I had to be disciplined in my own self-care to be strong enough to keep my children and those around at their best. Self-care is the most selfless thing you can do for others. It’s the prioritization of your own physical, mental, and spiritual needs. It was the physical self-care that helped me out of Stage 3 breast cancer in 2023”, Nunley shares.

Victor Kilgore, a Senior Benefit Consultant, reveals that his own journey through recovery was largely driven by his exercise regimen. Kilgore, who in 2006 was diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukemia and underwent 8 rounds of chemotherapy, 3 rounds of radiation, and a bone marrow transplant, credits his self-care routine as a major aid for getting him through this overwhelming and physically exhausting period.

Today, Victor’s healthy routine echoes his resilience, living by the axiom “a healthy mind in a healthy body”. By compartmentalizing his daily thoughts and experiences, he finds himself more energized and ready to provide exceptional service to Medicare consumers everywhere.

Showing Up for Others

Taking time for self-care and self-reflection isn’t just beneficial for you – it’s beneficial for the people around you, too.

Senior Manager of Quality Assurance Chiquitta Jones recognizes the value of bringing self-care practices to the workplace, maintaining that it can greatly improve workplace culture and team dynamics. Through her own Wellness Wednesdays initiative, anyone on her team could join her for a mid-week wellness break focused on taking time to recharge. Eventually, the practice became a QA-wide activity, encouraging a sense of community and shared self-care.

“When individuals prioritize their well-being, they bring a more positive and focused attitude to work, creating an uplifting environment.” She adds: “This can also greatly reduce stress and burnout, leading to higher productivity and better-quality work.”

Self-care and greater workplace engagement can also be attributed to a strong company culture; one that prioritizes the mental, physical, and emotional health of each team member.

LMS Specialist Courtney Kucala, who also co-leads GoHealth’s Culture Connection committee, understands the importance of offering diverse and engaging workspaces for employees to collaborate and feel supported. In many of the committee’s event planning sessions, there is a clear prioritization for health-centric events.

In relation to an evolving workplace culture, Kucala shares, “The collective can only operate successfully as a whole if each person takes on the duty to maintain their own well-being. Of course, you can’t pour from an empty cup. Engaging in self-care will give you the energy and capacity to give more to others.”

With GoHealth’s ongoing mission to ensure peace of mind in our consumers’ healthcare decisions so they can focus on living life, it’s imperative to prioritize self-care so each team member can share the very best version of themselves.

Annette Lopez, a Senior Benefit Consultant, works with Medicare consumers each day and finds that those moments of self-reflection empower her to be more present in her interactions.

“When we’re given the opportunity to reflect on our days, on our interactions with Medicare beneficiaries, and on those personal matters in our lives, we feel refreshed, empowered, and even more happy to help the members calling us.” She adds, “We will serve them with a positive, more uplifting spirit and willingness to go that extra mile.”

Taking Accountability for Self-Care

An important first step in navigating physical, mental, spiritual, and emotional well-being is simply taking that first step. Self-care does not just happen; rather, it’s an intentional decision made to improve or address a specific circumstance.

For Retention Advocate Alana Floyd, taking accountability and making the challenging climb to self-love and acceptance was a difficult but rewarding experience. As Floyd mentioned struggling with her size and weight in 2020, she came to the realization that change had to be made quickly.

She shares: “I noticed that my self-love was declining, which played a big part in caring for myself and my son. I wanted to make a change, and I did. Since changing my eating habits and becoming more active, my life has changed drastically for the better. I now feel and look younger than I ever have before.”

Coming to terms with what self-care can be is deeply personal, but it should always be a priority. Accountability also means finding new ways to love and accept yourself, or as Member Services Agent Sheppard Salter says, “making you a good investment. It’s not self-centered; it’s self-interested. And that’s a big difference.”

Sometimes, that investment in yourself can be as small as taking a ten-minute wellness break, going on a walk, or taking a deep breath. For Senior Benefit Consultant Gonzalo Morales, accountability means taking a moment in between calls with members to collect his thoughts, reflect on his previous call, and think about all the ways he can enhance his next consumer interaction. Or for Retention Advocate Tonya Muse, it means using daily meditation to connect with her authentic self, change any bad behaviors, and create new, healthy habits for her own sake and those around her.

Ultimately, there’s no wrong way to approach self-care. So, recognize that here and now, you are responsible for your well-being. Be kind to yourself. Start small. Explore new avenues to get in touch with your deepest, most authentic self. And don’t be afraid to ask others for support if you need help. Self-care gives you the opportunity to pursue the things that matter most to you – and that will never be a poor use of your time.

About GoHealth

GoHealth is a leading health insurance marketplace and Medicare-focused digital health company. Enrolling in a health insurance plan can be confusing for customers, and the seemingly small differences between plans can lead to significant out-of-pocket costs or lack of access to critical medicines and even providers. GoHealth combines cutting-edge technology, data science, and deep industry expertise to build trusted relationships with consumers and match them with the healthcare policy and carrier that is right for them. Since its inception, GoHealth has enrolled millions of people in Medicare plans and individual and family plans. For more information, visit GoHealth.com.