Episode 20: An Ode to Self-Care

Progressive museum work, particularly when focussed around community engagement, is often a form of emotion work that demands emotional labor. Museum professionals who are deeply engaged with the challenges of changing their institutions, negotiating a volatile political climate, or facilitating community work, can experience compassion fatigue, secondary traumatic stress, and burnout. So how can museum professionals look after themselves, in order to better care for their communities and colleagues? In this episode, the Punks investigate the role of self-care in museum practice. Although the concept is often co-opted by marketing professionals as a kind of balm against open-ended anxiety, self-care first came to prominence alongside the rise of the women’s movement and the civil rights movement as radical, political act; a reclaiming of the body against a system that suggested it lacked value. Today, these ideas continue to resonate. Actively practicing self-care can help you be more resilient, effective, and empathetic. We explore how. Guests: Seema Rao, Beck Tench Show Notes: http://museopunks.org We’d love to hear from you! How do you refocus and recenter when emotionally or physically exhausted? Hit us up on Twitter (@Museopunks) and share your best solutions with us.