Girl therapy, a viral social media trend, is about self-care. Trending as #girltherapy it has become a big component of beauty treatments to feel better — mentally and physically. It also has expanded to shopping, meeting friends, or indulging in feel-good things.
For physiotherapist Raina Mehta Ranney, girl therapy is “time for myself to indulge in things that I enjoy, and do things which are outside of routine life.” She also “loves to travel and spend time in nature as they are ways for me to de-stress and reset.”
Pros of girl therapy
Sometimes you will find yourself down and out in life. A little girl therapy never hurt anyone. You go shopping, or you stay at home and fix yourself a warm bath. You light candles and pamper yourself. That’s quintessential girl therapy. Life is often tough, and girl therapy could be that quick-fix solution you need to calm your thoughts down, sit back and unwind. You look stress in the face and say good bye to it. The world to you becomes full of stars, skincare, green juice and more. It’s called celebrating the moment and doing everything that puts mental and physical health first. One article describes girl therapy as “the desire to live a delicate, carefree, and glamorous life, free of insidious patriarchal influences.”
The article continues to say that “it’s undeniable that it’s fun to indulge in this life of simple luxury and cosiness, in which all the problems of the outside world disappear under thin layers of foundation, new acrylics, and a dazzling blowout.”
However, is it an illusion that all this external self-care is therapeutic? Is it really self-care and self-growth?
But then on a stressful day, who doesn’t like to unwind with a bath? Who doesn’t like to stretch their legs out? So bring on girl therapy. Like girl math and girl dinners, girl therapy is that newest trend on Instagram that you actually always knew about, and is now labelled as girl therapy. It’s all about embracing consumerism, and trying to see if acquisitions and purchases will mean a better sense of well-being.
For different people self-care aka girl therapy means different things. For student Snehal D’Souza girl therapy is all about spending quality time with her girlfriends, playing her music and travelling. “For me girl therapy means staying home and hanging out with my friends. We talk, cook and bake together. We share a lot, that’s my girl therapy. When I’m alone, I like to sing and play the piano. Playing songs gives me peace. I also like to paint. All these things are therapeutic for me,”says Snehal. “I also like to see new places, and travel. For me that’s girl therapy. I love seeing new and different things, other than what we see everyday. I love discovering new places.” Everyone has their own version of girl therapy.
Problematic times
But sometimes girl therapy is seen as a superficial trend and may become problematic. That’s because girl therapy focusses on external appearances, which may not be healthy. Girl therapy is, hence, telling us that if we improve our appearance, all the problems of the world will be solved. Not true. The idea of girl therapy can tie a girl’s worth to her external appearance, to how she looks.
In addition girl therapy reinforces capitalism, and accentuates economic disparities between people. Most want to be like girls from higher income groups, buy the things that they buy and flaunt them on social media.
So, girl therapy might just be widening the gap between the haves and the have nots.
Expensive but worth it
However, it’s hard to not indulge in girl therapy at least some times. It’s definitely a positive form of self-care, and is good when you have enough money on your card to
afford the things you need. Then you can go ahead and flaunt them on social media, adding the hashtag #girltherapy.
All therapy is expensive, so let’s look at girl therapy as a fun way to spend your cash. While girl therapy will always mean an expense, it’s still a tremendously feel-good syndrome.
Social media gives you the opportunity to flaunt all that you’ve done to look after yourself, so hail girl therapy. In today’s world, where social media is everything, life is also about being that girl who wakes up early, does some yoga, enjoys green juice, reads books, and does what it takes to improve and better life and well-being.
We welcome the girl therapy trend. It allows girls to be girls, and represents a world from which men have been excluded for a change. It’s all about discovering a new you and not shying away from looking after the self first. It’s a way to show the world that you’ve arrived.
