Summary

Karen's Lecture on Self-Care begins by stating that self-care "isn't about you" (67). For Karen, self-care is about meaningful friendships, but it is important not to put the burden of one's self-care onto one's friends. For personal development on that level, she recommends a professional therapist. Karen advocates for what she calls a clutch-five friend with whom you can be honest, but she cautions against using one's friends as a sounding board for negativity or as a stand-in therapist. Karen argues that everyone needs to go to therapy. She includes a few anecdotes of incidents in which she mistakenly ranted negatively at her friends to an unacceptable degree and they had to tell her to stop. This is what a good friend does and it can help a person realize that they should see a therapist instead to talk out those kinds of...