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t h r i ve
Oh god…
am I the toxic one?
Inputting boundaries, embracing the word ‘no’
and quiet quitting may all help us feel more in
control, but when does self-care become… selfish?
WORDS: KUSHIE AMIN
PHOTOGRAPHY: STOCKSY

C o s m o p o l i ta n 53
THRIVE Tox i c s e l f- c a re
ust last month, I came a hair’s breadth from
bailing on my friend Catherine’s hen party at
the eleventh hour. I had initially been thrilled
to be invited – but as the date approached,
my anxiety loomed. The thought of the long
train journey, the awkward small talk with
people I didn’t know, the cost – it all made
me feel uneasy. What if I couldn’t make good
conversation? What if no one liked me? And
what if I had to watch her play Mr and Mrs
while feigning interest in what her fiancé’s
‘most annoying habit’ might be? It was so
far from my comfort zone. Cancelling would surely be
a win for self-care, with me taking control of my life and
putting boundaries in place… right?
As I typed, deleted and then re-typed my message to
Catherine, I confided in another friend about my dilemma.
She said that to let Catherine down on such an important
event so last minute would be rude. (Note to self: cancel
earlier next time!) That by not going I would be giving in to
my own selfish needs. Her response was a blunt wake-up
call. I went to the hen. And when I arrived, Catherine was
thrilled to see me. In fact, the whole weekend was great
– I needn’t have worried. She later revealed her own
anxieties that no one would turn up to the event she’d spent
so long planning. I was so glad I hadn’t let her down.
In considering bailing, I had been responding to the
clarion calls of social media self-care gurus, who endorse
setting boundaries and living life on our own terms. The
hashtag #SelfCare has more than 30bn views on TikTok,
with #boundaries at 2bn and #cancelplans at 9m. Under
the hashtag #notleavingthehouse, users comically rejoice
in cancelling on friends and opting to stay in. I scroll past
hundreds of cute and colourful illustrations on Instagram
on a daily basis, which affirm things like, ‘It’s okay to cancel
struggles, there
plans,’ and, ‘Embrace the word no.’ So is there any wonder
my immediate instinct was to cancel? And look, boundaries
and self-care are incredibly important when used wisely. But
in putting ourselves first, how often are we truly exercising
a much-needed safeguarding of our mental health, as
opposed to just being a bit, well, lazy?
This ‘looking out for number one’ attitude has even
seeped into the world of work, where the age of going the
extra mile is well and truly over. Last year, the concept
of ‘quiet quitting’ went viral on TikTok which, in case you
missed it, refers to employees choosing to prioritise their
personal lives over pleasing their bosses. There were more
than 1.2m Google searches worldwide for the phrase some
months, with us Brits accounting for 12% of these.
American TikToker @saraisthreads summed up the
trend in a video in which she unapologetically claims to
‘act her wage’, by turning up to work with a Starbucks
Frappuccino in hand, laughing at the expectation of taking
more than 500 calls, lingering around the staff room
54 C o s m o p o l i ta n
and leaving a minute before 5pm. Several other videos
mocked the different workplace attitudes of overly keen
millennials who are willing to work all hours compared
with the more boundaried Gen-Z workers.
It’s no surprise that such messaging has put down
roots during a time of immense political and financial
uncertainty. Even before the pandemic, millennials were
being referred to as the burnout generation, trying to
balance work and side hustles with an active social life,
saving for a house, practising a wellness routine and
getting eight hours of sleep a night (not to mention all
those hours spent picking out the perfect pair of skinny
jeans and perfecting the ultimate side parting). The
backlash to the ‘always on’ narrative has been quick,
brutal and much welcome. And it makes sense. Saying
no, prioritising rest and knowing our limits is healthy
behaviour. And yet, for every meeting we miss or ball
we drop because we input our own limitations, there’s
probably someone else facing the consequences and
picking up where we left off. So what if laying down our
limits is actually turning into an excuse for being flaky
friends, lacklustre employees and rubbish partners who
simply dig our heels in and end up saying no in response
to anything we just don’t want to do?
Setting boundaries
When 23-year-old Rebecca† broke up with her long-term
boyfriend, she felt her best friend wasn’t quite supportive
enough. Where normally the pair would get together over
a glass of wine and chat about all the
things causing them stress, coaching
‘When we deal each other on everything from their
with our own horrible bosses to what to wear to a
friend’s wedding, suddenly Zara† was
pretty absent – just at the time when
can be a loss of Rebecca needed her most of all. With
empathy and every one of her unanswered texts or
calls, Rebecca would feel increasingly
understanding let down, with her disappointment soon
of how things morphing into frustration – and then
are for others’ anger. Rebecca began to pick holes
in their relationship and saw Zara’s
behaviour as ‘toxic’ and even disloyal.
‘I felt like she was a terrible friend, and that a good one
should always be there for you,’ she says.
In a moment of frustration, Rebecca wrote a series of
messages to Zara, accusing her of being a poor friend and
detailing how fed up she was of things being so one-sided.
Even though the two remained amicable, Zara began to
distance herself from Rebecca. To this day, Rebecca regrets
what she sent. ‘I feel mortified looking back and re-reading
my messages. It just reveals how toxic my own behaviour
had been.’ Rebecca turned to a therapist for support. In
doing so, she came to realise something. ‘I had unrealistic

and unfair expectations of our friendship. [Zara] had
a lot of her own mental health struggles, and I shouldn’t
have expected her to always take on my problems, too.’
According to psychotherapist Nicholas Rose, Rebecca’s
story is part of a wider pattern, in which everyone is striving
to do things the best they can, but far too often are in
autopilot mode and act without thinking. ‘When we’re
dealing with our own struggles there can often be a loss
of empathy and understanding of how things are for other
people,’ he tells Cosmopolitan. ‘If you only look externally,
you’ll keep repeating negative patterns of behaviour and
you’ll forever remain unaccountable.’
Rose suggests that looking inwards from time to time
and taking a moment to reflect on our behaviour can reveal
certain aspects of ourselves we may not have considered
before. ‘We tend to have a process of reaching decisions
and maybe not wanting to go back over and re-evaluate
them. Was this the best thing to do or not?’
So why is it so much easier to find fault in others and
more challenging for us to see where we’re going wrong
ourselves? When I asked friends about experiences where
they eventually realised their roles in conflict, many were
reluctant or vague about details. Go figure. Rose attributes
this in part to the vulnerability it reveals in us when we
THRIVE Tox i c s e l f- c a re
openly admit where we’ve gone wrong. In his book, Better
Together, Rose suggests that dealing with problems or
conflict can only be done effectively through teamwork.
Whoever we believe the problem belongs to, ‘it only gets
solved when both put [the blame] to one side and say,
“What is going on here, and what can we do to change it?”’
We’ve all been in a position where we expect ourselves
to take centre stage in someone else’s life (hello, main-
character energy). In this age of self-care, it’s easy to feel
entitled to put our problems on to others and expect instant
soothing. But our increasing desire to become armchair
psychologists and diagnose others as ‘self-involved’ or
‘toxic’ could, in fact, be hindering rather than helping us.
‘We’ve got an ever-increasing sophisticated lexicon of
psychological language such as gaslighting, narcissism
and toxicity being used online,’ Rose explains. While these
terms are entirely valid in some situations, when used
excessively and casually in everyday life, ‘such labels risk
putting all the focus externally on to others, instead of
holding ourselves accountable and looking at our own
potential to behave in certain ways’. Sheri Jacobson,
psychotherapist and founder of Harley Therapy*, feels
similarly. She agrees we seek to label people too quickly.
‘Someone isn’t toxic just because you feel they have
disappointed you,’ she says. Jacobson advises putting your
phone away, taking a step back from social media and
reflecting on the source of your mental health advice.
Rethinking accountability
It’s unsurprising that the age of unaccountability dovetails
with the current societal challenges we’re facing. Recent
data proves just how burned out and fed up we’re feeling
(something I’m sure you don’t need to see the actual
stats to believe, but…): a 2022 YouGov study found
that at least one in five Brits have sought help with their
mental health, while the Office for National Statistics
recently concluded that the number of people who have
left work since 2019 and have long-term illness and
mental health problems has risen by as much as half
a million. While anyone struggling with mental health
should always seek help from their GP, it’s hardly a
wonder we’d take solace in easy advice that seems to
offer a cheap, quick solution at a time when many of us
are feeling disillusioned and anxious about the future.
This tracks with Rose, who sees a wider sense of societal
malaise as why unaccountability may be reigning supreme.
‘We’re collectively dealing with anxiety around our own
survival. The pandemic and difficult situations in the world
all link to our sense of security.’ He adds, ‘When our security
is threatened, we’re defensive and more likely to scrutinise
how other people are behaving. We’ll be on a higher alert
to behaviours and problematic experiences.’
But does our desire to help ourselves have to come
at the expense of others? Is the only solution to carving
C o s m o p o l i ta n 55
out our own #boundaries to throw someone else under
the proverbial bus? When we’re going through a tough
personal situation, it may be natural for us to assume
that our problems are at the centre of other people’s
worlds just as they are for us, but this sort of blinkered
thinking may actually be doing more harm than we
think to the people around us, says Jacobson. ‘Ultimately,
accountability comes in two forms – both to self and to
others (society included).’
Setting serious mental and physical health conditions
aside, most of us ‘can demonstrate self-care while still
balancing external commitments. It means understanding
what we need to do to keep ourselves fundamentally
‘well’, while simultaneously appreciating that our choices
do have an impact on others. Reciprocity is generally a
good strategy to play – give-and-take benefits all parties,
compared with the unilateral take-take or give-give,’
Jacobson says. ‘Softening our expectations can really help.
We’d be wise to remember that self-care does not mean
we should feel, or act, entitled. It’s generally helpful to
adopt a gratitude stance rather than feel we are owed
more and better,’ she continues.
For Jacobson, instead of pulling back from our work
and friendships, doing the opposite may actually help to
56 C o s m o p o l i ta n
improve our sense of wellbeing more generally. ‘A negative
view of others and unrealistically high expectations are
a recipe for disillusionment,’ she explains. ‘If we’re able
to contribute to society (at work and with friendships),
express gratitude, consider and show
respect to others, all in a framework of
Relationships self-compassion (which is not mutually
are two-way exclusive), we’ll tend to be better off
streets that in our mood, optimism, physical and
even financial health.’
require our At a time when most of us feel our
cooperation, sense of control slipping through our
*HARLEYTHERAPY.COM. †NAMES HAVE BEEN CHANGED
collaboration fingers, it’s easy to see how placing the
blame on others for our unhappiness
and empathy can be enticing. Instead of being an
active participant with agency over our
choices and decisions, seeing others as the ‘bad guy’ feels
like the safe and easy option. But our relationships, whether
that’s with a friend or a work colleague, are two-way streets
that require our cooperation, collaboration and empathy
in order to be fulfilling. After all, who wants to be friends
with someone who bails on plans all the time, or to work
with someone who is dropping everything the second that
the little hand hits five? I know I don’t.