THE GOSPEL OF WELLNESS

An eye-opening account of how the U.S. has become “a self-care nation, though arguably one that still lacks the fundamentals of well-being.”

A journalist who specializes in health and women’s issues, Raphael is perfectly situated to investigate the massive wellness industry. What started as a movement to increase health and reduce stress has become, in many cases, a cure worse than the disease, with social media “fitfluencers” setting standards that are impossible to meet and a host of self-appointed gurus selling diet programs of every conceivable type. Most of the diets claim to be backed by science, but when Raphael drills down, she finds little reliable evidence and plenty of nonsense. Nevertheless, many people worry endlessly that they might inadvertently deviate from the plan, even if it is making them less healthy. Others stress about chemical pesticides infecting their vegetables and fruit, but the amounts are so miniscule as to be meaningless. “Food has become an utterly fraught ordeal for the average woman,” writes the author. “A Fear Factor episode that never ends. If you’re to take extreme wellness gurus and fad diets at face value, you cannot consume any sugar, gluten, pesticide residue, dairy, ‘chemicals,’ and more.” Some gym programs resemble cults, and countless people get caught in a vicious cycle: You have to work hard to pay for the stress-reduction programs that are needed because you are working too hard. Raphael delves incisively into the marketing techniques used by so-called wellness companies and finds a remarkable level of manipulative cynicism. Gwyneth Paltrow’s Goop line is a prime example. “Their health advice always seems to converge to one end point: buy more stuff,” writes the author, who saves her sharpest barbs for the purported benefits of crystals and biohacking. She hopes the pendulum will swing back toward a more sensible center; until then, it’s clear that she subscribes to a useful piece of old advice: If something sounds too good to be true, it probably is.

Writing with authority and empathy, Raphael tells a disturbing story of taking a good thing and then overdoing it.