Journalist and The Gospel of Wellness author Rina Raphael joins us to discuss why most media coverage of wellness is so uncritical, and how that allows misinformation to spread; why “science-washing” is rampant in the wellness industry; how wellness is used as a band-aid for systemic issues and ironically doesn’t get to the “root cause” that’s so often touted in wellness culture; her own complicated history with wellness; and more.
Rina Raphael is a journalist and the author of The Gospel of Wellness: Gyms, Gurus, Goop, and the False Promise of Self-Care. She writes for the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, Wall Street Journal, New York magazine, and Fast Company, among other publications. Her wellness industry newsletter, Well To Do, covers trends and offers market analysis.
Resources and References
Rina’s book, The Gospel of Wellness: Gyms, Gurus, Goop, and the False Promise of Self-Care
Rina’s newsletter, Well To Do
Christy’s latest book, The Wellness Trap: Break Free from Diet Culture, Disinformation, and Dubious Diagnoses and Find Your True Well-Being
Subscribe on Substack for bonus episodes and more
Christy’s online course, Intuitive Eating Fundamentals
Transcript
Disclaimer: The below transcription is primarily rendered by AI, so errors may have occurred. The original audio file is available above.
Christy Harrison: Hey there! Welcome back to Rethinking Wellness. I’m Christy, and my guest today is journalist and author
from , who joins us to discuss why most media coverage of wellness is so uncritical, and how that allows misinformation to spread; why “science-washing” is rampant in the wellness industry; how wellness is used as a band-aid for systemic issues and ironically doesn’t get to the “root cause” that’s so often touted in wellness culture; her book The Gospel of Wellness which just came out in paperback and lots more. It’s a really great conversation, and I can’t wait to share it with you shortly. Before I do, a few quick announcements.This podcast is made possible, as always, by my paid subscribers at rethinkingwellness.substack.com. And look, I know I keep talking about paid subscriptions, but the truth is that these are really the thing that allows me to keep this show going and helps me pay the bills for the editor, transcriptionist, and admin assistant who help me wrangle all the moving parts that go into making a podcast. It’s not easy, and it’s not cheap, so your paid subscriptions are hugely important in allowing me to keep doing this work, and I'm so grateful to everyone who's become a paid subscriber already
And not only that, but paid subscriptions also get you great perks like early access to every episode, bonus episodes (including one I did with this week’s guest, Rina which will come out on Friday), biweekly bonus Q&As, subscriber-only comment threads where you can connect with other listeners, and lots more. Just go to rethinkingwellness.substack.com to sign up. That’s rethinkingwellness.substack.com.
This podcast is also brought to you by my second book, The Wellness Trap: Break Free from Diet Culture, Disinformation, and Dubious Diagnoses and Find Your True Well-Being, which is available wherever books are sold! It's a deep dive into so many of the conversations that we have here in this podcast, like the connections between diet culture and wellness culture; how the wellness space became overrun with misinformation, and downright scams and conspiracy theories; why many popular alternative-medicine diagnoses are dubious and even harmful—and what we can do instead to promote true well-being. Just go to christyharrison.com/thewellnesstrap to learn more and order it now. That’s christyharrison.com/thewellnesstrap or you can find it wherever you get your books.
Now, without any further ado, let’s go to my conversation with Rina Raphael. So Rina, thank you so much for joining me on Rethinking Wellness. I'm so excited to talk with you today.
Rina Raphael: Yeah, I'm excited to be here.
Christy Harrison: You've written a great book, critiquing the wellness industry, and most of us you've had your own complicated history and journey with wellness culture. So I'd love to start off there having you tell us a bit about that, about your history with wellness culture and sort of how you came to critique it.
Rina Raphael: Yeah, so self-admittedly a wellness junkie. I was someone who strictly bought organic. I had all the supplements. I tried bone broth. I had a pantry that was full of biodynamic wine and kombucha stocked in the fridge. I mean, any trend, I tried it and I was going to SoulCycle. So very, very cliche stuff. And the reason I did that is because probably a lot of American women just didn't feel well. I was constantly exhausted. I was worried about my job, worried about the industry I was dating then at the start of I would say app culture, and I was just really heartbroken and floored by just how I was treated within the dating industry. I mean, it was just numerous complaints, legitimate complaints of how I just felt unwell. And to be honest, I didn't feel like there were places for me to go to.
If I went to the doctor, I maybe got 10 minutes. I was on Ambien for years. And what did the wellness industry dangle solutions? You're not sleeping well, take the supplement, you're tired, try this juice. Is it too stressful to gather all your friends for dinner? Is it hard seeing them join a boutique fitness gym that will be your community? Any issue that I had, they promised a solution and I really, really wanted to believe in it. So I got into all these trends, but I would say one of the things that really worked on me was that so many of these trends really promised certainty and success. So you go to your doctor and they'll probably say something like, well, there's an 80% chance this protocol might work X, Y, z, and that was really different than what I was getting from influencers and all these brands that promise me definitely will work.
And I think that's part of the appeal of wellness is that it really kind of promises you control and we're seeing over and over again that it really kind of lures in people who are uncertainty avoidant. So that was something that personally really appealed to me. But a couple of years into this experiment, I started realizing that I wasn't sure if it was actually helping me. My Fitbit was giving me of OCD in the sense that if I didn't get enough steps in or I didn't exercise enough, then I would punish myself and not have a meal. I became absolutely obsessed with unquote chemicals and terrified if I went on a vacation and I didn't know what was in my body wash. I started becoming really sort of terrified of everything, and I was putting in so much work into this. I mean, I was absolutely consumed with my health, and that's one of the reasons I have issues with this industry is because we're essentially fetishizing health instead of naturally folding into our lives.
So those were some of the problems I had, and we'll get just a little bit later, but I found out that so many of the trends that I believed in were really had very little Scientific evidence behind them, and I felt duped a couple of years in and I got really into sort of the skeptic community. Obviously they had been debunking a bunch of these trends for years, but I often felt like they were very condescending. Their sentiment was something along the lines of, I just can't believe that any woman would fall for this stuff. And I looked at myself and I looked at my friends and I said, well, we're not stupid. I mean, I don't think we're stupid and we fell for this stuff. How is this happening? How is this? And it wasn't just me and my friends, it would be an aunt, it would be my boss.
It was like everyone I knew was falling for this stuff and also working so hard on their health. And so I wanted to write a book that I felt like spoke to me and spoke to my friends as someone who's lived through it and also was an expert in this field because I was a wellness industry reporter that would kind of explain why is this happening? Why do we all feel unwell? Why are we putting all of our faith in these brands and these protocols, and is there something going on today that's different than decades past? So that's really what the book investigates. It's why has wellness grown to how big it is now
Christy Harrison: And what did you find?
Rina Raphael: Well, I think as I mentioned before, control is a huge aspect. I mean, I think that everything right now feels out of control, tech, the news, the political divide, stress and burnout, and everyone is sort of looking for solutions. And if you don't feel like you have a strong community or you're getting that attention from the medical establishment or the medical establishment has no answers for you, a lot of women's health conditions are underfunded and under research. So if you're someone who's suffering from a chronic condition, you will veer out to find some sort of solution that promises you control over that situation. There's not this one reason why wellness grew to a $4.4 trillion industry. There are multiple reasons and people are attracted to it for various different reasons as well. But I would say one of the biggest ones is the aspect of control.
Christy Harrison: I really identify with that, and that's one of the things I've found in my own research as well is that and my own experience, I have multiple chronic health conditions that I didn't get good answers for, took years to get diagnosed. I was having all kinds of symptoms that were being dismissed or minimized in the conventional healthcare system at a time when I was, I think really vulnerable for other reasons too. I was struggling with disordered eating and I was a journalist starting to become really obsessed with food and nutrition and going down these rabbit holes, and it all kind of culminated in really pushing me in this alternative medicine direction. But I've seen so many people go through that for various reasons, chronic health conditions not being served, but also just that general malaise that you talked about, that sense of things don't feel good and I don't know why and I don't have answers.
Rina Raphael: And I think a lot of these rituals that promise us control—and it could be over a chronic condition, it could be over mental health, it could be for a lot of different things that you're seeking—these rituals are comforting, especially when we feel overwhelmed. Even the ritual of popping a morning supplement, it can just make us feel safer and make us feel like we can manage what feels unruly. The problem is is that life is wild, and we can't control everything in our health. There are plenty of things that we're genetically predisposed to. So this idea of that you can control everything can sometimes be dangerous because it does sort of set you up for self-blame. And I found that over and over again throughout my research and even personally, I had friends who if something happened to them where they got some sort of diagnosis, they would automatically blame themselves that, oh, I didn't eat right, or, oh, I was using these chemical products. And in the book I give the example of one mother whose child was going through puberty early and she automatically blamed herself. She was like, oh, I should have been using all organic bath washes and this and that. And that's where I think it can become a little dangerous when we really think that everything is in our control.
Christy Harrison: Yeah, totally. I really appreciate too your point that wellness is treated kind of like fashion in the media. You were a journalist, you're writing about these trends and buying into them at the time, and you say it's not always pressed upon reporters to investigate wellness company's claims. I think that's super important and I'd love to dig into that a little bit. What were your conversations with editors about wellness trends that you wanted to cover, and why do you think there isn't more of a mandate on journalists to cover wellness in a way that's more skeptical and to really investigate claims made by members of the industry?
Rina Raphael: So it's true, there is this kind of revolving door of healthy ingredients, protocols or products. I always try to remind people, I'm like, you remember 10 years ago everyone was really into bone broth, and then it was green juice and then it was coconut water, then it was kombucha, then it was functional elixirs. Now it's sea moss smoothies. I mean, we just keep getting into stuff. And when you remind people, they're like, oh yeah, I remember when I was into that. And I mean, you see this across the board with various different things that we're told are the next big thing that we should put our faith into. And then when it doesn't work out, we just try the next thing. In a lot of ways, it's kind of like fad diet-culture, right? We just keep going on this. And you also look at where a lot of this wellness reporting is happening, and oftentimes you'll find it in style sections, fashion, Magazine's, beauty, Magazine's, and those reporters are not necessarily versed in science or the parameters of health reporting.
Oftentimes you'll find things like anecdotal pieces, so like, oh, I tried the supplement and it worked for me, therefore it works. And those are really, really powerful. Except the thing is just because something worked for one person does not mean, I mean, that's not a Scientific study. That doesn't mean it's going to work for you or that it has any Scientific evidence behind it. So that's one thing that I think that most people haven't realized how I would say the media has changed, fashion and beauty have gone a little bit out of favor and wellness became kind of the industry du jour. So every outlet wants to report on it, except sometimes they're not doing it in the most responsible way. And I myself was guilty of that. I worked for a business magazine and we were sort of more inclined to write about whether someone had a really great marketing campaign or they were eating up new market share or they got exciting new investments.
And that was kind of the focus. Very little was put upon whether this thing actually works or is validated. And then the second thing about all of this is that I think everyone is aware by now about what's happened to the journalism industry. There's fewer resources. Reporters are kind of pushed to do several pieces a week, sometimes several pieces a day. And so they're not given the time to really investigate a lot of these health claims and reporters are human beings. A lot of times they just default to what sounds right, and if claims are repeated over and over again, organic is definitely much healthier and kombucha will heal your gut. I mean, people absorb this and they don't think to maybe investigate whether that's actually true or not. So you see this kind of over and over again where just it's a confluence of several different issues that have kind of morphed into this, I would say kind of problematic issue with the media.
And again, I'm guilty of having done pieces like this where they're just not doing their due diligence. And I think part of this is also the fact that when I started writing about the wellness industry, we just put a lot of faith in it. I think it's sort of the way we thought about tech maybe 15 years ago where we're like, oh, look at all these brands. Let's say they're trying to help the average consumer. And we didn't really think ahead of what that meant or to investigate those claims. And so you're kind seeing the same thing now with wellness where now people are saying, Hey, wait a second, let's look under the hood.
Christy Harrison: Yeah, I think those are all such important factors for people to understand when they're consuming wellness and nutrition media. I think too about the fact that journalists talk to experts as sources, journalists. One of the reasons I left full-time journalism and went back to school to become a dietitian is that I wanted to be my own expert. I wanted to be able to write from a place of some authority about nutrition and health and food without having to rely on outside experts necessarily. But I think most of the time journalists are calling up people who have some perceived expertise in an area and asking their opinion. And I think that can get really tricky when it's like the sourcing of experts happens on social media and who has the biggest social media presence? Often these charismatic people who really game the algorithm in some way sometimes by having unconventional functional medicine approaches or integrative approaches or doing things that are outside of mainstream medicine. Sometimes it's not even a doctor, but a functional nutritionist or a health coach or something like that. And I think when those sorts of sources start to get tapped, I think about the stories that include a functional medicine expert as sort of being treated just like any other md I think you start to get a lot of muddying of the waters too.
Rina Raphael: And I also think, and this is my point again about just a fashion reporter or someone who generally covers culture being like, oh, I want to write a piece about wellness because wellness is everywhere now and they don't necessarily even know who, like you said, the right experts to go to. And that could even be something like if you are writing about, let's say toxic ingredients in whatever product you should be reaching out to a toxicologist, they're the expert in that. But oftentimes you'll have reporters be like, oh, I'll just reach out to a dermatologist if I'm writing about beauty and toxic ingredients. Well, dermatologists are not necessarily versed in that. So sometimes they are reaching out to people who have the right credentials, but they're not the right experts. And that's something you wouldn't really know unless maybe you had some experience being a health reporter, and I'm not making the claim that you can't learn that, or there aren't people who are beauty reporters who do do their due diligence.
They definitely exist. But as a general, what I see in general, they're kind of not doing that. And I think there's also a bias in the sense that a lot of people, especially a lot of reporters when they're confronted with negative information, they're told like, oh, all GMO food is bad. And like, oh, most beauty has toxic ingredients that are going to give you cancer. Negative information is so much more powerful than positive information. It's the same reason why politicians run attack ads because you remember those details. Humanity is more inclined to remember terrifying tidbits than we are when presented with science. We're kind of hardwired that way. So oftentimes when I speak to reporters and I say, Hey, this isn't accurate, it's a little bit more nuanced, they'll just repeat some sort of fear-mongering claim that they saw on Instagram. And I'm not blaming them to some degree. I did that in the past too. It's just an industry-wide problem.
Christy Harrison: Yeah, yeah. I think it's an industry-wide problem and human nature, as you said, to focus on those terrifying details and then really exacerbated by social media because with the sort of mandate to maximize engagement, keep people on the platforms longer, the things that do that because of that wiring in us, that negativity bias, it's like we are WIRED to stay and fight basically, and comment and share and post about things that make us angry or make us divided or make us frustrated. And also things that seem novel, I think there's a certain bias towards the novel as well. And so that's the stuff that gets the juice algorithmically. And there's the snowball effect, I think, where the more time you spend with that kind of content, the more it feeds to you that kind of content and the more extreme it can get.
Rina Raphael: Yeah, definitely. The algorithms reward the novel, the new, the exciting. And I wrote a piece for The New, York Times about all the scientists and medical experts and physicians that are trying to push back against that. And it's very, very difficult because giving people tried and true advice like, Hey, just try to eat your fruits and vegetables and get some movement, but don't overdo it. I mean, there's no way that they can compete with someone who has some insane claim. There's parasites living in your seltzer. There's just no way that they can compete with that. And it's so difficult for them. I think they found a little bit of success now with TikTok because they can sort of do stitching where they sort of Debunk something and people love debunking, but it's just sad that we're at the point now where it's just such an unfair divide between what influencers can work with. I mean, they can just pick out some claim out of the air. They don't have to do any research that's very simple to do. Whereas physicians and experts have to back up everything with data and science. Their job is just so much harder. And also they're not selling some dump supplement or detox, so it's very hard for them to make money.
And again, my history is of course that I was originally a wellness industry reporter for Fast Company Magazine. Now I write for various publications. But I feel like this industry had good intentions when it started. When I was first starting reporting on it, it was about boutique gyms and meditation programs. And then over the years it just gave way to, I dunno, crystal infused water bottles, detox cleanses and these shady workplace wellness programs or mental health AI chat bots. And I think that's when I became more skeptical and that sort of aligned with the exact same time where wellness became more of this aspirational lifestyle. So I do think now that it's become a little bit more ridiculous, there has been a little bit of a course correction, but for too long, I would say for a decade, I felt like this industry was just kind of given carte blanche to do whatever it wanted. And that was one of the reasons I also wanted to write the book.
Christy Harrison: And I think it's interesting in the book you say that you come neither to bury the industry nor to praise it for all your skepticism. You aren't totally out to tear it down. And I'm curious why you think it's important to have a nuanced kind of approach to critiquing wellness?
Rina Raphael: Well, first of all, I'll say that nuance is dying just in general within our culture. I think everyone wants a hard take. And actually I feel like a lot of people like my book because it is nuanced. But every now and then I do get a comment from someone who's like, why didn't you just completely tear down this industry? And it's like, you want me to tear down the fact that people really enjoy their gyms or that some people have more access to programs that really help them? I'm not here to say it's all crap, completely untrue. I mean, I appreciate the fact that when I go to the airport, there are fresher items or salads for me to eat. Now I appreciate that I can go on YouTube and there's a plethora of different programs, either yoga or meditation for me to access. So it's not all bad, it's just that this industry just became so consumerist, so productivity pressured and so individualist.
Those are my issues. It's what it's morphing into and the burden that's putting on the average American women. But I'm not here to say that you shouldn't enjoy whatever it is you enjoy. I myself love kombucha, but not because I actually believe it does anything for my gut. It's because I actually enjoy drinking it. So oftentimes I'll meet people and they're like, oh, so you're saying that boutique gyms are a scam? No, I'm not saying that. I'm just saying when they use kind of predatory marketing or they say things like, we're your family, we're your community. I would take that with a grain of salt because if you lose your job or you get an injury, there goes your quote family or community. And I've seen that over and over again, especially during the pandemic where people were like, Hey, I really thought this was my family, my community, and I was kicked out for X, Y, Z reason.
Christy Harrison: I really appreciate that. And I also have come to appreciate nuance a lot more in recent years. I think I've had a whole journey with becoming really strident and having the incentives of social media reinforce that and take me away from my true values, which I think include nuance and compassion and being open to different perspectives and things like that. And I do have a sort of harder science line as well. I'm also very skeptical, but I, you also have been turned off by the dismissiveness of the skeptical community. And this podcast is sort of an effort to create a space for more nuance and have conversations that don't fall into because a critic of wellness culture, I certainly have had my share of bad experiences within it and seen a lot of people go through a lot of bad experiences within it too. And I'm also very empathetic to the fact that people are attracted to it for important reasons and that we need to attend to those reasons.
And people are not stupid or gullible or being duped for lack of critical awareness. I mean, I also consider myself not to be stupid. And yet I was taken in by it too. And I think of myself as pretty science-minded, and even back then as a young journalist, I was hungry for the truth. And so the fact that people like us and many others are getting taken in by this industry, there's something there. There's something that it's offering that is not being offered in conventional healthcare. So I think it's important to have that kind of nuanced conversation and awareness and empathy for why people get attracted to it.
Rina Raphael: And the other thing that really bothers me sometimes with critiques is that oftentimes you'll see this kind of very flattened argument of like, well, it's just a bunch of rich women who want to do crazy goop things. And it's like goop and that sort are just such a minority. When I spoke to, and I've interviewed hundreds of women for my book, the average woman who's into this stuff is not a goop attendee. These are people oftentimes who are really stressed out or are really struggling, or oftentimes they have legitimate chronic conditions. And I just saw such a lack of empathy in critiquing this industry. I felt oftentimes it fell in the consumer instead of blaming the actual industry and these brands for what I consider pretty predatory or deceptive marketing at times. And so again, that's kind of where I was coming from, where I was just like, why are you poking fun at my pain?
Why are you targeting me instead of these kind of very irresponsible brands? And so I think that's becoming a little bit more apparent now. There are many reasons why people are attracted to wellness. It's multifactorial, but also this industry is particularly targeting women and they are taking, I would say, strategies from other industries. It's really, really interesting to me that a bunch of the publicists or branding experts that I worked with over a decade ago when I covered fashion now work for the wellness industry. And they've taken all the strategies from the alcohol industry and fashion industry. Now they've applied it to wellness. And I like to joke, I have yet to see a man who's terrified of his deodorant, but half the women I know are legitimately terrified of their deodorant. And why is that? And it's because I've spoken to experts and they say they're like off the record because that type of fear mongering marketing doesn't work on men, but it sure works on women. And that's just so depressing. And that's kind of what the book goes into is just sort of this type of marketing and that's that marketing that is so powerful, fear is so powerful that's drawing in a lot of people. And the consumer isn't to blame
Christy Harrison: And it preys on these existing divisions in society and the existing pressures on women, I think to be in charge of the health of their family and in charge of their own health because they're not being served very well in the conventional healthcare system and so often feel like they have to be investigators. I know for myself, certainly that was the case taking on this mantle of getting to the bottom of things because it felt like no one else would. And that is such a prime target for something making you feel afraid of your deodorant so that you'll buy this natural one that you then have to reapply five times a day. And it's sort of exploiting these existing inequalities in our society,
Rina Raphael: Or it's like I would say, capitalizing on legitimate complaints and anxieties. To be fair, yes, I'm sure there are legitimate reasons why you would be concerned about the food supply or different from brands. I totally get it. It just takes that little kernel of truth and it kind of blows it out of proportion. Oftentimes with a fear mongering marketing, and like I say, go on a woman's website and type in the word toxic and you'll get hundreds if not thousands of articles of your deodorant is toxic, your skincare is toxic, your dildo is toxic, everything is toxic and everything's a danger. And then you type in toxic into a men's website and it's like toxic is used in relation to your relationship with your boss. They're just not as focused on these things. And a lot of it falls on women because oftentimes they're sort of the CEO of the house.
But also there's just a very, very long history of targeting women to be afraid or the self-help industry has long targeted women. It's always about how women need to be more perfect, how women need to be more in control, how women need to be more zen. And that's an issue that I had because I fell for a lot of that. And there's one part in the book, actually, I think I quote Ruth Whippman who wrote this amazing book called America the Anxious, where she talks about the fact that when she visited co-working spaces or women's events, all their leisure activities were essentially self-help. It was meditation programs and fitness programs. And whereas when you went to men's spaces, it was all about fun. It was like pinging pong and beer and whiskey tastings. I mean, so much of this culture is just sort of about telling women how they have to be better.
Christy Harrison: Well, I think that relates to something I wanted to get into, which is that the pressure to engage in this kind of self-care, you write that it really just adds to the systemic issues underlying women's stress and does nothing to change those systems. I love this line that you wrote. You said, if we criticize some doctors for simply treating symptoms, why are we repeating the same mistakes with wellness? And I think that's so aptt and I see that showing up in so many ways in wellness culture, but we'd love to talk more about that. What are some of the systemic issues for which you see wellness being used as a bandaid or at best a temporary reprieve?
Rina Raphael: So a lot of people see the subtitle of my book and they're quite offended. They say, what's wrong with self-care? That seems like a toxic idea. And I say, no, it's the way we're being sold, which is that instead of looking at the root issues of why we're so stressed, we're telling people that they're stressed because they didn't prioritize enough face masks or bubble baths. That's kind of the idea that I'm getting at. You look at workplace wellness programs that put the onus on the individual to self-manage their stress versus maybe like, well, maybe you're stressed because your boss is giving you too much work. Self-care culture as it is today suggests that we alone need to calm ourselves down. So anxious, download this meditation app. You're not performing well at work. Maybe you need to do more yoga. It's always this burden that we have to kind of shoulder.
The thing is is that we're overwhelmed to a laundry list of legitimate complaints, and that could be lack of adequate childcare policies, like a really pathetic work-life balance, addictive tech, the fact that we don't get enough vacation time, all these sort of things that are sort of really systemic issues within our society or even within our healthcare system. Like I mentioned, a lack of research or funding for women's chronic health conditions. Now obviously we alone can't solve anything. There is a need for relaxation techniques, but what I find so well within this wellness industry is that so many solutions ultimately funnel down to buy this thing, the apps, the classes, the arsenal of spa goodies, and they're all kind of consumed alone, all this optimization, self pampering. We clutch our healing crystals, we write our pelotons, we take our bubble baths. They're all kind of done alone in our home.
And I just think it's so strange because it essentially does two things. One, it isolates us, but also it kind of distracts us from what really needs to be done. So I kind of make the joke in the book that I'm tired of seeing headlines that are stressed. These are the yoga classes you need to take. I want to see headlines that are stressed. Here's how to tell your boss to stop emailing you after 6:00 PM about to have a nervous breakdown. Maybe this is how to tell your partner that they had to share their portion of the housework. Why is the answer always yoga? It's so condescending to what the real issues are. So that's mainly my point. And I kind of make the joke that in the 19th century hysterical women were sent to an asylum in the 20th century. They were put on Valium on the 21st, they put us on Xanax, and now they're directing us to a wellness app. It's the same thing over and over again.
Christy Harrison: Totally. Well, it's interesting too, this I think dovetails a little bit with something you've written about recently, which is science washing and wellness, the way that products are claiming to be immune boosting or promoting gut health or full of adaptogens or whatever. And I personally find it so interesting that there's this heavy emphasis on science when it suits wellness companies, but then there's often a reflexive dismissal of science as well, like science hasn't caught up with what we know, or there's no research money for this because big pharma wants to suppress natural remedies or whatever, this sort of conspiratorial tone. And so science is used when it's handy or convenient when it justifies what maybe a wellness company wants to do, but then it's dismissed as well. The science just doesn't exist because they're out to get us or whatever, when the science really isn't there. So can you explain a little bit why science washing works so well to market products and how that plays into all of these systemic issues that we were talking about here?
Rina Raphael: Yeah, I recently wrote a piece for The New, York Times on this. And I mean, anyone who's listening to this has probably been to a supermarket recently. Whole Foods is probably the biggest epitome of this, but if you go to a beverage aisle and it's just outrageous, every soda now has some label that's like supports immunity, hormone balancing, cell rejuvenating, and then they have these other little labels that are clinically tested. And those are really, really powerful, especially if you're looking at something like kombucha or probiotic. You just automatically assume these things are true. And so these terms clinically tested.
They don't verify whether the product actually works or is any good. Oftentimes it just means it was tested, but maybe it was tested on one person or on three mice and Bolivia for decades ago. Any brand can slap these labels on their bottles, even something like Doctor recommended, which sort of sounds like that has authority, but what if the brand paid the doctor? Can you confirm that the doctor is legitimate authority in that specific field? What if it was Dr. Oz? That's the thing, and I get it when you go shopping, you don't have time to really think this through. And there is a sort of trust that we generally have, but it's become really, really outrageous. And unfortunately a lot of these science washing tactics work, there was one study that found that people who are more likely to trust science were actually the ones who were more likely to share false claims containing Scientific references.
Essentially if it sounds like Bill Nye were sold. So all the people who are like trust science, trust science, they just see some Scientific references and they're like, that's enough for me. And so you'll find that these brands even will go a step further. They'll have a science section on their website and I'll have all these studies referenced and the average person sees that and they're like, oh, look at all these studies. But if you actually click on the studies, the studies have no relationship to the product that they're selling or sometimes oftentimes even the topic that they're discussing, but they know that the average consumer is not going to click on those studies. Sometimes they don't even have access to them behind a paywall, and B, they don't know how to read the study. They realize that the average consumer just wants a little padding of just let me know that it has this halo effect that it's science sanctified and we can get into the reasons why science washing has taken off. But this is something that has long been in the industry, but it's really, really ramped up in the last few years, especially around the wellness industry.
Christy Harrison: Yeah, I find it so interesting. That's a pet peeve of mine and something that listeners probably will have heard me talk about a lot is like you got to click through and see what it actually says. And oftentimes, probably more often than not, it has nothing to do with what is being claimed. The study might be on something totally different or have only the very most tangential relationship with the claim or something that I've been toying with writing about recently, although it's so in the weeds and probably super boring to the average person. But I think it's really important from a evidence-based medicine kind of perspective, is that some of these companies will use references from predatory journals that are not indexed in PubMed. So they're not reputable journal articles, but they have this veneer of Scientific truth, they look like Scientific evidence, and yet they're from these publishing companies that are kind of pay to play, where if you pay them their fee, they'll publish anything.
They don't really have quality control. They don't really have peer review in the same way that good Scientific research does. And so I've seen companies that have nothing but citations from these predatory journals that are not indexed in PubMed, the reputable index of Scientific references. And it makes it look like, oh look, there's all this science behind it, and they'll use these sort of elaborate terms, this very Scientific sounding, it's really pseudoscience, but it's language that I think can create this false sense of reassurance for people that there is science behind something. I really like that study that you referenced, and I talk about that in my book too, that the sort of broad trust in science makes people vulnerable. But if people can be critical thinkers about science and think about the fact that not all science is created equal and science is not sort of a monolith, that there's good science and bad science or all kinds of gray areas in between and that we can learn to be a little bit more aware of what science actually says and what research actually says and what claims are being made that are and are not supported by science, I think it makes us less vulnerable to those kinds of claims.
Rina Raphael: And there have been polls that have found that consumers increasingly want Scientific evidence. That's something that they are looking for. And part of what's driving this is the rising cost of living shoppers think if I buy something, I want proof that it works, or there might be other consumers who just want to fall back option if someone questions the product that they're buying. So if someone's buying some sort of controversial product or whatever, they can just sort of tell their friends, but no, look, here's the study. So there are various reasons why this has taken off, but I'd say the biggest one is that everyone's trying to get in on wellness. Why did our sodas suddenly become, basically all of them are like health tonics now. Everyone wants in on this. And one of the best ways to get in on it and to convince the consumer is to have all of these flashy labels that sort of give the mirage of science. And so part of this is also just a response to what's happened over the last few years, especially coming out of the pandemic. I think a lot more consumers are more enticed by science. They recognize how important that is, but they don't necessarily have the tools to really parse what is real science and what is worthy science versus what is just deceptive marketing.
Christy Harrison: I tend to think that it's important to be skeptical of all marketing that claims to be science-based and take it all with a huge grain of salt, especially things like you mentioned clinically tested. It's like, okay, well a clinical test means it probably wasn't actually peer reviewed and published in a Scientific journal. It just means, yeah, I gave this to some of my patients and they seem to like it or whatever. It doesn't actually show anything. No. So just being skeptical of all those kinds of claims I think is really important.
Rina Raphael: And also one of my favorites is Michelle Huang, who runs Lab Muffin Beauty Science talks a lot about dust. I think she calls it fairy dust washing. I might be getting this wrong, but this idea of that brands will sort of dangle some ingredient that everyone's obsessing over, and it could be vitamin C or it could be CMOs or whatever, but you don't know how much of it they put in. They could just be putting a teensy millimeter of it and still be able to put on the label that they use this kind of enticing ingredient. So science washing, it comes in so many different forms and she makes the claim. That's oftentimes why ingredient lists aren't very helpful. You dunno how much of the ingredient is in it, you don't know how it interacts with all the other ingredients, but this kind of transparency trend where every brand is putting all their ingredients that makes the consumer feel like, oh, I know what's in this as if we actually, none of us are chemists. None of us know how to actually read an ingredient list. But that's again, very, very powerful.
Christy Harrison: It is. I want to talk a little bit about the title of your book and the notion of wellness as religion. Your book is called the Gospel of Wellness, and I'm curious how you see wellness and wellness culture as being similar to religion and perhaps also taking the place of it in contemporary life.
Rina Raphael: So the title of the book is not literal. It's a little tongue in cheek. I'm in no way suggesting women literally treat wellness or join a gym as a way to replicate, organize religion, but organized religion has been on the wane. And I make the case that wellness is acting like deconstructed religion. It's a regulatory system instructing us how to move and live our lives. So what you find is is that the pursuit of health is offering identity, community meaning purpose, rituals, all the things that organized religion frankly used to give us. And now that there's kind of been that gap, and especially with in the book, I go into a certain segment of women in the population that has been a little kind of off put by organized religion. They're looking for those things. So if you talk about the fact that even let's bring up something like community, if you look at generations past, if they wanted to see their community or feel part of something, they would join their church or their local synagogue.
Well, that's been kind of taken away and we're so isolated and we're so busy again, try to make dinner with your girlfriends. It is like herding cats to try to find a time that works for everyone. And I also can't tell you how many times I hear people say like, oh, my friends canceled dinner. I'm so relieved. They're not saying they're relieved, they don't want to see their friends. They're saying that they're just so busy they can't make time for it. And so even something like a boutique gym can act as a way to be your community, to have a sense of belonging. That's just one example. But there really is something to be said about this pursuit of health makes you feel like you're doing something moral, something good. And it's the way we speak about health or even body size in this country.
And oftentimes body size is conflated with health where people feel like they're doing something virtuous by eating a certain way or having an organic diet or eating clean, whatever it is. And that can sort of give them all the things that they no longer have access to, meaning, purpose, whatever. If we're even talking about sort identity, I can't tell you how many people tell me that They get a lot out of wellness in sense of being part of something and having an identity. If you show up to brunch and you're in your workout gear and you're like, oh, I'm going to eat, I'll clean today and then I'm going to go to the gym for cardio and then do yoga, people will be like, oh my God, you're so great. You're so good. I mean, there's so much of sort of idolizing health in our culture.
And again, that's what I mean by that. It's become sort of this replacement of how to live your life and that you can get goodness out of it. I mean even talk about something like nature, which is almost armed with God-like powers, and then we assume sickness is thereby attributed to anything that's unnatural. Synthetic wellness even has its own symbols and false idols like supplements. So even wellness has many of the same sins as religion, like gluttony and sloth or self-denial, which oftentimes is about food. So there are a lot of similarities between it, but overall it is tongue in cheek. My point is just that people are searching for ways to live their life and they think that they can subscribe to this protocol and it will give them control, happiness, goodness, respect, whatever it is.
Christy Harrison: Yeah, it's a search for meaning.
Rina Raphael: Yeah, definitely. And I think we've made it harder in the society to find a bunch of these things throughout the book, I quote Oprah who talks about how people need to find meaning and purpose. Well, how do you find that if you get rid of the usual roadmaps that we generally had? Well, this is one avenue for people, and it's not just health. You can talk about social justice, politics, nationalism, there's a bunch of replacements for religion these days, and the pursuit of health is one of them.
Christy Harrison: Yeah. I think this is an interesting segue into another question, which is that you argue that the wellness culture here in the US is not necessarily replicated in other countries. I'm curious if what we're talking about with the search for meaning plays a role in that, or if there are other reasons why the US is particularly drawn to wellness, what is it about here that makes it so appealing?
Rina Raphael: So what we're finding is that wellness is obviously a global phenomenon, but it is not replicated to the same degree as it is in America and other countries, specifically other countries that maybe have more communal societies, a more robust or socialized healthcare system that aren't as individualistic. So there are certain things that kind of primed us for the ballooning of these sort of industrial complex that we have right now. And there are many reasons for this that I go through in the book, but I'll just highlight a couple of them. So number one is that I think we're a very highly optimistic country. We're dreamers, we're the nation that put the man on the moon. Our ancestors ventured out west to secure golden fortunes. We grew up on Disney endings. We kind of want to believe a little bit in the fantastical and the unbelievable.
And I think that's kind of primed us for believing in easy fixes in a bottle. And we also are a highly consumerist society. So this idea of buying your solution is very, very appealing to us. We're also strivers that's kind of born out of the Puritan work ethic. So working out like crazy and sticking to a meticulous diet plan, that's actually something that we'll do if we think that we're promised something. And that could be a future free of sickness, stress or aging, whatever it is. And again, we're remarkably individualistic, which is why our version of health is all about why the individual can take charge of your health. Rarely do you see these sort of communal solutions or calls for us to fix the healthcare system. Instead, it's like what you are told to do to buy or you're told to meditate your problems away.
So those are just some of the reasons that kind of primed us for it. And it's kind of funny because my book came out in other countries and let's say the UK response to my book is very different than the US one. The UK is a little bit more skeptical, and also they have obviously the NHS, which is very different than our medical healthcare system. And so they're kind of floored sometimes by the book. They're like, is this really what Americans are doing? Why do you guys need all of this? And again, we have different struggles here. Those are just some of the reasons. And I give the example in the book of how I interviewed this researcher from Italy, and I was asking him something along the lines of, oh, well what's wellness in your country? And he just started laughing and he said, we don't use this term wellness and I dunno what to tell you.
We take hour and a half lunches, we get six to eight weeks mandated vacation. We have these more communal societies where people see their family more often. We don't need wellness, you need wellness. And it kind of stuck with me. And obviously that's a simplification of our countries and their struggles, but there is something to that that there is something going on in America that is making us gravitate towards this industry because we don't feel well for a number of reasons. And I don't think the answer is in downloading another wellness app. We should really be looking at what the root causes are.
Christy Harrison: Isn't it so interesting that in wellness culture and alternative medicine, there's this slogan that we look at the root causes, we don't just treat symptoms, and yet I feel like alternative medicine is in a way a symptom of this larger thing that you're talking about. People's appetite for it is a symptom of this missing piece in our lives, I think in some way.
Rina Raphael: Yeah, totally. And also if someone goes to the doctor and they have a chronic condition and the doctor just shrugs their shoulders and says, I don't know what to tell you. I dunno what this is, or We don't have a cure for this. Well, that kind of opens the window for a competitor to come in. And again, your doctor, as I said before, is not going to say 100%. We have the cure. They deal with probability. And a lot of these influencers, they gather the masses with assurance.
Christy Harrison: Assurance is what we really need too. I think when we're seeking help and support and not getting it, it's like that sense of certainty from someone who seems to have the answers is incredibly appealing. I mean, what do you think people can do to become more tolerant of uncertainty?
Rina Raphael: Wow, that's such a good question. That's a hard thing to say. I mean, to condition yourself to understand that life is wild, that we can control everything, that's obviously very, very difficult. But I will say someone trying to sell you their supplements probably doesn't have the certainty that you're actually looking for. And listen, I'm really simplifying it here because it's more than just someone offering a solution. Oftentimes these are communities or a shoulder to cry on in the book. I don't demonize the medical system. I can't tell you how many doctors have told me we wish we could spend an hour or two with our patients, but the system doesn't incentivize that. We understand that patients are frustrated that they only get 10, 15 minutes with us. We wish it was different too, but there's this unfair advantage that influencers have. I make the case that 20 years ago if some guru wrote some sort of alternative health book or a diet book, that book sat on your nightstand waiting for you to have 20 minutes before bed.
It's a different system. Now. We have influencers who are available on Instagram and they can dmm with you. They can answer questions, they post several times a day. The access that you have now is completely different than it was decades ago. And so you're comparing that to what doctors can offer you like 10 to 15 minutes every what few months. It's just such an unfair advantage. But you have these people who are really suffering and I talk about suffering, and it could be something from they don't have childcare policies or maternity benefits or they're dealing with burnout and stress, or they have a medical condition that no one can really help them with and they want to be part of a community that will listen to them. Or even having someone who says these very powerful words, I believe you or I hear you. And that is something that I feel like the medical industry or the Scientific community could probably be better at and sort of appealing to these communities even myself years ago. And that's what I think is missing. Whether or not that'll make people feel better about not having control, I don't know. But I think that they could start with that first step of really trying to listen to people as to why their foot's so frustrated and giving them the support that they need.
Christy Harrison: I think that's really important and well said. And I think the care effect is so real. The part of placebo effect or the family of placebo effects is the care effect of having someone listen to you and take you seriously and make you feel like they're going to help you get to the bottom of things even if they can't. Just that promise and that empathy and support and sort of being there for you, I think goes such a long way to helping people feel better and can probably explain a lot of the benefits that people seem to get at first anyway when working with an alternative medicine provider or following a new influencer or something like that. I think it's a really powerful effect to just feel like you're being heard.
Rina Raphael: And we also just have such eroding trust in institution and experts, and in some ways that's because we have influencers who are eroding that trust. But also there is some self-blame here in the sense that talk about nutrition, and I mean you of all people would know this, but we've driven the average American woman absolutely batty. I mean, with these Scientific studies that come out every single day, one day, eggs are good for you the next day they're not good for you. Red wine might be the cure for heart health. It may not be. We've driven people crazy where they're just like, I want to just be told what to do already. And so they will sort of veer towards someone who just says, I figured it all out. I have the roadmap for you and I'm going to tell you exactly what you need. That's really, really understandable. I mean, what would you say, I mean you've worked with obviously so many different people, but I think a lot of people are just legitimately confused.
Christy Harrison: Totally. I think people are legitimately confused. There are really good reasons for that. I think there's the dietetics field bears a huge amount blame for that. I think the media bears some blame for that too. And sort of uncritical reporting on headlines and looking at press releases. I mean the sort of a Scientific communications industrial complex of people who are employed by universities to communicate research findings in a way that's press friendly, I think also bears some blame for that. This is also a systemic issue, the publisher parish climate at universities, the scramble for legitimacy among dietitians too. I think this still exists. I still talk to dietitians who are like, we need to make our profession more legitimate because it's sort of this black sheep of the medical industry or something. I think there's understandable pressures on all of these industries, but the way that it plays out is that people get all these conflicting messages and one day it's one thing and one day it's the next and these things go viral and they have those elements of novelty and provoking anger and outrage and sort of shocked responses that help make things go viral on social media.
And so I think it just creates this climate of such huge anxiety for people. I think one thing that I've found helpful and I think many of my clients have found helpful is just to start tuning out some of that noise and to start understanding the pressures that are on those industries. And like you said, scientists are people too, or doctors are people too. These are the human beings behind these industries and these findings, journalists are people too. We all have our reasons for doing what we do. And when you can start to look at that and understand that it can take the temperature down a little bit, I think, and start to feel like, okay, so this is not just the new objective truth that I now have to jump to and totally overhaul my diet and lifestyle to conform to. But this is a finding that was made by one lab in one area of research based on maybe observational data that's not necessarily saying anything about causation.
Let's take a breath. Let's take a step back. Sort of not letting the panic headlines drive your emotional response and your behavior. I think too, just this is a huge tall order and something that is not accessible to so many people in our culture for so many reasons. But I think learning skills for emotion regulation, that's something that a lot of us didn't learn as kids. I think that we need to be able to do in some way for ourselves as adults if we can. And whether it's mindfulness practices or finding a sort of mind body practice that helps you connect with yourself and sort of recognize emotions welling up and watching them come and go and allowing yourself to have space for your feelings, but not necessarily act on them learning to sit on your hands and do nothing in response to some of these headlines or whatever it might be, a social media post, a guru telling you something, an influencer that is sort of screaming at you to do something, change something like do this diet, push by, buy these supplements.
Whatever it is, just to sort of sit and say, okay, I recognize that I'm being pulled to do that. I recognize that this pull is strong. What are some of the reasons this feels so strong and what can I do instead of just going down this road that I feel like I'm being pulled down, but actually sit and sort of make a choice that's more aligned with my values and kind of orient to my own inner compass. And that's really hard when there's these magnets all over the place, pulling your compass off of true north. And I mean for me personally, it's been therapy, decades of therapy at this point that I think have helped with that helped give me a little bit of more of a sense of inner calm and also meditation practice, which is part of the wellness industry. And so certainly I am critiquing something that I also partake in and use at some level in the form of meditation and yoga and things like that.
And that goes back to your point, I think about the retreat of organized religion and community from people's lives and the hole that leaves in us. I think finding sources of community and connection that are not subject to the whims of social media and this sort of outrage machine that I think a lot of us are caught up in. And I think that is a big piece of it too, perhaps, is really cultivating a sense of inner trust, which again, is hard and sometimes impossible for so many reasons, but I think that can help people weather uncertainty better than when they're just sort of feeling whipped around and uncertain and seeking answers.
Rina Raphael: Yeah, I hear that. And I also always tell people I have some advice, but just one is, as you said, just not feeling yourself, feeling pulled and understanding why that's happening and questioning that and why you feel you need to buy something or why you feel you need to do something. But also understanding that a lot of the things that were marketed or were sold upon by some influencer, just recognizing that just because it works for one person doesn't necessarily mean it's going to work for you. Wellness is just so highly individualized. It's really about understanding what you need to feel good and what you need to feel or whatever it is. And that could be something as simple as sitting down with a cup of tea. It doesn't necessarily mean you have to do some retreat or do some punishing bootcamp. It really is what you want to do, and I feel like there's been so much noise within this industry telling people what they need to do, that they have lost touch with their inner needs.
I wrote this piece for the LA Times about how wellness culture is coming for kids, and it was fascinating speaking to this teen therapist who told me that she was dealing with all of these tweens, like maybe 13, 14 year olds who were stressed about their self-care routine. They actually thought that because if they weren't prioritizing their bubble baths or skincare mess or whatever it was that they weren't relaxing and they were getting so caught up in I have to have this enough time to do myself. Even though they have other outlets. Some of them were on sports teams, whatever it was hanging out with friends, but they got so caught up in This is what I need to do. They had really interpreted the blatant instructions from this industry all they saw.
Christy Harrison: That's so interesting. I feel like kids' brains are so WIRED to interpret in black and white ways too, but so many of us are as well. I think a lot of us don't move past that in our development sometimes.
Rina Raphael: One of the reasons I think this marketing has been so successful is because it really combines two things. One is I would say empowerment. A lot of times this marketing is couch in the terms of you take ownership of your health and you're going to find out whatever it is that's not working for you and you're going to stop it. That's obviously something that's quite powerful, especially for women who have felt that they've been dismissed or mistreated or ignored by various different industries like medical industry. And then there's this individualism part of it that it's like I myself am taking this supplement. I myself am taking ownership of my body and going to this class. It's kind of like this bottoms up versus higher up kind of bladder where you feel like you yourself are taking ownership over something versus being told to do it.
And then those two combined, I think just really, really resonates with people. I forget who it was, but there was someone, I read this book once that said that the most powerful term in American marketing and advertising is a term freedom. You see that all the time. Like Wolf free you from your medical condition will free you from big pharma, will free you from big food. And so all of this together, once you start recognizing the patterns and the tricks and the tools that this industry uses, I think you become more aware and you don't fall for it as much. One thing that I became aware of is, for example, how supplements advertise themselves. So oftentimes you'll see that brands use these terms like boosts or supports or stimulates or optimizes or aids or helps, and there's no quantifiable way to measure these ambiguous terms support.
For example, if something says that they support your immune system, what exactly does that mean? How do you quantify that? There's no way to quantify it, which means that there's no way for you to protest if it doesn't work. So you'll often see that they can't use terms like treats, fixes, cures. They're actually barred from using those terms because they're not FDA regulated. So they kind of work in this grace space where they suggest a health outcome, but they don't actually promise it. And so now when I go into a store and I see words like boost or supports, I know that it's a completely BSS term. It doesn't promise me anything. And so I just completely know not to buy that product because it's a useless term. How do you actually quantify supports boost? You just can't do it.
Christy Harrison: Yeah. And those tiny little disclaimers at the bottom saying, this statement has not been approved by the FDA A or whatever it's like,
Rina Raphael: Right, right. And teens teensy, little lettering that you would need a magnifying. Yeah. But yeah, that's one of those things where once I think people recognize these terms, they just kind of wisen up a bit.
Christy Harrison: Yeah, for sure. Well, this podcast is called Rethinking Wellness, and I've been asking all my guests, in light of your work, how are you rethinking wellness or have you rethought wellness for yourself?
Rina Raphael: I just now do what feels good, and I try to block out the trends at the same time. As I said before, if I do enjoy something, I let myself do it. I'm not above a Sephora shopping spree. I will certainly, like I said, I will buy a green juice. I think it tastes good, but I don't think it's going to do something miraculous for me. I'll try, oh, there's some seamass smoothie that's selling at airone. Out of curiosity, maybe I'll try it, but I don't put my faith into it anymore. And I also have just gotten a lot better about understanding my media and social media diet, who I follow now, who I trust now is so different than it was a couple years ago. I really try to take the advice of people who take a nuanced approach who might give me answers like, well, this study was hard to parse. We don't really have the answers yet, and they're okay with saying that. And that's something that I obviously never saw from influencers who were so dogmatic about everything and claim to have the answers to everything. I've gotten a lot better of just being okay with the, maybe we don't have answers for this yet. Take it with a grain of salt.
Christy Harrison: Yeah, that comfort with uncertainty, right. Openness to not knowing.
Rina Raphael: I mean, I'm trying. It's definitely not easy. Sometimes you really want answers, and I just had a baby, and definitely throughout pregnancy, you want answers. And I love the work of Emily Oster. I can at times can be a parenting guru, but I really loved her book Expecting Better. That took a very data-driven approach to pregnancy, and sometimes she just gives you probability. She doesn't say one way or the other, and I think that's really refreshing in this day and age.
Christy Harrison: I agree. Yeah. I'm a fan of hers too and have found a lot of use out of that book and her other work as well. So thank you so much for being here, for sharing all that you did. It was really a pleasure to talk with you, and I hope you'll stick around for a little bit for another bonus question. We're going to talk a little bit about how the industry is changing and the future of the wellness industry, so hopefully listeners will stay tuned for that. But in the meantime, can you tell people where they can find you, learn more about your work and get your book?
Rina Raphael: Yeah. My book is called The Gospel of Wellness, and it just came out in September in paperback, so it's at all bookstores or Amazon or wherever you get your books. I also have a Substack called Well To Do where I dive into trends and sort of the industry and a lot of the marketing, so you can find me at welltodo.substack.com. I also write for various publications including The New York Times, LA Times, Wall Street Journal, so you can find some of my writing there as well.
Christy Harrison: Awesome. We'll put links to that stuff in the show notes so people can find it. And thank you again for being here. It was really great to talk with you.
Rina Raphael: Thank you. Super fun.
Christy Harrison: So that's our show! Thanks so much to our amazing guest, and to you for tuning in. If you've enjoyed this conversation, I’d be so grateful if you could take a moment to subscribe, rate, and review the podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you’re listening.
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This episode was brought to you by my new book, The Wellness Trap: Break Free from Diet Culture, Disinformation, and Dubious Diagnoses and Find Your True Well-Being, which is now available wherever books are sold. Just go to christyharrison.com/thewellnesstrap to learn more and buy the book or just go into your favorite local bookstore and ask for it there.
And if you’re looking to heal your relationship with food and break free from diet and wellness culture, I'd love for you to check out my online course, Intuitive Eating Fundamentals. Learn more and enroll now at christyharrison.com/course. That's christyharrison.com/course.
Rethinking Wellness is executive produced and hosted by me, Christy Harrison. Mike Lalonde is our audio editor and sound engineer, and administrative support is provided by Julianne Wotasik and her team at A-Team virtual. Our album art is by Tara Jacoby and our theme song written and performed by Carolyn Pennypacker Riggs. Thanks again for listening! Take care.
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