Unpacking "Wellness": How We Lost Our Way and How to Find It Again

The word "wellness" appears everywhere these days. It’s splashed across Instagram feeds, embedded in corporate mission statements, and woven into the marketing language of everything from juice cleanses to meditation apps. At Nourished Minds Counseling + Wellness, we've watched this term evolve from a holistic concept encompassing mental, physical, and emotional health into something far more narrow and commercially driven. Too often, "wellness" has become synonymous with weight loss, restriction, and the relentless pursuit of an idealized body that exists primarily in filtered photographs.

This linguistic hijacking isn't just semantically frustrating; it's clinically concerning. When wellness becomes code for thinness, we lose access to a concept that could genuinely support human flourishing. Instead, we create another pathway toward the very struggles we're meant to be addressing such as disordered eating, body dysmorphia, and the kind of rigid thinking patterns that characterize both eating disorders and OCD.

The Great Narrowing

Somewhere along the way, wellness culture absorbed diet culture's fundamental premise: that our bodies are projects to be optimized rather than homes to be inhabited. This shift transformed wellness from an expansive concept about living fully into a restrictive set of rules about eating less and moving more. The language became telling. We started talking about "clean" eating (implying some foods are dirty), "cheat" meals (suggesting moral transgression), and "earning" our food through exercise.

For individuals predisposed to eating disorders or OCD, this reframing of wellness can be particularly dangerous. The black-and-white thinking that characterizes these conditions finds fertile ground in wellness culture's binary classifications of good and bad foods, acceptable and unacceptable body sizes, and virtuous versus lazy behaviors. What appears to be health-promoting messaging can actually reinforce the cognitive patterns that maintain psychological distress.

Consider the person with OCD tendencies who encounters wellness messaging about "toxins" in processed foods. The contamination fears that might have once focused on germs or chemicals now have a socially sanctioned target. The compulsions that might have involved excessive handwashing can morph into elaborate food preparation rituals justified as "clean eating." The wellness framework provides a culturally acceptable container for symptoms that might otherwise be recognized as requiring treatment.

Reclaiming the Territory

True wellness—the kind that actually supports human thriving—looks remarkably different from its commercialized cousin. It acknowledges that health exists across a spectrum of body sizes and includes psychological well-being as a fundamental component. It recognizes that our relationships with food, movement, and our bodies are deeply personal and cannot be standardized into universal prescriptions.

At its core, authentic wellness is about capacity rather than compliance. Instead of asking whether we're following the rules correctly, we might ask whether our choices support our ability to engage meaningfully with our lives. This reframe moves us away from external validation and toward internal attunement, a skill that proves essential in eating disorder recovery and anxiety management alike.

What Wellness Actually Encompasses

Real wellness includes the messy, imperfect realities of being human. It encompasses the decision to order takeout when cooking feels overwhelming, the choice to skip a workout in favor of needed sleep, and the recognition that comfort foods serve important emotional functions beyond mere nutrition. It includes therapy sessions, medication when helpful, and the radical act of treating ourselves with the same compassion we'd offer a good friend.

For our clients navigating eating disorder recovery, wellness might mean learning to eat regularly even when appetite signals feel unclear. It might involve challenging the food rules that once provided a sense of control but ultimately created chaos. It includes developing flexibility around eating and movement.

This expanded understanding of wellness also acknowledges the role of community, purpose, and meaning in health outcomes. Research consistently demonstrates that social connection, sense of purpose, and psychological safety contribute more to longevity and life satisfaction than many of the behaviors emphasized in mainstream wellness culture.

The Path Forward

Reclaiming wellness from weight loss culture requires both individual and collective effort. On a personal level, it means developing discernment about the wellness messaging we consume and questioning whether advice truly serves our overall well-being or simply our appearance. It means recognizing that the most important relationship we have is with ourselves, not with the scale, the mirror, or the approval of others.

Professionally, it means expanding our definition of health outcomes beyond weight and appearance-based metrics. That health access is imperative, that wellbeing is “both collective and personal”, according to the Health At Every Size® principles. It means recognizing that true wellness might actually involve weight gain for someone recovering from an eating disorder, or increased flexibility around food rules for someone with OCD tendencies around eating.

The word "wellness" is worth saving, but only if we can restore its original meaning. At Nourished Minds, we believe wellness encompasses the full spectrum of human experience, including struggle, imperfection, and the beautiful complexity of being embodied beings navigating an uncertain world. When we untangle wellness from weight loss, we create space for something far more meaningful: the possibility of living fully in the bodies we actually have.