Weekend Book Review: The Gospel of Wellness

The Gospel of Wellness: Gyms, Gurus, Goop, and the False Promise of Self-Care by Rina Raphael

My rating: 4 of 5 stars
Genre: Nonfiction, Health, Self-help

Edition Reviewed: Hardcover, 352 pages

Published September 20th 2022 by Henry Holt and Co.

The Gospel of Wellness by journalist Rina Raphael is a much-needed close up look at the $4.4 trillion wellness industry that is based largely on pseudoscience, consumerism, and a lot of wishful thinking. That is not to say that wellness isn’t an important aspiration, but crafty entrepreneurs, stealthy marketers and opportunistic influencers are making BIG bucks by zeroing in on women’s dissatisfaction, insecurity, and need for some semblance of control over their hectic lives.

Raphael examines a number of practices, products and issues that have cropped up as a result of the wellness trend, which has become so important in so many lives that it can be called the new religion. She looks at the phenomena of “wealthness” and the uber expensive, exclusive heath clubs, wellness retreats and overpriced exercise classes only accessible to the wealthy. She attends a Goop (founded by actress Gwyneth Paltrow) wellness gathering where pseudoscience and consumerism abound. She calls out “clean eating” and “clean beauty” for preying on the fears of consumers but lacking the science to back up its benefit. She also explores how the wellness movement got so big by shedding light on issues such as the gender disparity in clinical studies on women’s heath and lack of access to care for underserved communities. She points out that people, especially women, have become alienated by the medical profession (don’t trust or are not helped by their doctors) and now look to alternative medicine and healing advice and practices.

This important book helps women examine the wellness industry and their participation in it, and what might need to be discarded as well as what should be kept. It asks us to look at our problems and priorities and challenges us to admit what’s truly working, and what might be hype or a downright waste of time and money. And it calls us to trade in the allure of marketing and influencers for legitimate science and our own common sense.

One small detraction was the book’s organization, which hopped around with chapters on exercise, nutrition, social issues in a somewhat random order. I felt it would read smoother in sections on: physical wellness, mental/spiritual wellness and social issues and change. Additionally, Raphael does a great job covering a full menu of topics on wellness, but I wish she had addressed the issue of marketing alcohol to women as a wellness tool. We see it in social media, in advertising, in products glorifying drinking, in yoga studios, in health clubs and races and fun runs. Women are being sold the fact that alcohol can be a healthy way to deal with stress and parenting, and that is a huge myth that needs to be exposed and annihilated.

Overall, I strongly recommend this book to any woman looking to clarify her relationship with wellness and be enlightened by a close-up examination of the industry. Thank you to Goodreads and Henry Holt and Co. for an ARC of this timely and significant book.



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