I Don’t Believe in Wellness, but Well-Being is Something I Can Get Behind.

August is “National Wellness Month,” but these days, it feels like everyone’s talking about “wellness” all year round. And perhaps that’s a good thing, as the term might finally be reaching its sell-by date! I find it frustratingly vague and open-ended. It makes me wonder, what does an ideal state of wellness look like exactly—and will I know it when I’ve achieved it? Or might it be possible to just spiral down a rabbit hole of never-ending me-time, gazing for eternity at my reflection while lifting weights? 

Suppose we take a different approach to the pursuit of health. It’s fine to torture your body a little bit, it releases sirtuins that aid in the longevity quest, but being a zealot not only defeats the purpose, it makes you the crashing bore other people will try to avoid. Which is not ideal, because relationships with other people are an important aspect of good health.

I propose we evolve the term from “wellness” (vague) to “well-being” (clear). The greatest contributor to what I call well-being is to do what you love doing. Other people cannot tell you what that is, but you know without having to be told what brings you joy. For example, my daughter fosters kittens, and when I hear her talking to the little creatures on the phone, I can sense the joy in her voice.

The next item on my well-being agenda is easy. While everyone must find their own path to experiencing joy in life, we do share one need in common—we all need rituals to keep us grounded, and personal rituals fit the bill nicely. The simple, personal rituals we perform every day go a long way to improving our physical, and therefore our mental health. There are obvious ones, like flossing and brushing after meals, then for skin care junkies (which is most of us, right?) a morning routine that finishes with the application of sunscreen and a nightly routine that includes retinol. 

If I don’t do my nightly skin care routine I don’t sleep well, and sleep is of course very important, as my sleep coach, the feline known as Fat Eddy, will attest. In addition to being a companion nonpareil, I find that attending to her needs helps keep me on track as well. FE and I have daily rituals—every morning she has her breakfast, then she’s outside patrolling her backyard, then by the time I have my breakfast she’s ready for her second one. It’s a routine that we both have come to depend on. Recently she’s started to sleep at the top of my pillow, right over my head. Perhaps she senses that my sleep patterns have changed, and this is her way of comforting me. It’s become a ritualistic thing that really does help, especially when she purrs loudly. Thank you, FE!

After my morning ritual of greeting Freya (that’s the Norse god of love, fertility, and battle, for those wondering) I start my work. Mostly writing, which has its moments. Sometimes I even get in the zone. I absolutely try to get a walk in every day, because for diabetics especially it seems that walking activates leg muscles to release anti-inflammatory myokines that bring blood sugar levels down better than any other exercise. I also row for an hour every evening (perhaps an homage to my Viking ancestors) though unlike them I watch tv—just plain exercising without watching something is excruciatingly boring for story addicts such as myself, and I can’t read and row at the same time. Thank you, modern technology, for keeping us strong and entertained!

So, if I have any advice, it’s to find the rituals or routines that make you. Healthy ones, like eating your vegetables. Ones that make you more attractive, like skin care. Ones that keep you fulfilled, like being creative at some task. Ones that keep you engaged, like talking to a friend and/or reading a good book. And most of all, giving yourself permission to occasionally be naughty, and you can take your pick of transgressions there.

To start you on your journey of putting your head on straight so you can stop listening to the self-styled wellness gurus of the world, here’s a book I highly recommend: Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind, by Yuval Noah Harari. It puts being human in perspective, and as an added bonus, he’s quite funny.

If you’d like some additional ideas for routines and rituals you might adopt that contribute to your well-being—and therefore skin health—I invite you to check out BEYOND TOPICAL: THE EDIT. This is a curated selection of products we personally recommend that complement skin health and influence well-being. Based on our ongoing discovery + conversations with thought leaders in their respective fields, this inspired and evolving assortment of offerings pair well with our topicals and provide you with one holistic resource for skin health.

— Marie Veronique Nadeau