Health Nut to Holistic Wellness
The Holistic Nature of True Health
Although my first area of expertise was nutrition, it didn’t take long for me to see that having a healthy lifestyle is much deeper than eating and exercising. Awareness of and regulation of thoughts and feelings is crucial to true health, which includes mental, emotional, and physical aspects. The mental and emotional components deeply affect physical health as well.
Obsessive Health Culture
I remember when I first decided to study nutrition, in hopes of one day helping others with some sort of wellness program. Back then I, too, was caught up in the social messages of good and bad foods, mandatory exercise, and the constant fear of my untrustworthy body doing something crazy at any time. I was the proverbial “health nut”…and I was pretty proud of it. Unfortunately, I bought into the idea that eating patterns and exercise and body somehow indicated my value as a person. This belief derailed my happiness and well-being for years.
Universal Struggles
I’ve found over time that even people who do not have food or body issues tend to have the same underlying struggles. Self-image, anxiety, depression, meaning, identity, relationships, and life purpose are part of most people’s lives. Our society gives few clues on how to handle these big lessons. Sometimes the only people who get to work on these things are those who spiral out of control. No one should have to hit ‘rock bottom’ before having access to therapeutic growth opportunities. Every person benefits from understanding themselves better.
Beyond Nutrition
Now a fully recovered former trendy nutrition guru (when I was an ‘expert’ before getting an actual nutrition degree), I have gone on to work in the areas of identity and purpose, mood issues, life transitions, eating disorders, weight issues, and overall wellness.
Your Journey Today
Embracing Discomfort
That resistance you feel is just the pull of the familiar, it isn’t something helpful–just another false answer. Of course, your current situation isn’t all honey and roses either but it is what you know, it is just the gravitational pull of the habitual, of the known. We tend to stick with what we know even when it’s clear that it’s not what we want or need because it’s more comfortable to do so than to put up with the uncertainty and work that comes with making a change.