My husband teases me regularly about my frequent change in diet, which I try to take in good stride because he’s mostly right. In our eight years of marriage I have been a vegan, which morphed into pescatarianism, a phase that lasted 4 years until a personal trainer told me I wasn’t eating enough protein (who can eat fish 3 meals a day?). This transitioned me back to meat-eater, then I stopped eating sugar, which lead to not eating carbs, which lead to not eating gluten, and now I maintain a sort of “paleo, gluten-lite” type diet (which I occasionally cheat on), and I try to eat a lot of probiotics, which I’ve been told will help me avoid Alzheimer’s. I also attend 4 yoga classes a week, have a Fabletics subscription, and listen to Pema Chödrön audiobooks when I’m feeling stressed out. In the club of Western woman searching for wellness, I’m a pretty active member.

Wellmania is about that search, but Delaney, a travel journalist, doesn’t settle for attempting the latest fad diet or trying Pilates at her local gym. From taking on 101-day-fast to practicing transcendental meditation, Delaney thoughtfully balances out what she gains from these experiences with the challenges of maintaining a picture-perfect version of health. She considers the consumerism driving this search: after all, isn’t it only wealthy people who are able to attend 90 minute, $20 yoga classes, travel to Thailand to learn meditation with a Buddhist monk, and eat organically?

 What I loved about this book is the author’s honesty and frame of mind, she’s doesn’t try to paint herself as a guru or the embodiment of wellness, and she doesn’t try to hide her hedonistic side, she enjoys when her experiences demonstrate that she could do both:

“This is my path – what C.S. Lewis called a ‘secret road’ that we are all walking on, but each road is different. I like to think that I’m walking in the middle of the road, between the wellness lane and the hedonism lane, trying not to get run over by cars. Maybe I am meant to pick a side. But right now, I can’t – and that’s okay.” (page 149)

Ultimately Wellmania made me think about how I practice wellness, my occasional obsession with it (and then lack thereof), and what a realistic healthy life that is good for the entire planet should look like (hint: it’s probably not the one that Lululemon is trying to sell me. No hate.) I genuinely loved this book, was surprised by it, and would recommend it to anyone who is interested in health, yoga, modern society, or enjoys irreverant life advice from an honest, funny, writer.

Wellmania by Brigid Delaney

Publication Date: March 13, 2018

I read this as: Edelweiss ARC*

*This book was published in another version that came out in 2017, I’m not sure why it is being republished or what the differences are between the two. I like this one.