HEALTH, WELLBEING

ON THE LANDSCAPE OF WELLBEING.

Whilst the origins of wellbeing date back into ancient times, contemporarily wellbeing has become a wider part of the social discourse, alongside the expansion of digital technologies. As our access to smart technology has increased, so too have our opportunities for “optimisation”.

There is a duality within this rise to prominece of wellbeing information and accessibility, on one hand it democratises care, offering the potential for empowerment and shifts in perspective, and on the other- it risks that our that our individual needs and experiences, lie dormant underneath a plethora of fixes, and the subtle implication that our bodies are akin to machinery. Something to improve rather than attune to.

Whilst binaries do not exist within life, nor in health- neither approach is inherently good, nor bad, and is shaped by our individual needs and preferences, what may lie as an antidote to endless optimisation, is discernment, the capacity to understand what might be useful and relevant to one’s own life and situation-what one needs individually to be well, and what indeed what being well feels like.

By H. Coutts

27.Oct. 2026

References and Further Reading

Dr Doery Mai Ling 14th May 2026, ‘Why Embodiment Matters More than We Think’Sense of Self Journal, https://www.sos-senseofself.com/journals/why-embodiment-matters-more-than-we-think/ Accessed Online 26.10.2026

Image Via Holly Fielder