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The word wellness became mainstream in the United States around 1980, and wellness counseling literature often cites the beginnings of wellness around this time. The problem with this identification is that the roots of what counselors understand the wellness movement to be stretch back to between 3,000 and 1,500 BCE in India. Since wellness counseling literature often is not contextualized appropriately, failing to address the historical roots of wellness concepts and practices earlier than the 1980s wellness movement in the West, counselors are often missing crucial information regarding wellness for themselves and their clients. The purpose of this article is to encourage social change by grounding the wellness counseling literature in this missing history. To do this, we explore wellness from its conception until the present day, discuss wellness practices for historically marginalized groups (i.e., Black, Indigenous People, queer, fat, and disabled people), and provide implications for mental health counselors.
The term wellness has been defined in a variety of ways through its history. When individuals within the counseling field speak about wellness, their conceptual understanding of the term is often conceptualized through the work of Myers et al. (2000) with a focus on health and well-being and the integration of body, mind, and spirit. However, the underlying roots of the wellness movement as understood in the United States today have existed for much longer, dating back to between 3,000 and 1,500 BCE in India (SRI International, 2010). To ground a counselor's understanding of wellness in its history and encourage social change regarding how mental health counselors understand their own wellness and the wellness of their clients, one must understand wellness from its conception until the present day, both within and outside professional counseling. Investigating how wellness practices have been co-opted from African and Indigenous Peoples by white/European colonizers is important in helping create necessary changes. These societal and systemic changes can be achieved by challenging conceptions of what it means to practice wellness and contextualizing these practices within their proper history.
EASTERN HEALING PRACTICES
Ayurveda is the first recorded wellness practice, beginning as an oral tradition and later recorded in the Vedas, the four Hindu spiritual texts (SRI International, 2010). Ayurveda focuses on harmony between the body, mind, and spirit, taking into account...