New Year, New You

The 1970s saw a renaissance of Black women writers like Alice Walker and Gloria Naylor who told stories of Black women’s pain and healing. Tamika Carey says that just a few decades later, these stories trickled up to a whole Black women’s wellness industry, driven by figures like Oprah Winfrey, Iyanla Vanzant, and even Tyler Perry.

In the wellness world, “natural” reigns supreme. So much so that according to Alan Levinovitz, it’s become a religion. His new book explores how too much faith in nature can be misleading and even harmful.

When we’re making New Year’s resolutions, many of us look to add to our lives to make them better: eat more vegetables, sleep more, start running. Leidy Klotz argues that instead of always trying to make change through additions, we should consider more subtractions.

We are living through what’s been dubbed “the great resignation.” People are leaving their jobs in droves and we can’t quite figure out why. Richard Bargdill (Virginia Commonwealth University) thinks that boredom might have something to do with it. Bargdill studies habitual boredom and how people can break out of the boredom cycle to lead a better life.