This book explores how the wellness industry has built itself by telling us that we’re not complete without whatever trick they have to offer. One of my favourite insights comes near the end where the author states that happiness doesn’t fit into our lives now, we have to shape our lives around the ideas that happiness should be a capitalist consumer driven fulfilled life[1].
From debunking the myth that we should be happy all the time[2], to reminding us that the happiness sellers of the world want us to feel incomplete[3]…so they can sell us stuff, Cabanas and Illouz draw back the curtain on how happiness culture needs us to be unhappy for it’s gurus to survive.