What if the wellness trend everyone loves is not right for you?

There is something quite persuasive about watching other people do something that seems to make them feel amazing. When you see enough people stepping into ice baths or emerging from the ocean looking refreshed, it is easy to wonder whether you are missing something.

Cold therapy has become a familiar part of the wellness conversation. But every time I see someone looking blissfully happy in cold water, I think about how different that experience is from my own.

Even putting my big toe into the ocean can sting. My body tenses, and instead of feeling refreshed or energised, I want to get out.

For me, it has raised a question that reaches beyond hot and cold. How much attention are we giving to our own experience when everyone around us seems to be recommending the same thing?

I found somewhere I could thaw out.

About a year and a half ago, I started training in a heated studio. I began doing hot yoga and one hot cycle class a week, and I noticed how much I enjoyed being in that environment.

I am someone who can still feel cold when it is 25 degrees outside. While other people are perfectly comfortable, I can be looking for another layer.

Walking into a warm studio feels like an opportunity to finally thaw out. I enjoy moving in that warmth, and I often leave feeling more settled and comfortable in my body.

I cannot separate every part of that experience. There is the movement, the time I have set aside for myself and, in yoga, the opportunity to slow down and focus on my breathing. The warmth is something I particularly enjoy, but it is part of the whole experience.

What I do know is that it has become something I look forward to returning to.

My friend finds that feeling in the ocean.

One of my friends swims in the ocean a couple of times a week and absolutely loves it. She finds it energising, and it gives her something that my heated studio gives me: an experience she enjoys making time for.

I can appreciate that without needing to copy it.

Her enjoyment does not make my discomfort less real, and my preference for warmth does not take anything away from what she gets out of swimming.

We can both be looking after ourselves while choosing different ways to do it.

That sounds obvious when I write it down. Yet it can be surprisingly easy to forget when a wellness trend gathers momentum.

Listening to your body takes practice.

We receive so much advice about how to feel better that looking after ourselves can start to feel like another thing to get right.

There is always a new routine, another challenge or someone explaining why their approach changed everything. Sometimes that information is useful. Sometimes it becomes so loud that we stop noticing our own experience.

I am learning to pause and ask myself whether I actually enjoy something, how I feel afterwards and whether it is something I want to keep doing.

That does not mean every uncomfortable experience is harmful, or that everything enjoyable is automatically safe. Cold water and heated exercise both place demands on the body, and personal health circumstances matter. Pain, dizziness or feeling unwell are reasons to stop and seek advice rather than push through.

But I do not need to force myself into cold water simply to prove that I am committed to my wellbeing.

There are other ways for me to move, rest and make time for myself.

You can choose a different starting point.

The more I pay attention, the more I realise that caring for myself involves understanding myself.

I want to know what helps me feel settled, what I enjoy returning to and what fits into my life in a way I can sustain. I want my choices to come from that understanding, alongside reliable information, rather than the feeling that I am falling behind a trend.

This is part of what I want to encourage through Start With Me. We can stay curious and learn from others while giving our own experience room in the conversation.

For me, the warm studio is somewhere I enjoy being. For my friend, it is the ocean.

Perhaps your place is neither. It might be a walk outside, a gentle class or a few quiet minutes that belong entirely to you.

When you put the trends aside for a moment, what do you notice about what helps you feel good?

Ali 🤎