Excerpt from The Gospel of Wellness by Rina Raphael, plus links to reviews, author biography & more

It all kept me up at night. It was in my thirties that I'd stopped sleeping and shortly thereafter began suffering from anxiety. Which is how I found myself looking for stress relief—and major emotional release. Mind you, I was already dipping my toes in wellness at the time. This just heightened my need for it.

I found it one day tucked away on the third floor of a small and unremarkable brick building in Tribeca. Soothing neutral palettes and a wall of mirrors filled this airy fitness studio. Below one's feet, the wood floor rested atop a layer of rose quartz crystals. (Even if clients don't see the crystals, the hope is that they feel the "vibrational energy.") Right outside the studio doors, a bathroom boasted marble counters, modern gold-plated fixtures, and Chanel bath products. Inspirational tunes by Florence and the Machine set the pace for this class called The Class.

Thirty toned women in Lululemon sports bras and leggings stood silent, their flat tummies on display. Eyes closed, they placed their right hands firmly on their hearts. In this pose, they patiently awaited the command of their instructor, the fitness guru Taryn Toomey, who would lead them through a "meditation, just with your body."

This self-described "cathartic mind-body experience" serves as an unorthodox therapy session. Here, women are encouraged to yell, shout, scream, and express themselves while also doing challenging cardio moves. At other points, they're told to stand still and quiet the mind. The Class centers around emotional management, which is why class names echo women's late-night venting sessions: I Love My Kids Just Not Right Now (give me a break!), F*CK Everything (when everyone and everything seems like the absolute worst), and the I Don't Wanna Workout (don't make me work out!).

Toomey, a blond, lithe, statuesque figure with the raspy voice of a Kathleen Turner, addressed the room while perched on a window ledge overlooking the Lower Manhattan skyline. "We're out of our bodies most of the day," Toomey said. "It's time for a reunion." The crowd nodded in agreement. Some looked genuinely touched.

Together, the crowd furiously squatted and shook, all while repeatedly shouting "Huh!" in tribal chorus. From there, the women contorted themselves into winged positions, their arms outstretched. They breathed heavily as their leader urged them to "rise up."

Midway through a medley of jumping jacks, lunges, and burpees, Toomey's voice intensified, taking on new gravitas. "What are your blinders?" Toomey demanded. "Your blocks—what are they?" Her voice got even louder, like a commanding priest. "What are they? What are they?!" As if hitting the crescendo at an opera, she shouted with gusto, "Feel! Feel! Feel!"

The room lost it. The session devolved into a rave as the Prodigy's electronic music anthem "Firestarter" roared over the speakers. Some class members moaned like birthing animals, while others shook their limbs with the spastic fervor of inflatable air dancers outside used car dealerships. One jumped wildly in place, tears rolling down her cheeks, as she yelled. Others frantically thrust their arms into the air, their $4,450 Cartier Love bracelets jangling. Rage, grief, and frustration were suspended in the sweat-mixed-with-Chanel-moistened air.

"This is a safe space," Toomey whispered.

Toomey at times can come across as a therapeutic healer, a cross between Deepak Chopra and Jane Fonda. "You start to realize that most of what's going on [in the body] is in the mind," Toomey told me. "And you know that you actually have a choice, and you can reroute it—that's what we do in The Class: we practice the ability to do that." That type of thinking is part of Toomey's appeal: a splash of the woo-woo grounded in the practical, incorporating her self-help messages within tried-and-true elements of mainstream fitness. She is completely aware that metaphysical and spiritual practices can seem foreign, and she makes the effort to render them more accessible to consumers without alienating her more Goopy fans. Her studio's crystal-embedded floors, for example, are alleged to "cleanse" bad energy. Despite spending thousands of dollars on them, Toomey will quickly label herself as a "pretty big skeptic." When asked whether she believes in crystals' supposed healing properties, she says she believes the most important healing element is the "power of intention."

Excerpted from The Gospel of Wellness by Rina Raphael. Copyright © 2022 by Rina Raphael. Excerpted by permission of Henry Holt and Company. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.