11/21/2025
An American Psychiatric Association article lists behaviors like exercise, sleep, diet, mindfulness, and kindness as though these are the root causes of mental health. These actions do matter, but theyβre insufficient if someone is in a dysregulated environment or lacking real relational support. They miss the link between these behaviors and the neurophysiological conditions that allow someone to access and benefit from them.
For example, a person in chronic survival mode canβt just "sleep better" or "practice mindfulness." Their biology is protecting them. Without a safe container--interpersonally and environmentally--those actions are inaccessible or even triggering.
The APAβs framing puts responsibility on the individual to fix their suffering with small habits, without acknowledging how social structures, trauma, poverty, racism, neglect, or disconnection destroy the very conditions that support mental health. It ignores the elephants in the room.
Then, when someone shows symptoms--like anxiety, shutdown, or despair--the same institution that told them to "do yoga" treats their suffering as a personal failure or chemical imbalance. Instead of seeing symptoms as a reflection of the personβs environment and the breakdown of relational safety, they pathologize the individual.
IPNB says suffering is relational and healing is relational. The APA still largely treats suffering as a personal flaw to be managed, rather than a signal of something missing in our collective ecosystems. Thatβs the disconnect. And thatβs why people who are doing their best still end up blamed, shamed, and drugged, when they struggle.
And that's why the great increase of distrust in the mental illness industry and psychiatry in particular.
