Bioharmony Glossary: The Words We Use
These are Toast & Fig Jam’s working definitions for our Bioharmony philosophy. They explain how we use the words; they do not replace clinical definitions or other people’s uses of the same terms.
Bioharmony is the philosophy. Body-compatible living is its practical application. Capacity, conditions, and support help us consider what is workable; participation is the person-defined direction. Notice → Support → Choose is one practice for connecting those ideas in an everyday moment. The wider philosophy also considers your physical needs, sensory environment, work, relationships, resources, and participation without self-erasure over time.
The word Bioharmony also appears in other organizations and fields. This glossary describes Toast & Fig Jam’s interpretation, without claiming invention of the word, affiliation with another business, or ownership of those other meanings.
Bioharmony
At Toast & Fig Jam, Bioharmony means noticing how body, mind, relationships, environment, and circumstances interact, then responding with support and choices that make meaningful participation more possible. It is an awareness-led philosophy for living, not a medical treatment, a promise of calm, or a requirement to continually improve yourself.
Everyday example: A person who wants friendship explores a shorter, accessible gathering and later considers whether it helped them connect.
Scope: Founder philosophy; usefulness and long-term product effects are hypotheses.
Body compatibility
Body compatibility, in our framework, describes the fit between a person's changing capacities, needs, preferences, and circumstances and the demands of everyday life. It asks what conditions would make participation more workable. It is contextual and revisable, not a biological score, a safety assessment, or the medical concept of biocompatibility.
Everyday example: Comparing the practical demands of a crowded café and a quieter accessible meeting space.
Scope: Toast & Fig Jam’s working language, related to established person–environment approaches.
Related context: WHO ICF; FDA biocompatibility. These sources provide context; they do not validate or endorse Toast & Fig Jam.
Body-compatible living
Body-compatible living is the practice of adapting routines, environments, expectations, relationships, and support to the person who actually exists today. The aim is workable participation in meaningful life, with room for changing capacity and real constraints. Comfort can matter, but it is neither the only goal nor proof of safety.
Everyday example: A caregiver arranges one shared task rather than adding another wellness routine.
Scope: Supporting application framework for Bioharmony; demand, comprehension and product benefit need testing.
Neurowellness
Neurowellness is an emerging umbrella used by wellness businesses and writers for approaches concerned with the brain and nervous system. Its meaning varies across education, practices, services, and technology. At Toast & Fig Jam, we use it cautiously for understanding relevant influences, while evaluating each factual claim and support separately.
Everyday example: An explainer separates evidence for an individual practice from a device manufacturer's category language.
Scope: Observed industry usage; no umbrella efficacy conclusion.
Related context: GWS. These sources provide context; they do not validate or endorse Toast & Fig Jam.
Nervous system support
Nervous system support is our everyday umbrella for considering resources that may fit a person's reported experience and circumstances. Support can be bodily, sensory, environmental, relational, practical, protective, or professional. The phrase does not establish how a practice works, whether it suits someone, or whether their physiology has measurably changed.
Everyday example: Asking someone to accompany you to an appointment.
Scope: Support covers many different options. The evidence and fit need to be considered for each one.
Regulation
Regulation describes processes through which responses are adjusted to changing demands and circumstances. In Toast & Fig Jam's everyday language, it concerns access to flexibility and choice, not permanent calm. Activation, sadness, anger, withdrawal, and rest can serve purposes. A person's description alone cannot establish an autonomic state or mechanism.
Everyday example: Anger can inform a considered request for change.
Scope: Scientific uses of this term vary. Our everyday framing is not a validated measure of physiology or product outcomes.
Capacity
Capacity is what a person can realistically engage with in a particular situation, considering energy, attention, skills, health, support, time, and material conditions. It changes across tasks and moments. Naming capacity should help adjust demands or find assistance, not assign worth, diagnose a condition, or predict a fixed personal limit.
Everyday example: Attending remotely rather than commuting.
Scope: Everyday working definition; clinical pacing guidance is condition-specific.
Related context: CDC ME/CFS. These sources provide context; they do not validate or endorse Toast & Fig Jam.
Self-abandonment
Self-abandonment is a nonclinical phrase for repeatedly overriding needs, limits, preferences, or values in ways that leave someone less connected to themselves. We use it only when the person finds it useful. Survival choices, caregiving obligations, discrimination, limited resources, and necessary compromises must never be reduced to personal moral failure.
Everyday example: Repeatedly agreeing to discretionary commitments while wishing for time to decide.
Scope: Popular/experiential construct; no validated TFJ diagnostic scale.
Self-honoring choice
A self-honoring choice takes a person's needs, values, limits, preferences, responsibilities, and circumstances seriously. It may involve action, waiting, compromise, protection, rest, or asking for help. It need not feel comfortable or satisfy every desire. The person remains its author, and can reconsider the choice as information and conditions change.
Everyday example: Asking for time before answering rather than issuing an unsafe ultimatum.
Scope: Normative brand language; effectiveness depends on the context.
Self-trust
Self-trust is a revisable confidence that you can notice what matters, seek support, make choices, and respond when those choices need changing. Our belief is that lived experiences of having your own back can contribute to it. Self-trust includes uncertainty, correction, and help; it does not require always being right.
Everyday example: Recognizing an unsuccessful plan and asking for different support.
Scope: Brand thesis/product hypothesis; adjacent psychological constructs require careful attribution.
Self-authorship
Self-authorship, in our everyday usage, means increasingly shaping choices and life directions through considered values, preferences, relationships, and commitments. It includes responsibility and dependence on others, not total control. The term has an established developmental research history; our practical interpretation does not claim to reproduce, replace, or validate that theory.
Everyday example: Testing a creative commitment while keeping necessary paid work.
Scope: Established theoretical lineage, not proof of TFJ outcomes.
Related context: Academic context. These sources provide context; they do not validate or endorse Toast & Fig Jam.
Participation
Participation means being involved in the activities, relationships, and situations that matter to a person. It can include creating, connecting, working, resting, receiving care, or being present in a small way. More activity is not automatically better. Meaning, access, support, consent, and the person's own account determine what participation means.
Everyday example: Enjoying a visit for fifteen minutes with an agreed exit option.
Scope: Established professional concept plus explicit brand interpretation; no implication that WHO endorses TFJ.
Related context: WHO ICF. These sources provide context; they do not validate or endorse Toast & Fig Jam.