Understanding Wellness

Wellness

There are seven components to the wellness: emotional, mental, physical, social, spiritual, vocational and environmental. All of these components constantly require some energy, but many people lack balance among all areas. That is, most of their energy is tied-up in one or two areas such as emotional and social. Neglecting the other four or five areas causes problems throughout the system. It can be compared to trying to maximize gas mileage. You can devote a lot of time and energy to keeping your car tuned up and the oil changed, but if your tires are under-inflated and you are carrying a 50-pound bag of dog food in the trunk constantly, you are not going to reap the full benefits. The same thing is true for your body. If you are trying to maximize the use of the energy you have, you must attend to all aspects of your life, not just the ones that obviously need attention. Think about the last time you were stressed out. Most of your energy was going to the emotional component of wellness and the other areas such as social, physical and environmental started having problems. You neglected your relationships or tended to be more irritable. You probably got sick easier and had difficulty sleeping and there was just no energy left over to clean. Look over the following areas and identify imbalances and ways to correct them.

Components of the Wellness Model

The emotional aspect of the person involves any energy expended in the course of experiencing feelings.

The mental aspect is defined as those processes that receive, encode and disperse information. Their personality, their self-concept, and their mental abilities including creativity and problem solving shape people’s mental component.

The physical aspect of the person encompasses all of the physical/physiological processes that demand energy. These include neuroprocesses, digestion, respiration, immunity, exercise etceteras.

The social component of people includes all of the activities involved in forming and maintaining relationships with friends, family and coworkers. Examples are: communication skills and forming and maintaining nurturing relationships

The spiritual component is the energy dedicated to defining and living a purposeful life characterized by recognition of the connection to others and the universe and engaging in behaviors that promote balance and harmony with oneself and the universe. Most religions are based on principles similar to spiritual wellness, but spirituality is a way of /ife, not just a set of doctrines. People may choose to define their spirituality according to the doctrines of one or more religions, but it is not until they embody the intention of the doctrines and actually live by them that they will be spiritual. Spiritual wellness involves defining and living by a set of values and ethics with reflection upon their consequences for the greater good, and behaving in ways consistent with those values.

The vocational aspect is the energy dedicated to defining and reaching career goals. This includes: deciding on a career path, defining vocational needs and goals including:geographic location, benefits, opportunities for advancement and the environment within which one will work.

The environmental aspect is the energy dedicated to maintaining a positive, productive, relaxing environment for all of your senses.

Consider ways that people can multi-task in order to attend to all areas of themselves while accomplishing an energy intensive task such as moving or spring-cleaning which inevitably takes time and energy. Emotionally, it can be very draining, or people can take a little more time and look at some of the “treasures” they uncover in the very back of the closet. Environmentally, people can also attend to their surroundings to make them less dis-stressful. If people thrive on order, do not just throw everything into the middle of the floor and try to re-organize. Label the boxes. Plan a strategy for re-organization before starting. Finally, consider setting a relaxing mood with aromatherapy and music. Mentally, there is little effort needed if there is a plan-of-attack. People should figure out ahead of time how to move the piano down three flights of stairs so they are not stymied when the movers arrive. Physically, they should make sure they have enough rest, energy and good food--not just M&Ms and Mountain Dew. Also, use good form, bend at the knees, get help lifting overly heavy objects etceteras. Socially, make it a cleaning/moving party, get help, someone to talk to (someone to rub your back when you get tired). Vocationally, for people who move/clean on the weekend, plan on being sore on Monday. They will discover muscles they never knew they had. People’s allergies might also act up. Monday probably will not be very productive. Plan on either having an easy day, or taking the day completely off :-}

Think about ways you can help yourself go with the flow instead of swimming upstream. More suggestions can be found at Doctor-Is-In the sister site of the Counselor’s Community or Counselor Continuing Education and Self-Help Manuals .