I - Introduction:

Why is it important for health and wellness professionals to develop psychologically, spiritually and physically? What areas do you need to develop to achieve the goals you have for yourself?

     

In my opinion, it is vital that health and wellness professionals lead by example. This is a field where incorporating integral health practices into their own lives is integral to professionals, before offering treatment to others. This is also a profession where people can easily judge where you are at personally with in career that you are considered a professional in. If you want people to follow you, you must represent your brand.

    According to (Dacher 2006. p.167), when professionals implement integral health in to their own lives, they “will come to know that the alleviation of suffering and the ascent to human flourishing are more than ideas.” These professionals will than want to end needless suffering to the best of their ability and therefore, “the soul of medicine returns.”

II - Assessment:

How have you assessed your health in each domain? How do you score your wellness spiritually, physically, and psychologically?

                                                                                                                                                        We we’re given several tools throughout this class to help us incorporate integral health into our

Professional lives. I have been highly evaluating and finding outside resources to get a good and semi accurate account of where I am at in each component.

Some of the questions I asked myself dealt with which part of my life is suffering the most, what levels to I aspire to achieve for myself in the future, what components are most ready for the growth and will stand to gain the most benefit, how will I form a plan to implement these changes

       + In the physical aspect of my life, I would currently rate myself at a 7- I want to strive to be considered a fit person, just not in shape. I believe this would help me to attain a 9 or 10 rating.

       +In the spiritual aspect I would consider myself at a 6- I am very excepting of other people’s spiritual belief or at least believing in themselves, if nothing else. I consider myself spiritual person, but I would like to rely on it more than I do right now.

        +In the psychological aspect- I would currently rate myself at a 7, but it fluctuates.

III - Goal Development:

     Physically- In the physical aspect of my life I want to strive to be considered a fit person, just not in shape. In the pass couple of years I have become more in shape than I ever was in my 20s, but knowing the health benefits that I can.

Spiritually- I feel most at home when I am practicing yoga. I use to joke with my friends that would ask me about church that they could always find me at the “House of yoga” before our Sunday brunch. I want to get back in that habit instead of just using yoga as a workout. I feel that I am more at peace and find peace in others when I really focus on grounding myself at yoga.

Psychologically - Since stress affects how I handle things psychologically I want to be better equipped to handle these situations and for that number not to fluctuate, but maintain as I am faced with things.

IV - Practices for Personal Health:

What strategies can you implement to foster growth in each of the following domains; Physical, Psychological, and Spiritual. Provide at least two examples of exercises or practices in each domain. Explain how you will implement each example.

Strategies I plan on using include entering a race that I have to pay for and commit to doing it with others. I also plan on; keeping documented progress via a social network. This will cause me to hold myself more accountable.

To get back into using yoga spiritually, I need to find a new studio to practice at on top of my current one. While Brikram yoga helps me build mental resiliency, helps me biologically, and physically. I don’t get the spiritual benefit that I got from my previous hot yoga studio. I will search to find one and attend that one on Sunday mornings. I grew up going to church and our culture generally looks at Sunday as attendance day spiritually. By adding it to that time slot, I will go back to viewing it as my place of worship. I also plan on talking about it to others, I feel as though this reinforces spirituality.

Psychologically- I can often sell myself on something if my health is going to benefit. Benefits of mediation may include lower blood pressure, restores digestive system, releases fears, reduces anxiety, relieves insomnia, and freeing the mind from self-doubt and chatter.  I’m all about mental resiliency, so “I’m sold!”. To incorporate positive psychological growth I plan on reminding myself to practice meditation more regularly. I have also downloaded the audio to my mini MP3 player, which I keep on my nightstand. The constant reminder as I get in and out of bed should get me to listen more often. I also plan on purchasing more books to read along with the 2, I already have.

V - Commitment:

In order to hold myself accountable on achieving this goal I plan on making a video reviewing this assignment and giving myself words of encouragement of why I as aspire to have optimal health. By continuing to make these video diary entries throughout my journey and documenting the process so that I can see and hear it: I hope remain on the path to achieving my journey. I also believe writing this all down has served as a healing tool and cleared my mind of the chatter so I could refocus my efforts to attain full integral health. Finally, I will make a vow to myself to complete this project.

References

Dacher, E. S. (2006). Integral health: The path to human flourishing. Laguna Beach,

CA: Basic Health Publications, Inc.