Journey to Wellness

It is too easy to be distracted by life, that self makes time for people but not for self. When own mental, physical, emotional and spiritual health is off balance, it is necessary to know how to self reflect and understand the causes to identify solutions. Self awareness is not just about understanding how decisions made by self can affect others, but how decisions made by self can be affect self.

Our diet, environments, relationships and lifestyle can enrich our health or destroy it. Of course, the former will provide a more stable foundation to build a purposeful life.

Living a healthy lifestyle is a journey as a lot of the practices are learned and not natural. Everyone’s health needs are different, so it is necessary to know self and own needs to nurture own health. Even when optimum wellness is achieved, it is still a challenge to maintain a healthy lifestyle and something that needs to be practiced daily in various ways to maintain mental, physical, emotional and spiritual health.

When assessing your own wellness, it important to reflect on and note your reflections for reference:

• Mental health – Is your thinking clear and solution focused or do you overthink negative thoughts? Do you understand what causes you to think in ways that affect your behaviour? Do you think you deserve the best? Do you put others before yourself? Do you know and understand yourself? If not, you may benefit from some therapy and counselling.

• Physical health – Do you exercise daily? What type of exercising do you enjoy? Exercise is very important to condition and strengthen your body, it is also great for mental health because it releases happy hormones like endorphins and serotonin. Walking, yoga, cycling and aerobics are exercises that can be done daily with no or little equipment.

• Spiritual Health – In relation to higher spiritual power, what do you believe and why? Do you have any understanding of the spiritual world? Do you believe in universal energy? How do you nurture your spiritual health to be your best and why?

• Diet Health – Do you have health issues? If so, what’s caused them? Do you eat nutritious foods in every meal or snack? How much junk food do you consume? If you are overweight, why? What can you remove from your diet to be healthy? What do You need to eat more of to be healthier?

• Emotional health – How do you deal with your emotions? Do you acknowledge your feelings or emotions? Can you express your feelings and emotions? It is important to learn to control your emotions before they control you but you need know yourself, develop self- awareness and be honest with self about emotional states. Learn to check in on yourself when you feel off balance.

• Relationship health – Reflect on the status of relationships with families, spouses/partners. Friendships and work colleagues. If there are problematic issues, reflect on the causes and consequences as well as your own part in the scenario not just the others involved. How will you handle the situation?

• Environmental health – Stressful workplaces can have a negative impact on own health. Reflect on the cause of stress, possible solutions and put them into action to nurture your health and wellbeing.

• Financial Health – How are you finances? If you overspend, why? If you are in debt, how will you make payments? It is important to know how to save money as well as spend, especially if its towards a vision that will allow you to be your best.

All of the above factors affect your wellness, so take control of your health before your health takes control of you!