Unit 9: Project

Introduction:

Psychological, spiritual and physical aspects of health and wellness are all interconnected and act as a primary source of feeling whole. Health and wellness professional need to ensure that they are living by these standards in order to promote and encourage customers, patients, family members as well as themselves that achieving health and wellness to the ultimate level is possible if you believe and work hard. I believe in the old saying “practice what you preach” if you are looking to change someone else’s life, you must first change your own. I need to develop in all areas, mind, body and soul. I need to learn to relax my mind and develop more control to handle situations that may occur on a daily basis. I plan on practicing, training and dedicating myself to achieving my goals. I will never stop learning and setting goals.

Assessment:

I have accessed my health in each domain of spirituality, physicality, as well as psychologically and reflect on all that I have learned and how much I still have to learn. I have begun my journey, but the road ahead is shining bright with opportunity. I score my spiritual wellness as a 5, I have never been a faith or spiritual based person and only seemed to rely on this domain when I was in need. However, since I began my journey into integral health I have realized that I have improved already in this short amount of time since feeling whole involves spirituality. I believe that this domain needs the most work because I have never been exposed to a spiritual life before this and now I am creating it and discovering it for myself. I score my physical wellness as a 7. I have always been a health conscious person when it comes to eating right and exercises to stay in shape. I slack off here and there and would admit that my motivation needs a boost occasionally. I am now pregnant and have set a whole new set of goals that I look forward to achieving in the next 6 months. I feel that I always have room to grow with my physical wellbeing. Lastly, I would score my Psychological wellness as a 5. I have a very short attention span and cannot control my mind from wondering and worrying which leads to stress. Over time I have realized that training the mind is possible and I have been working daily to complete exercises that help me de-stress and organizes my thoughts to be better in my professional and academically.

Goal development:

I enjoy setting goals when it comes to my health and wellbeing because there is no better feeling then to set a goal and achieve it. I feed off of accomplishment and am on cloud nine when I put my mind to something and succeed. I plan on setting the following goals:

Physical: I plan on continuing a gym regiment throughout of my pregnancy to ensure that my child and I are health and well. This will also make getting back into shape post-pregnancy easier, which will also be a future goal of mine. Since weight lifting will be limited I will change my diet to ensure I am consuming the accurate amount of proteins and nutrition to maintain muscle mass. I am currently using pregnancy nutrition apps on my iPhone that assist me with these goals.

Psychological: I will actively continue to complete exercises I have found beneficial to my psychological wellbeing such as loving kindness and subtle mind. I will participate in yoga at least 1-2 times a week to calm my body, mind, and soul. I plan on learning how to meditate and make this a normal part of my everyday life. I have hopes to be able to settle my mind and control my emotions through any situation.

Spiritual: I plan on reading more about my faith and reading about other’s beliefs to incorporate my own sense of spirituality. I would like to explore all kinds of ideas and beliefs to create my own and pass my vision on to my loved ones and others.

Practices for personal health:

I can implement the following strategies to foster growth in physical, psychological and spiritual domains:

Physical: Cardiovascular exercises such as zumba and jogging are two activities I have learned to love and appreciate. There is nothing better than achieving goals while doing something you love and enjoy. My physical wellbeing is important to achieving my overall goal of complete wholeness.

Psychological: I would love to learn more about meditation as well as educate myself about way to calm the mind and understand exactly why the mind works the way that it does. Through meditation and education my mind can expand with knowledge which will result in a route to train and understand my mind which is another one of my ultimate goals.

Spiritual: Through Prayer and Yoga I plan to expand my knowledge and set more goals spiritually. I will take time out of each day to close my eyes and reflect on all that I am blessed with and all that I have received. I want to pray for things I believe in and I am thankful for. I will use Yoga also as another way to free my mind and body.

Commitment:

In the next six months I plan to make a commitment to myself and to my child to live a healthy lifestyle and continue my journey to integral health by keeping a journal. I will continue to eat healthy, engage in meditation and yoga at least two to three times a week and strive for happiness and wholeness. By keeping a journal I can reflect back on earlier months to view my progress to ensure I am staying on the right track. Once I feel that I am reaching my goal I will help others around me in any way possible to promote loving-kindness. The achievement and satisfaction that I have conquered thus far has benefitted me more than any other life event that I have crossed. I have incorporated this class and all my knowledge into my daily routine and will continue on this path to human flourishing.

Unit 8: Looking back

After reviewing some of the awesome practice sessions we’ve completed in this course, it is very difficult to not discuss all of them as favorites! However, I fell as if I took a lot away from the loving-kindness exercise. Early on in the class I was inexperienced with these types of exercises now overtime I realize that loving-kindness is the exercise I have continued and will continued to practice now and into the future. I was able to relax and really feel full of joy after this exercise. The second exercise was the subtle mind exercise. This really allowed controlling my mind and where it would wonder. I have never felt in control like I did during this exercise while remaining calm. I feel that since I had been practicing other exercises before exploring into this one my mind was already on the beginning stages of being trained.

I have truly implemented both of these exercises into my daily routine. I like to complete these at the end of my busy days to relax and release all that I have endured for the day. These exercises allow me to realize mistakes are OK, and a smile could brighten someone else’s day. Simple things in life go the farthest and I think I am beginning to realize that the more I let some of this “heavy” stress go.

Unit 7: Meeting Aesclepius

As always I really enjoyed the exercise this week, Meeting Aesclepius. However, this week I found myself very distracted and unable to focus and meditate the way I hoped that I would. I am unable to keep my mind in one constant thought or idea because I have so much going on in my life. I am hoping to rediscover the meditation I feel that I was working toward and I hope to be able to achieve this exercise next week sometime after I clear my head from these unneeded worries and thoughts. I believe once I am back on track in order to foster these practices you must think of them as a normal part of your life, like a daily routine.

"One cannot lead another where one has not gone himself" is pretty much spelled out to me. You cannot expect someone or tell someone how to do something if you have never done it. In respect to health and wellness this means that each person may have a different approach on how they would like to accomplish their goals. As a health care professional we must understand that everyone is different and we cannot begin to tell people how to achieve goals that we never have. I feel as health care professionals we do have an obligation to better ourselves because how can we give any advice or guidance on an act we are not working to achieve. It’s kind of a huge contradiction in my opinion. Working on a goal day by day will allow that goal to become a daily part of your routine and will not feel like such a task anymore, but more like something you cannot wait to do, the highlight of your day!

Thanks!

Unit 6: Discovering Me

The exercises this week were similar to the other audio exercises that we've completed. However, this week with the assessment I learned that I may not have a grasp on my life exactly like I thought I did. There are many areas within myself that I would like to change, change for the great good. I began to focus on my Husband, and my family and most importantly my children. I thought about how focusing on these "empty" parts of me could improve my relationships as well as teach others I care for how to live happily and freely. I cannot begin to judge others or view others in some sort of light because I am unable to fill those areas myself. I would like to become whole, so that I can help others find their peace as well. Meditating and continuing these exercises and activities will allow me to make more of these realizations and work to improve them. Without looking at myself from the inside out I would have never realized this.

Amanda

Unit 5: Subtle Mind

The loving kindness exercise and the subtle mind exercise were both very relaxing and I was really able to feel at ease while listening to both. However, the loving kindness exercise really seemed to focus directly on what it is that makes us feel loved and happy and how we can channel those feelings into others we love and even others that we do not know. The subtle mind exercise focused more on clearing those thoughts out and easing the mind while remaining in control. I really enjoyed both either way, and felt that I got valuable lessons from each.

Spiritual, mental and physical wellness all have their own backgrounds and provide different wellness for people but they are very similar and all help the mind, body and soul function better. Whenever I exercise or go to yoga I always feel more awake, more focused and overall just in better health. It is amazing to me how all three of these works together for such amazing results.

Unit 4: Loving-Kindness

I really enjoyed the loving-kindness listening exercise this week. I felt very relaxed and I liked that is was a decent amount of time and also liked the calming music at the end. I found it to be very beneficial in a way that I got to understand that I cannot share these feelings of loving-kindness with anyone until I experience them with myself. I feel that I am able to share this with my Husband, which is the person I thought about that I love with my whole heart. I feel at peace when I think about the love we share. On the other hand, I felt that the part of this exercise that was difficult was thinking about a person who is suffering and breathing in their pain and breathing out peace and health. I was unable to complete this part of the exercise without becoming emotional. I understand that this exercise was not meant to heal that person, but it was difficult to stay focused when I know how much pain and hurt they are in and how much I would love to make it go away. I would however recommend this exercise to everyone because I found it to be very beneficial and calming...made me understand a lot.

Without training the mind there will be no improvement, just like physical fitness. Without working out and hard determination you will never gain the muscle you were hoping for by summer. Mental workouts will take time, not everyone has tons of time during the day to practice so as long as we are taking 30 minutes or so a day to practice we can enhance the mind daily. No sense of trying to overdue it because then you will get burnt out or no follow through and like anything else once you get out of practice it's tough to get back in and it's tough to gain what you have already learned back...it's like starting from square one.

Amanda

Unit 3: Optimal wellbeing?

Reflecting on my physical wellbeing, spiritual wellbeing and psychological wellbeing I realize that I am not anywhere near where I would like to be in regard to optimal wellbeing. My physical wellbeing is an 8 because I believe I am in the best shape and health I’ve ever been in my life. My husband and I are expecting our first child and eating right and working out have been very important for not only me but my little one. My spiritual wellbeing is a 5 due to the fact that I was brought up in an Orthodox home and went to church camp each year to learn about my religion. I believe as I got older I let life get in the way of my duty to attend church and practice what I know. While I still have my faith and am a spiritual person, I believe I could do better. Lastly, I would rate my psychological wellbeing at a 6. I believe that my mind is in a million different places sometimes. It is hard to focus on one task when I have 100 other things to do.

 

My goal is to remain fit and healthy for my baby. This includes using the elliptical to exercise and eat fruits, vegetables, and other super foods! My goal is to attend church and get back into the routine in which I felt that I had a good relationship with my faith and spirituality. My last goal is to prioritize a little more and make checklists daily to help keep my mind in order and block out the irrelevant things in life.

 

I really enjoyed the exercise this week, just as much as last week. Unlike last week I felt myself very relaxed and at peace. Last week my mind wondered a lot and it did this week too but I felt as if I could realize it then control it and remain focused. I also did not fall asleep this week which tells me I was either able to control my mind and stay awake, I have been getting a good amount of sleep, or both! Either way I felt a lot more still this week and in control.