Wellness And Everything You Need To Know About It
In these days when people seem to be busy all the time, taking proper care of our well-being is more than crucial. However, sometimes striving for wellness it is not as easy as it looks. It comes with some changes in our habits. The things we do everyday impact us in the long run, after all. Therefore, we tend to focus on our wellness as a way of life and take the small and daily initiatives that lead us to reach our full potential and optimal wellness.
Anyways, what is wellness for you? We already know that the word wellness is often used to denote a person’s general health. However, wellness itself has multifaceted ways. Since each way indicates the overall health, it’s important to try and keep a balance between wellness’ ways or areas. John Valenty a CEO in Wellness.com defines wellness as “the result of the personal initiative, seeking a more optimal, holistic and balanced state of health and well-being across multiple dimensions.”
Whereas according to The World Health Organization: “Wellness is a state of complete physical, mental, and social well-being, and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity.” So although wellness and health are interlinked together, we come to understand that wellness is not only the absence of illness. It connects the dots with emotional and mental health as well.
Related: Wellness And Health: Definitions And Importance
U.S. Department of Health & Human Services listed 8 areas of wellness and they are: Physical, emotional, social, spiritual, intellectual, occupational, environmental and financial. Let us see below what each of this area is and how we can better apply them to our lives.
Physical Wellness
Physical wellness Is concerned with life aspects that are necessary to keep yourself in a good physical condition. This can be done with a combination of healthy eating habits and beneficial exercises or physical activity. In addition, an adequate amount of sleep is also required. Whether you better function with 7, 8 or 9 hours during the day, you must know it by now. The ideal way would be to stick to the same sleeping and waking up routine every time. Physical wellness also means to be responsible and know your body that well and this way you will notice any problem that comes along the way, so you can even address it when needed.
Emotional Wellness
This is another important part of overall wellness. It inspires people to be able to identify and accept their emotions, whatever they might be and handle them in the best way possible. Emotional wellness is also about self-care and stress and anxiety reduction and it directly indicates our general well-being. A good way to start and increase awareness about your feelings is through meditation.
Social Wellness
After connecting with ourselves, understanding and accepting our own feelings, social dimension plays also a major role in the total health equation. This area is about fostering genuine relationships and nurturing connections with people around us. Many studies found out that developing healthy interactions with other people helps our general wellbeing.
Spiritual Wellness
Not all of us define being spiritual in the same way, but this area focuses on leading a harmonious life with ourselves and others while searching for meaning and purpose in life. Overall, you have to know who you are, what you believe in and what helps you to grow spiritually.
Intellectual Wellness
In order to achieve a more balanced life, one should also develop intellectually. Intellectual wellness encourages us to engage in activities and new ideas that expand our knowledge and push us to reach our fullest potential in life.
Occupational Wellness
Occupational wellness Inspires us to follow a career path that motivates and satisfies us. Since working takes a larger part of your time during the week and life as well, it’s quite important to find a job that we like and makes us feel accomplished at the end of the day.
Environmental Wellness
It’s generally known that our surroundings can affect our health. So environmental wellness is about taking care of the place we live in, our workplace and also planet Earth. Let us try and be friends to our environment, we could probably try and recycle more and motivate our friends and family to do so too.
Financial Wellness
According to a survey done in 2017 by the American Psychological Association, 62% of Americans reported that money was a significant source that caused their stress. So, since money plays quite a critical role in our lives, financial wellness guides us to manage our financial expenses and rather bring satisfactory outcomes in our wellness goals.
Whereas, here are some simple things that you can add to your routine and improve your wellness at the core:
Maintain a healthy diet
Breakfast, lunch, and dinner are very much needed for our body to better function during the day. However, we do not always tend to eat healthy meals when the eating time comes. Instead of fast food, our body would thank us more if we added more vegetables to our plates. Also, decrease alcohol intake and reduce smoking if possible.
Exercise more
This is a very important tip that definitely helps a lot. Even if you aren’t a gym member yet, you can try and walk during the day for 20 or 30 minutes. In cases when you can avoid elevator, do so and rather take the stairs. Whatever you do, move and be active consistently.
Get a good night’s sleep
Sleep deprivation not only makes you feel less energetic during the day but also can contribute to various health issues. Consider that getting 8 hours of sleep every night largely impacts your body and mind. Therefore try to create nighttime habits that help you get better sleep. Try to reduce caffeine and unplug from all your electronics one hour before bedtime. You can rather opt to read a hard copy book or take a warm bath instead.
Drink a lot of water
Dehydration never helped anyone. While at work during the day, try to drink a full bottle of water every day. Staying hydrated can positively impact not only your mental focus but also your energy and metabolism.
Lastly, we hope that incorporating these small changes in your life can have a fruitful impact on your general wellness and life will get better for you!