Final Blog

On week three I wasn't having a very good day when I did  my blog.  However it changes day to day with what life brings me.  Today my ratings are higher.  To begin with my psychological rating would a 6 which has greatly improved from a one.  I am feeling good about life and am excited that in February i will be done with school and can breathe and enjoy coming home and not doing homework.  My spirituality is still an eight.  Always room for improvement, and I am going to continue to try to meditate or just relax during a portion of the day.  My  physical rating is working its way up.  I would rate it a 6, I am in the biggest loser at work and now I have a week off after today for class I am going to start hard core running and lifting weights.  Chunky no more for this girl.   '
This course has been great in giving me options to improve my all over well being.  I enjoyed this class very much.  Good luck to everyone. 

Unit 9 Project

Introduction

            Health and wellness professionals need to be fully developed in their psychological, spiritual and physical states of being.  In order to teach others, the ones teaching need to have a grasp and experience the benefits of health and wellness.  If not the students might thing their teachers are frauds or that the experiences won’t benefit them.

            My personal areas that need improvement are in spirituality and physically.  Going to school, working full time and dealing with possible deployment, I have lost sights on my health and wellness.  My goals are to get back on track and start working on my spiritual and physical aspects of my life.

Assessment:

            I would rate myself a five in the physical realm due to not being unhealthy but not being at my best.  My workout regimen needs to improve for health reasons and military reasons.  Passing a physical fitness test is important in keeping my position in the military.

            In the spiritualty realm of my health I would rate myself a four.  I don’t leave enough time for me and often I am stressed to max.  This is the area I need to improve myself the most.  The psychological realm of my life is about the same ranging around midway.  I know what I should do but finding the time and energy to do the things that are good for me hasn’t been a priority.  I am working on goals in each area.

Goal Development:

            Physical Goal:  Within in the next month I need to be able to run a two mile run under nineteen minutes and perform at least seventeen pushups and fifty sit-ups.

            Spiritual Goal:  I want to meditate at least once or twice a week.  Once I become comfortable and proficient increase the occurrence to once a day.

            Psychological Goal: My goal is to control my thoughts and feelings.  I want to be able to become better at thinking before I react to a situation and find the positives in every negative situation.

Practices for personal health:

            Spiritual Domain: Meditation and relaxation

            Physical Domain: Insanity workout and Pilates

            Psychological Domain: Finding the positive in every situation and talking with loved                           ones instead of bottling everything inside.

Commitment:

            In the next six months I will track my progress by simply waking up every morning and rating how I feel.  I will track my weight loss during the next six months to show my progressing in my physical realm.  Another way for me to track my progress is to see how well I can quite my mind and thoughts.  I am looking forward to leading a better lifestyle. 

Week 8

The most beneficial exercises were meditations and subtle mind.  Subtle mind was the hardest but once I got the hang of it, I can finally quiet my thoughts.  During the day they just become overwhelming.  Meditations are a great way for me to relax and I am a type AB personality.  I can be mellow and at times intense, so meditation makes me control my intense days better.  I need to implement these practices in my life to better foster "mental fitness".  The how is finding time to do the practices.  With school, work, household and sports I am often limited.  However my goal is to start setting aside more time to work on my "mental fitness". The best time for me is before I fall asleep.  Its helps me de-stress and fall asleep faster when I do my meditation.

Unit 7

Track # 4 was similar to the rest.  I did like centering my thoughts around one person who I loved and cherished, my late Aunt Liz.  I found it easy to absorb her knowledge and love because before she passed I did it every time I gave her a hug.  My thoughts did start to wonder when just the background noise was going for a long period of time.  It was very soothing and I lightly fell asleep.  I need to improve my focus skills so I don't fall asleep anymore.

The saying "one cannot lead another where one has not gone himself"(p. 477) is a true statement.  Until you have experienced something how can you teach someone what do to or expect. This applies to health and wellness professional because you have to lead by example.  When people have seen what you have done and are capable of doing they will be sold on the idea and what to try it themselves.  Its like diet pill or workout plan, if there is no success stories how do we know that it really works. Of course you have an obligation to your clients to be developing your health psychologically, physically and spiritually?  Again leading by example and shows that your profession is dynamic and not one sided.  Implementing psychological and spiritual growth my personal life can be done by simply setting time to meditate.  Life is often fast speed and we don't allow time for ourselves.  Setting the time to take care of our spiritual growth is a great start to leading a healthy life.

Unit 6

     The loving kindness exercise was quite difficult to remember the words while trying to stay relaxed and focused.  I often lost the flow of words and then my focus was gone.  I think saying the words outs loud is more difficult than thinking them in your head.  However the message was a great thing to say out loud and send out to the ones in need. 
    Intergral Assesment of Annie
My source of difficulty is in my interpersonal aspects of my life. My interpersonal aspects are something I find hard to control and I like knowing and preparing for my future.  Its a place in my life where I feel like no matter what I do I will not be able to change everything.  I think I need development and growth in each line of development.  The biggest development will be from the mind to soul.  I need to work on the inner me instead of focusing on the outside world
The biggest and harderst exercise that I need to incorporate into my development is mediatation and relaxation.  Being type A personality, its hard to sit in one place at a time and just think.  Controlling my thoughts is going to be a challenge but I am going to work at it. 

Comparing

The love and kindness exercise along with the subtle mind I have found are too long.  I lost interest and focus very quickly.  It didn't help that when I looked at the time that it was going to take that I didn't want to do it before it starts.  I think they are both great practices but my attention span can sit quietly for 20 plus minutes.  Type A personality I have is going to be my challenges with these exercises.
The readings this week were great since I am starting a new workout program.  I often focus on how difficult the exercise is instead of the benefits it is having over my mind and body.  I do feel better after exercising but when I am running on the treadmill my mind is often running as fast as I am.  I am not saying that is super fast but I often forget that I am working out.  Then when I come back to reality, my mind is exhausted making the body follow suit.  I am definitely going to work on my thoughts while I am exercising, to achieve total benefit. 

Loving Kindness Practice

It is always hard to find time to relax and experience these exercises that are given to us in our class.  However this exercise was the best so far.  The narrators voice was soothing and the sounds of waves made the experience better.  When I am often left to just my thoughts and they seem to wonder out of control.  I have everything from what I am going to do when this is done to how much I don't truly appreciate my family.  It is going to be a long journey but the loving kindness practice is another V8 juice to the head to remind me to stop sweating the small stuff.  Instead just focus on loving yourself and others in your life that mean the world to you. 

The mental workout is the same as working out your body to look and feel great.  You have to put the effort into it, commit everyday to take the time need to accomplish your goals.  This workout I believe will have more benefit to our health than just working out muscles.