Introduction
It is important for health and
wellness professionals to develop because we must first be a role model for our
clients, if we go into helping a client and our heads are a mess or we have no
spiritual practice, we are less likely to be able to help those clients. As the saying goes “practice what you preach”,
if we are helping a client with the practice of meditation then we need to be
meditating in order to be on common ground with that client. Knowledge is probably the most important of
all, know what you’re talking about, you just can’t go in cold with something like
this. If you’re helping a client change
to a eating a healthy lifestyle you need to be living that healthy
lifestyle. Staying positive and living our lives in the
present will enable ourselves to give our gifts to our clients as well as to
ourselves. The area that I need to
develop is the physical. I have struggled
for some time to lose the weight that I need to and to get on a regular
exercise regimen, however I am proud to say that I am doing it, it still needs
work and a little tweaking but I have lost 8 pounds, it’s just the last piece of
the puzzle that is being put into place!
Assessment
As I previously rated myself spiritually
and psychologically at a 9, this is the same rating that I would rate myself today.
I continue to use my spiritual practices
that I have come to learn through my spiritual journey in the past couple of years
and I think that those practices trickle down to the psychological for a healthy
mind. I rated myself at a 9 because I believe that we are always growing as a
person and that we are learning new things every day, whether it be in our scope
of practice or about ourselves as individuals. Originally I rated myself at a 2 for the physical,
however because of recent turn of events, I am bumping myself up to a 5!
Goal
development for integral health
Spirituality ~ My goal for this at this point would to stay
steadfast with the practices that I already have in place since they are working
for me.
Psychologically ~ I will incorporate the loving kindness
practice to help rid some of the clutter in my brain.
Physically~ My goal is to stick with the strength training regimen
that I created, and also to get out in nature more, of course when all the snow
is gone.
Practices for
personal health
To foster growth for all three of these aspects I will try new
activities for each of these.
Physical ~ I would like
to try Qigong. The basis of this practice
is to manipulate energy in order to promote self-healing, increase longevity, and
prevent disease. Wu Tao is another exercise
that I had tried awhile back and I will try to incorporate this into my life
again. This is a dance based moving meditation
that balances our vital life force energy and targets specific energy pathways to
free blockages.
Psychological ~ I have a friend who is studying emotion code
using muscle testing. This is a process of
questions that is asked, silently in her head, and that our bodies answer. Our bodies tell where there are trapped emotions
lying. After the emotion is discovered she
pulls it from your body and sends it to Mother Earth for transmutation. I do believe that I have some trapped emotions
that need to be cleared so I will be working on this with her. I would also like to try some hypnotherapy for
my anxiety of test taking. A hypnotherapist
uses the art of hypnosis and their training in psychology to give positive beneficial
therapy to the sub-conscious.
Spiritually ~ When spring approaches, and hopefully it will
soon, I plan on getting out more in nature like taking small hikes to connect to
my inner self in a different way as nature is very spiritual.
Commitment
Assessment will be important if I want to reach my goals and
continue to carry out my practices. I keep
a journal of every day happenings, but I think I will also keep a separate one
for these practices that I have already implemented and for the ones that I plan
on implementing into my life. The strategy
is to find something that you love and are passionate about to maintain those
practices into long term practices.
Best of luck to all of you in your future endeavors!
Namaste
~Michelle
