What Is Wellness?

• Wellness is about you.
• It is about learning to love your whole self. It is about assuming charge of your life, living in process, and channeling life energy.
• It is about choices.
• It is about the one way to wellness - your way.

Wellness As Distinct from Treatment

Much of contemporary medical practice and even "alternative health" practice are oriented toward treating disease. This is important. But it is not enough. Our definition of wellness extends the definition of health to encompass a process of integration characterized by awareness, education, and growth.

What You Will Find

Factual text is interspersed with exercises and personal examples as we attempt to engage the whole of you - whole brain, whole heart, whole body, whole soul - so be prepared.

Stay active in the process. Do the exercises. Formulate questions. Develop a personal wellness journal. Remember that wellness is a process and that, once begun, this exploration is a lifelong adventure.

The text that follows is from the Wellness Workbook and is organized according to the twelve sections of the Wellness Energy System, illustrated by the Wellness Wheel below.

Introduction to Wellness Wellness is the right and privilege of everyone. There is no prerequisite for it other than your free choice.... The Wellness Energy System and Illness/Wellness Continuum set the scene for the remainder of this entire section. more...

Self-Responsibility & Love The complementary concepts of self-responsibility and love together form the foundations of wellness and encourage the free flow of all other types of energy. more...

Breathing The way we breathe is the way we live our life. Actually, the words for spirit and breath are the same in many cultures. more...

Sensing It is through the senses—seeing, touching, smelling, tasting, hearing, and others—that we know and enjoy our world. more...

Eating Despite a growing concern for the relationship between nutrition and health, making radical changes in a short period of time is often a set-up for failure. more...

Moving To be alive is to be moving. Inhibit movement and we create illness. Stop it and we are dead. Allow it fully, and we realize wellness. more...

Feeling From the moment of birth, with our very first breath, we experience feelings and emotions. They can be intense, frightening, or wonderful. Life fully lived is life with feeling. more...

Thinking Most agree that what goes into our mouth affects our health and wellbeing. Few understand that mental nutrition is every bit as important as oral nutrition. more...

Working & Playing Almost all our waking hours are spent doing one or the other. If there is an imbalance or significant problems in either area, our state of health will reflect it. more...

Communicating Every time we speak to (or write to, or look at) someone, we are revealing ourself. When not communicating with someone else, we are usually carrying on an internal conversation with ourself. more...

Intimacy & Sex Intimacy is one of the most sought-after, yet feared, qualities of life. A major component of intimacy is sex—the vital life force: elan vital, ki or chi—the energy of our aliveness. more...

Finding Meaning By learning to look within and trust what we find there, we focus on what is instead of living in future hopes or past memories. Crucial to finding meaning is being who we arenot who we think we are supposed to be. more...

Transcending In moments of transcendence, all problems and worries disappear. We feel more together than ever before, whether watching ocean waves, being absorbed in music, or experiencing the "aha" moment when a solution appears. more...

Note: The links below are a compact version of the above links.

Introduction to Wellness
Self-Responsibility & Love
Breathing
Sensing
Eating
Moving
Feeling
Thinking
Working & Playing
Communicating
Intimacy & Sex
Finding Meaning
Transcending

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