Final Project

Ginette Trapp

HW420-02

March 5, 2011

I.                     Introduction

It is important for a health and wellness professional to develop psychologically, spiritually and physically because the practitioner must really know and understand his practice in order to be efficient.  Dacher states, “To model and teach this special work requires not merely book learning, but direct hands-on instruction in the many practices that facilitate the path to human flourishing.” 

In my own life, I need to continue to work on the spiritual and physical aspects of my development. The past several years have been full of stress due to the lengthy illness and subsequent death of my only living brother followed by the realization of my mother’s battle with Alzheimer’s.  This does not include the daily stresses of being a wife, mother and full time employee.  I have not always managed this stress well; I have gained weight and been short tempered at inappropriate things and times.  I believe that if I had been more centered and had spent more time in spiritual development, my stress would not have been so severe.  So my goals are to become more spiritually centered and incorporate a new physical workout into my life that will help manage stress as I continue to move forward in achieving my career and personal goals.

II.                  Assessment

Assessing yourself is always a difficult task because it forces you to take a hard and

            honest look at yourself.  I have generally assessed myself by looking at how I am

handling the stressful events that occur in my life.  If I remain balanced, I know that I am doing well.  I ask myself questions that make me look at specific aspects of my life.  As I begin to take on this task, I will rate myself in each domain using a scale of 1 to 10 with 10 being the highest.  I believe in the psychological domain I would rate myself at a 6.  I believe I am pretty stable but at times of high stress, I can to show signs of stress.  I have had bouts of depression and I am always susceptible to becoming depressed.  I believe if I continue to work on myself in all of the domains, I will lessen the possible bouts of depression.  I believe that all of them are connected and   they work together to keep you balanced. 

Spiritually I would rate myself at an 8.  I am constantly working on myself spiritually.  I am taking the time to pray and meditate daily.  Spiritual health is important to the entire health of a person because it helps to reduce stress or at least helps you manage the stress; which can have a detrimental effect on a person physically. 

Physically, I rate myself at a 4, because I am not physically active.  I am about 15 or 20 pounds overweight, which I can feel in my daily life.  I need to incorporate some type of physical activity into my daily life.

III.                      Goal Development

Since it is obvious that I have need for improvement in all three areas, I will set

            goals to help me achieve greater development in all of three areas.  In the

            psychological area, my goal is to manage my level of stress and deal more effectively

            with stress when it occurs.  Also it is my goal to work to not allow myself to get so

            overwhelmed that I am susceptible to bouts of depression. 

                        Physically, my goal is to get my weight back down to a weight where I feel more

            comfortable with myself.  So this means that I will also begin a workout plan that will

            help me lose weight and get in shape.  Instead of sitting down in front of the television

            for hours doing nothing.   I will do jumping jacks or sit ups during the commercial breaks.

            I will also try to incorporate yoga combined with meditation which will help me with

            development and growth in the psychological and spiritual areas too.

                        My  goals spiritually is to continue to read, study and meditate on the God’s

            word.  So that I will continue to grow and become more settled and balanced.  I will take

            classes at my church that will help with my growth and development. 

IV.                 Practices for personal health

There are several strategies I can implement to help me achieve my goals for

            physical development.  As I stated before I will start to do some type of physical

            activity during commercials when I am watching television.  I will also implement a

            workout program that I will commit to at least three times a week.  I will also monitor

            my food intake so that I am eating proper portions as well as eating more nutritional

            foods.  All of these things combined will help me achieve the goal of losing my desired

            amount of weight.

                        Strategies that I will use to help me meet my goals for psychological

            development are to implement exercises or practices such as yoga and meditation. 

            Both of these exercises are great to help calm and quiet the mind so that it can be

            cleared of all the noise so that you can think more clearly.  This also helps to release

            Stress levels and helps you learn how to manage stress.  When I begin to feel stress,

            I can take a few moments to meditate to help alleviate stress before it becomes a

            serious problem.

                        The strategies that I will use to help my development spiritually are to the same

                        As those I will use to help me develop psychologically.  Yoga and meditation are

            great tools to help with spirituality as well as psychological development.  I will

            Implement the loving kindness exercise into my daily routine and if not try to do the

            Exercise at least three times a week.   

V.                   Commitment

I will assess my progress or lack of progress over the next six months by using my

            monthly calendar to plan when I want to do each of these exercises and practices.  I will

            note the weekly on my actual participation or lack of participation in each of these

            exercises and practices.  I also like to journal, so I will make a point when I am

            journaling to note which activity I have actively done.  This will give me a written

            log of my progress which will give me the information needed to monitor my

            progress.  These same practices of making a monthly calendar and journaling are

            the tools I will use to help me maintain my long term practices for health and

            wellness. 

References

Dacher, M. E. (2006). Integral health: The path to human flourshing. Laguna Beach, California: Basic

 Health Publications, Inc.