Unit 9 blog: Yes! To Integral Health

I.

“Without integral practice, we experience only a portion of the health that is available to us” (Dacher, 2006).  What Elliott Dacher is trying to point out is that for the most part of our lives, we haven’t experience all aspects of healing.  In our society, our mind is set on instant gratification and when our health and well being is not at its best, we turn to conventional medicine where they focus on “healing” one area of the body instead of the whole body.  Integral healing is the very opposite.  Integral healing in part focuses on the whole body by developing in depth the psychological well being, the spiritual well being, and the physically well being of the individual.  To become a great health and wellness professional, being able to develop the psychological, spiritual, and physical aspect of our life is crucial to our professional life, our personal life and our interpersonal life.  As health and wellness professionals, we want our clients to feel like they can have full trust and honesty in our healing and in order for that to happen; we must be fully developed in those three aspects of well being.  Just like Dacher (2006) stated in the text, “One cannot lead others, where one has not gone himself.”  The areas that I feel that need more strengthening in order to improve my overall well being are all of the three aspects aforementioned.  I need to strengthen my psychological well being, spiritual, and physical well being.  Out of those three, I want and feel like I need to strengthen my spiritual and psychological well being the most.  Once I develop my inner consciousness by the use of integral practice, it is then I can become the kind of health and wellness practitioner that my future clients may need for an integral healing. 

II.

When it comes to integral assessment, we are identifying different aspects of our lives that require attention (Dacher, 105).  I have identified the two areas that I feel that needs more improvement and just by doing so, I am on the path to integral health.  When it comes to scoring my overall health; for my physical well being, I give it a score of 7.  I give it this score because I maintain an active life.  I walk a lot and the work that I do for my job is somewhat intense-physical labor.  The reason why I didn't rate it higher is because I do not work out in terms of going to the gym and other physical exercise.  I want to engage in exercise activities in order to reach optimal well being.  In terms of spiritual well-being, I rate myself a 5.  I actually feel like I am moving downward instead of upwards.  I am connected with my higher being and whenever I need guidance and self control I pray.  I did not rate myself higher because I do not pray or communicate with my spiritual side as often as I should, I often pray when some obstacle is in my way, but it should go beyond that reason.  Besides praying, I want to engage in other spiritual techniques such as meditation which can be quite a challenge for me, but with practice, it should be a natural feeling at the end.  As for my psychological well-being, I rate it 6.  I rate it this because I have grown to accept who I am as a person over the years.  If I work on balancing my emotions and the cognitive aspect of my life, I can obtain a higher score. 

III.

There are certain goals that I want to accomplish for my well being in order to continue my path to human flourishing. 

·       Spiritually, my goal is to be more prayerful.  I have to train my mind to be focused on prayer.  I want to be able to meditate as well, something I never really took to try on my own. 

·       Physically, my goal is to step my foot into the gym.  I want to be able to find a work out program that will fit my lifestyle so that I can head towards optimal well being. 

·       Psychologically, I want to make myself feel happy more often.  I need to realize that I am blessed for the things that I do have.  With the other things that I don't have, as long as they are realistic, I have to push myself harder to get them.  I am always the dependable one (as been told by friends and family) and always help others, and I want to keep being that kind of person for the people around me.  I need to be able to free up my mind and release stress from my body so that I can continue the path to integral health. 

IV.

In terms of practices for my personal health, the strategy that I have in order to promote my physical health is to get involved with Pilates and yoga.  I have always wanted to try both of these exercising programs because of the qualities and benefits they obtain.  Eating right is the preventative aspect of health in my opinion, so continuing to research about different ways of obtaining health from foods is a goal of mine so that I can help myself and my clients. I also plan to get a bike this summer so that I can go bike riding in the park.  This will not only encourage my physical well being, but also my psychological well being because it will help me to focus on my emotional and cognitive aspects of my life while exposed to the nature setting.  More over on promoting for my psychological health, I will practice some of the mindfulness exercise that I have learned throughout this course.  I really enjoyed practicing the Journey On relaxation exercise and the Crime of the Century relaxation exercise.  For my spiritual health, I plan to practice the witnessing mind technique, the calm-abiding technique, and unity consciousness technique so that I can control my mental chatter, have an undisturbed mind, and obtain a deeper insight in myself and in my life. 

V.

My commitment for the next six months is to learn more about integral health and its benefits.  I plan to continue to be more engaged with the chakra system as my form of meditation because it was something that I enjoyed experiencing during one of our relaxation sessions.  Also with the chakra system, I really do take it into consideration because I learned that there are special foods that brings out the energy for each part of the body and I m willing to get involved with that personally since my ultimate goal is to be a nutritionist.  Once I experience this for myself and see actual benefits, I can feel comfortable advising my clients to incorporate this practice in their lifestyle. I plan to become more physically active for the sake of my well being by learning Pilates and yoga.  To enjoy fully with these changes, I have to work with a new schedule.  The best time that will help me to get motivated to be committed to these changes will have to be early mornings before I start my day. 

In conclusion, I am responsible for my own well being and my overall health and it is my duty to be aware of how to maintain the one body that I have.  With appropriate research, support system, and motivation for staying committed, I should be able to take advantage of my whole body with ease.  Now is the time to be in tune with our mind, body, and spiritual aspect as oppose to Western medicine who is more engaged with the biological aspect of health.  Taking care of our whole body and not just the visible parts, connecting with our outer, inner, and innermost being, changing our negative attitudes about certain things in life to positive and more will help us get on the path to human flourishing.

Source: Dacher, E.S. (2006).  Integral health: The path to human flourishing.  California: Basic Health Publications, Inc.