”Maine, how would you define health? Sleep, nutrition, exercise, what else? This week's article creates a definition of wellness and explains how those factors interact with each other. We hope you learn something new!
Reading Time: 5 Minutes
MWi Hacks:
- Learn about one perspective on “pillars of health” and how many components of well-being interact with each other.
MWi Summary:
- Six components of health include fitness, nutrition, sleep, stress, relationships, and core values.
- It is easy to get wrapped into focusing on one piece of health, like exercise or nutrition.
- But all factors of health relate to each other, and it is important to consider all of them when focusing on health and wellness goals.
Our pillars of health are:
1. Fitness
2. Nutrition
3. Sleep
4. Stress
5. Relationships
6. Core Values
You can’t separate components of health. They are interconnected. Your nutrition impacts your fitness. What you do for exercise impacts what you can do with your nutrition. Work, life, and relationship stress go into the same cup as exercise stress. If you neglect community, connection, and gratitude, your efforts to improve yourself with fitness and nutrition might feel empty. If you neglect your fitness and nutrition because relationships and socializing dominate your free time, you may start to feel resentful of the people in your life. If you refuse to adjust sleep habits to facilitate recovery, eventually adaptation to exercise will stop and mood will decline. If the things you do and people you devote your time to do not align with your core values, you will miss out on the sense of purpose that we all strive for in life.
Often, people want to believe that fitness, nutrition, stress, sleep, work, relationships, and values can exist on different islands. They want the ability to focus in one area and see progress while ignoring the impact to or impact of the other areas that might be equally important to their goals.
The reality is, all of those things live on the same island.
It is not possible to cut weight with nutrition while training 4-5 hours a day chasing performance.
It is very difficult to manage stress and make good food choices without appropriate sleep.
It is not possible to get appropriate sleep without creating a routine.
Relationships are central to happiness and trajectory in life. You are who you associate with. It’s hard to make meaningful progress without establishing boundaries in relationships that do not serve your goals.
It is difficult to feel your sense of purpose and belonging in this world if your daily actions and social circles do not align with your core values.
There is a reason why the people who have the most success with coaching are open about all of these areas. Fitness and nutrition are only two components of a diverse wellness continuum. If your goals are to have success with specific fitness and nutrition goals, you have to be willing to examine how the other elements fit into and impact your progress.
MWi would like to thank Meredith Root, for her expert insights that we were able to share with our community. To read the original article go to:
