Unit 10 Post

Well this is it, the final round. It's been fun everyone and thanks to those that have read and responded. I wasn't able to find my unit three stuff. I put it into my previous classes folder and the exercises I found were not the personal assessment that was mentioned in the assignment instructions. I'm sure the score hasn't changed as I have not yet started implementing the exercises I should, but I will. The break will give me an excuse or lack thereof to start a new schedule involving the meditation exercises and Bible reading I need to do.

Practicing the meditations for this course has been very rewarding. I feel I have already written about those experiences multiple times so I won't bore you with the same details. The hardest part of class has been dealing with the increased business that summer brought. Though the next school year means I will have a kindergartner and a third grader so I am more than a little worried about what that coupled with my final year of school will bring. Still I think this experience will help me assist others because I understand how much there is to do but I also understand that not taking time out for health has disastrous consequences in the long run. Once again thank you all for your help and support. Good luck in your future endeavors and if you are interested in essential oils feel free to ask :) Aloha

The Final and not so final post.

• “Once we have firmly turned toward our deepest self, gradually, petal by petal and realization by realization, our inner life will unfold. We will then be on the most direct path to a profound and enduring health, happiness, and wholeness” (Dacher 2006). I really love that quote. It is important for health and wellness professionals to develop psychologically, spiritually, and physically so they/we can help our clients do the same. If you’re anything like me, and I know I am, you like watching shows like House M.D. Imagine what health and wellness would look like if the professionals were all like House M.D. He’s an extreme example but I think most of us have had an experience with a practitioner who wasn’t really listening to us or concerned with what we felt, some have even gotten outright jerks.  Modern medicine has lost countless patients because of unwillingness to be humble. Humility is just one thing I need to develop to achieve the goals I have for myself. I must work the most on psychological development because I tend to have a very fatalistic outlook towards the future. This mindset is not conducive towards achieving goals or having faith in people.
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•   Assessment-wise, I have assed my health using a rating scale of horrible to excellent (horrible, bad, fair, good, excellent). I am not horrible in any area but it seemed like a natural place to start. Physically my score is good. It is good because I do work out regularly and watch what I eat but not enough to get me to the next level. Psychologically I am fair. As I stated above I need to work on expanding my definitions of what is possible. Spiritually I would say I am good. There is still a huge amount of room for improvement here. I can be very judgmental and ungracious but I have become and am becoming more loving towards people, but not mosquitoes, they can die.
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• On a less itchy note; in each area I have a goal to reach. My physical goal is to get down to a size ten by graduation (about a year). To accomplish this goal I will have to continue working out and make sure I don’t get lazy on my food. My psychological goal is to set aside a time each week to meditate for at least ten minutes. After the first month I should be meditating twice a week and by the seventh month I will be meditating every day for at least ten minutes. I know meditation is one of those things that can develop us spiritually and mentally but I chose to make it a part of my psychological goals. I will be doing the loving kindness meditation and the stillness meditation to start though I may find another I like.  I will start this program starting August first so it will be easy to track. My spiritual goal will be to read my bible or pray after each meditation, that way there will already be a time slotted for it.
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•   More specifically, for me to reach my goals and continue to grow physically, psychologically, and spiritually I will need to incorporate various exercises into my life. Physically I will try new, healthy recipes at least once a month. This will help me eat healthier and expand my culinary abilities because unfortunately I am not very good at cooking vegetables and yes I know they are healthier raw but I love in your face taste. (Extreme broccoli...just trying it out, moving on.) Another exercise I can incorporate physically is yoga. Adding yoga to my fitness program once a week would really help my muscles and metabolism since most of what I do is cardio it will be good to break it up with yoga. Psychologically speaking a good exercise is Sudoku. Number puzzles are very good to keep up cognitive functioning and since I don’t have to do too much with numbers otherwise this will be good for my brain. The next mental exercise will really come into play after I finish school: reading for knowledge and growth. After school is over I need to make sure I don’t just read for pleasure, though that is important. I need to regularly read books that will teach me and help me grow. I am thinking I should not count magazines, even good ones like the Nutrition Action Newsletter because it isn’t quite as in depth as an actual book. Spiritually, the first exercise is part of my mental goals but it also a spiritual practice; it is the loving-kindness meditation. This meditation is very important for fostering love for everyone, including myself. The final exercise is prayer. I am good at praying with the girls before their bedtime but I tend to neglect my own prayer life. Prayer is its own kind of meditation and I can substitute regular meditation for prayer sometimes. It’s in the quite that we can hear God best.
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• In conclusion, good goals come with their own progress assessment. That being said, in six months I can check the progress of my physical goal by trying on my size ten pants and seeing how well they fit. Ideally they would fit fine but if they don’t I know how much work I still have to do. Mentally it will be more difficult for me to track my progress on my own. I will probably ask those closest to me if they have noticed a change in me in the last six months. If they answer in the affirmative I know that I have been making progress, if they answer in the negative I will whip myself with noodles or just restart the meditation regime. Spiritually I will measure my progress by how connected I feel to God and people. Do I feel closer or at the same space? If I do not feel closer I either haven’t done enough or I let my new habits slide. The strategy I have for maintaining my long term practice is to not let myself get out of my habits while away from home. I have noticed that it is easy to go on vacation and lose all progress on goals, which is what happened to me a year ago. Even as I go to family reunions, cruises (hopefully), or weddings (yay) I won’t let myself stop doing the things I need to. After all we don’t stop brushing our teeth or bathing on vacation do we?

Dacher, E. (2006) Integral Health: The Path to Human Flourishing. Basic Health Publications Inc. Laguna Beach, CA.  

Unit 8 Post

I'm glad we get to pick two exercises to write about because there are two that stand out to me. The one I enjoyed the most was the loving kindness exercise though I would modify it a little. That one is probably the best for me because I need to work on my loving kindness and patience with my loved ones. The exercise that was the most eye opening for me though was the subtle mind exercise. That exercise really showed me that thoughts will go away if you ignore them. That was revolutionary for me because I have had times when I was younger when I felt beat down by unrelenting thoughts, I wish I had know about this then but oh well.
I will really put an effort into making meditation as much a part of my life as exercise. I have found myself saying that I will have so much more time when I am done with school; which is true but I need to start now and make it a habit. I am actually looking forward to this final. I think it will be very helpful to make a concrete plan to expand the other areas of health. Actually it occurs to me that I should use the oils when I meditate, YL has blends just for spiritual awakening. Sometimes I am slow on the uptake.

Unit 7

Well I like the meeting Aesclepius meditation. whoa text change... Ah well I like this one better. Meditation has increased my psychological wellness by letting me experience what it is like to ignore thoughts until they go away. This has been very helpful to me because I used to get beat up by my thoughts until I discovered I could make/let them go away. I can continue to apply this in my life by making sure I continue meditating after my classes are over. 

The saying "one cannot lead another where one has not gone himself" means that if I have never experienced psychological, physical, and spiritual wellness I can't tell others how to get there. Yes I have an obligation to my clients to develop various aspects of health because if they come to me for the steps to wellness I should be able to tell them from experience. Experience is also helpful because it allows me to know exactly what challenges they will face in their journey to wellness. 

Melissa at the farm

So here's me standing among the lavender at the essential oil farm in Mona Utah. Next to me is another type of Melissa, it's in the mint family and I didn't even know it was a plant until I started doing essential oils. I was gone for the past week so I could experience convention and farm day. It was worth it :)

Unit 6....nuf said

June has been a crazy month for me, anyone else experiencing it too? I did not actually do the meditation or the integral assessment because I had just two days to get everything for this week done and I couldn't fit in those two tasks (especially the second one). If I had to guess I would guess my interpersonal relationships would be the first thing worked on. I guess that because I have spent at least a week almost perpetually mad or annoyed at my husband. Mind you I haven't told him that because it would do more harm than good. The stress of my upcoming trip to Utah has taken it's toll on me and today was the worst because of my pre-final preparations. (if pre-final is a new word I claim it)

Don't get me wrong I am looking forward to this trip but getting there and back and leaving my kids with J for half the week is nerve wracking. If any of you are the praying type please pray for their lives and sanity. He is super uptight and they are beautiful messes and it is a recipe for angst for me. Anyways specific exercises I can do to improve my interpersonal relationships would be to talk to the other person, no matter how difficult a task it is. Another thing to do would be to do a modified loving-kindness meditation just focusing on him. I don't know why it gets so hard to love your spouse but here we are. Anyways if you all respond to my discussion posts after tomorrow please don't feel slighted if I don't respond to a question. I will not take my laptop with me as the wi-fi there will be eaten up and I will be exhausted. Have a good week and I'll see you for the tail end of week 7.

Unit 5 Post

I have to say I liked the loving kindness exercise more. Mainly because I have an easier time with these when I have something to focus on. With this one I was doing pretty good for that long pause in the woman speaking but when she started talking again afterwards it scared me to death. After that my concentration was pretty shattered. I did notice that my thoughts are very much like the waves in that they crash in regularly then are gone if I am trying to ignore them. It is truly very difficult to ignore thoughts without something to focus on. I forgot she said to focus on the breath if you get distracted. I did find her interjections off putting because just when I got into the zone she would break the spell. It's hard to relax and let go when you're anticipating a voice to break through the relative stillness.

I feel like I keep having to answer this question of how spiritual wellness affects the others. Spiritual wellness, things like love, forgiveness, and gratitude are present in a healthy mind and absent in a sick one. I don't know anyone with a healthy mind who is bitter and resentful, those things don't go with wellness. In my own life I know on days when I am angry (usually at my husband) I don't feel as good as other, better days. Also days where my kids are driving me crazy I notice I am much snappier than days when they are more sane. It's true that in these examples outside forces have a lot of control over my wellness but that's were the benefit of mental fitness comes in. Calm that is constant no matter what is going on. Truly I wonder if those calm abiding people drive...