Unit 10 Blog

1.  My physical health was an 8, my mental health was a 7, and my spiritual health was a 4 in unit three which was seven weeks ago.  My physical health remains a very strong 8 and with the beach volleyball season in full swing I feel amazing physically.  Mentally I feel a bit more accomplished than normal with keeping my GPA up with three A's this term and while it's been the norm for me to have three A's every term this term was a bit more challenging with some of the health issues of my dear Julie has been going through so I'll give my mental health a small bump to an 8.  Now my spirituality and what that has done.  I feel through the tragedy of a young gal suffering and dying of cancer there are two clear choices people, this includes me, can chose.  I can either run towards God and or away from him and I chose to run towards him.  Sitting in Julie's hospital bed while reading her the bible has been some of the most spiritual experiences I've ever had and I feel God in the room with us.  So my spirituality has grown from a weak 4 to a respectable 7 in the past few weeks. 

2.  I set some pretty simple goals and I have reached or attempted to reach them all.  For my physical health I spoke about taking a yoga class or at least stretching more often which I have been doing almost daily.  My mental goal was to stay focused with school and I feel I completed that task.  I have a week off and then it's another three classes here at Kaplan and my mental health will be continually challenged as I see myself taking classes for the foreseeable future.  My spiritual goals were to continue with my journey reading the bible in a year and I'm still on pace to succeed in that goal.

3.  The things/activities I chose to implement into my life have all been at least attempted.   Yoga has been taken a few times, school is a weekly thing, and I'm reading the bible daily so I feel all my activities have been taken care of. 

4.  My experience with this course has been nothing short of great.  I say that due to the class totally exceeding my expectations and that is fantastic.  I feel have grown with my acceptance in meditation and that has been rewarding.  It's difficult to quantify what is good and what is bad in a course such as this due to me just basically trying some of the new ideas of meditation and sharing that with clients will make me a better trainer. 

Mike Scales

Unit 9 Final Project Blog

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Unit 9 Final Project

 

Mike Scales

 

Kaplan University

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

HW420: Creating Wellness

 

Professor Nysewander

 

08-08-2014

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Unit 9 Final Project

 

            As I young child there were few things that really upset me as much as my dad telling me that I must, “do as I say, not as I do.”  I believe it was the simple hypocrisy of the statement that lead me later in life to realize it’s by attraction and not promotion that I found myself following.  The simple question posed is asking the importance of health care providers and wellness professionals to develop psychologically, spiritually, and physically.  Is there anything more important?  Practicing the principles in which a health care provider will be assigned to be teaching others, in my opinion, is perhaps the most important aspect of their lives.  Living what they are teaching and preaching is something that I feel is second to none when it comes to importance.  One of the great minds to walk the planet, Albert Einstein is credited with saying, “Example isn’t another way to teach, it’s the only way to teach.”  Imagine walking into a health care provider and having them give you advice or offer help in the way or health if they themselves didn’t appear healthy?  So the physical aspect would be vital as that’s what patients and clients will first recognize.  I believe that the attraction some people have, or charisma if you will, is the combination of spiritual and mental health.  Those both will show up fairly quickly in a conversation with a health care provider.  My personal development in these areas has been a slow but steady road.  The physical aspect of health is the easy one for me as I’m a very active beach going surfer who plays beach volleyball a few times a week and is in the gym six days a week.  I attend weekly meetings of the church and work on my spirituality as I see it by expanding my personal relationship with a God of my understanding.  Mental, or psychological health, is one area that today, as a full time student and a participant of life, to me is the one area that for me follows the other two.  Mental health is important and continuing to seek knowledge helps with that but it’s been my brief experience that if my heart, or spirituality, is in the right place my brain seems to follow.  They all work together in my life and the more I acknowledge that truth the more willing I am to never, or at  least try to never, neglect any of them as they are all important for me to develop as a wellness professional and more importantly as a human. 

            Self-assessment is something I’ve been working on and its importance has been growing as I get a bit older.  Assessment of my life, where I’m at, where I’m headed, and where I need to improve is an aspect of life I wish I would have been practicing at a much early age.  The most difficult task with my personal assessment is being completely honest with myself without being too much my own critic.  Honesty is the basis for any self-assessment in my opinion and without it makes any assessment moot.  My spiritual health is one of faith and trust.  I am going through a very difficult time with a dear friend suffering from a fatal illness and though my mind wants to ask “why” my hearts is telling me that it’s just something I’ll never know the answer too until I meet my maker.  I must continue to trust my God and not question Him.  At times this is very difficult for me but I continue to turn to my God when in doubt which is growth for me at this point.  My mental, or psychological health, is something I feel I’m also improving with my dedication to school and the real gift has been a dose of humility which has cleared my brain to learn and accept that I know so very little.  Humility has been, and continues to be the greatest gift I’ve received from God with regards to my mental health.  I feel arrogance and ego had, for far too long, kept me from learning and experience all that others might offer.  I feel today that I’m open to learn and experience what others have learned and that has been a great experience.  My physical health is something that has always been an easy aspect, and completely enjoyable, part of my life.  I have been an athlete my whole life and being active and busy with sports is part of my fabric.  So with all that said I would give myself a 6 in spirituality, a 7 for my psychological health, and a strong 8 for my physical health but the more important aspect of them all is I do feel they are all trending the right way, upwards and onwards.  I feel my best days are still in front of me. 

            After taking an honest appraisal, or self-assessment, of one’s lot in life what am I to do next?  It’s to see where I’m struggling and to make some goals or decisions to make some changes, right?  So when it comes to my spirituality I find there are two areas that I want to work on.  The first one is to be more diligent with my daily prayer.  I have set a goal to pray upon awaking and praying before I lay my head on the pillow at night.  I feel it’s important to start and end every day with at least a brief prayer.  The second aspect of my spiritual health I’m looking forward to improving is my working with others.  Working with others to help them improve their lives is a great way to help myself become more aware of what it’s like to be more like Jesus wants us to be.  If I can make small strides in these two areas I do hope that it will grow my spiritual life.  Psychologically speaking I feel that this aspect for me is a goal to remain as humble and teachable as I can.  I feel my brain can and will absorb what it needs to if I make the decision to set aside my own prejudice, my own hurts, and my own ideas aside so I can be open to learn.  My goal for all of this is simple and one word, humility.  I’ve spent far too much of my life thinking I knew the answer and my honest assessment is that has served me all that well and sure hasn’t helped my loved ones to flourish as they should.  So my mental goal is a decision to remain humble, very simple to say but more difficult to practice.  My physical goals are an ever evolving improvement on two things.  I was blessed to be given enough ability to play volleyball for a living and along with that God given talent there in me lies a work ethic that serves me well in the gym, on the beach, and when I’m doing any physical training.  So my goal, like every physical goal, is to become a bit harder working, a bit more educated, and bit more active in helping others with their physical health.  This is the easy part of life for me but due to the importance I have always put on the physical aspect of life my propensity to get a bit depressed when I’m injured and not able to participate in physical activities is very high.  Now that I’m in my 40’s (turned 40 in December) my aches and pains come on a bit more frequently so allowing myself time to rest and recover is my new goal so I don’t get injured and have to miss more time than I should.  So getting the proper rest and allowing my now older body to recover is my physical goal. 

            So what are some options, or actions that can help me improve in my areas I suggested I need help in.  Spiritually seems to be an obvious action for me.  Praying and praying all the time is a great action to improve my spiritual life.  There is another aspect to praying, which I’ve been told is my opportunity to speak to God, which is to listen to God, which is what I’ve been told is meditation.  So the two ideas that I need to practice prayer and meditation are the two physical actions I can, and will, take to help improve my spiritual growth.  Actions are the work that I need to put forth to achive any goal, no matter what aspect of life it has to do with.  Activites or actions to help with my mental health is a bit of a cross section with my spirituality in that prayer and meditation are going to be a part of them both but they will be focused on different things, which in my mind, seperates the actions enough to help me with the different aspects of mental and spiritual health.  Visualization is another aspect of my life that I’m working on that can help me mentally.  Visualizing how I my day might work out or putting a proper visualization on stressful situations can and will help with my mental health.  The other meditation I have been working on and plan to continue is the aspect of loving kindness in all aspects of my life.  That mental approach to the day is a great tool for me to live a stress free life and be default allows my brain to focus on the important things of helping others.  Two actions that I’m working on with my physical health are taking one yoga class a week and the other is to do nothing once a week.  Though both actions might appear simple on the surface the reality is I’m asking myself to take two days off from hard core training to take a yoga class which will help me stay limber and to take another full day off to do nothing which in itself is the hardest thing for me to do.  Both of those physical actions, or in the case of resting no action, will help me to remain fresh and ready to compete on the beach which is what I love to do.  So all areas and actions are going to take a conscience decisions and they won’t be easy to accomplish but with some hard work I feel I’ll be able to improve the actions. 

            Measuring progress in aspect of life will be, and always is, a tricky task to say the least.  Life isn’t a linear object that continues to move in one direction which allows me to gauge where I’m at with my goals.  Life is an ever evolving series of events that provide different ejoyments, difficulties, and tasks as we move through this crazy thing called life.  So assessing the goals and where I’m at isn’t something I can quanify so to speak but the idea that I’ll be taking a long hard look at my life every six months is the best I can do at this point.  At that point I can see where I’m moving forward, where I might be stagnant, and hopefully there won’t be many areas in which I’m back sliding.  I have marked on my both my phone and computer six month “updates on myself” that will be great reminders to sit and look at where my life is.  I guess putting myself on my own calender is one way I know to take time out for me.  I realize now that you’re either growing towards improvement or moving towards mediocrity and I choose to move towards improvement. 

 

Mike Scales

           

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

References

Dacher, E. (2006). Integral health: The path to human flourishing (p. 143). Laguna Beach, CA: Basic Health Publications.

 

Unit 8 Blog

Practicing love and kindness is very much like something I've been working on in my life and that is the act, thought, and belief that everyone deserves my grace, just as God has shown on me.  I have been working on the realization that anger and judgment are extremely detrimental for me and just as God has been kind to me and given me his grace and forgiveness I must learn that for others.  This is a very similar idea of showing others love and kindness of which we studied earlier in the term.  I feel both ideas are interchangeable and one that I make efforts to practice every day.  Not only are anger and judgment bad but justified anger and judgment are even worse for my overall health.  It's something I must work on a daily, sometimes hour by hour.  Though some might feel it's impossible to show love and kindness to those we might not like it's for us, the person showing the love and kindness, that gets the benefits. 

The mediation and quieting of the mind is another idea that I've been practicing on a daily basis and plan on continuing.  I have set ten minutes in the morning and ten minutes in the evening to practice some quiet meditation and prayer.  For me they go together at this point and if they need to be separated at some point I'll cross that bridge at that time. 

Mike Scales

Unit 7 Blog

1.  This Aesclepius fella, or inner healer, was a tough one for me to summon to me.  I have found that it's a bit more difficult for me to practice these mental exercises when my moods and emotions are less than good.  The past 30 days or so have been very stressful and painful for me and when I get real quiet with these exercises these emotions seem to come out and concentrating on the speaker becomes near impossible for me.  My best friend has been battling small cell carcinoma pulmonary type, cancer, for the past four months and her battle is coming to an end.  Up until March of this year she was an extremely healthy and active 33 year old full of life and cancer has been brutal and fast with her.  With all that said these slow mental exercises sometimes are challenging to say the least for me.  I know that I'm getting something out this one as I was trying to send her loving care during this one which I believe will always help but I am not able to, yet, fully concentrate on contacting my inner healer.
2.  "Do as I say not as I do" was one of those little sayings that drove me nuts as a kid when my parents might use it.  I believe that most of us would prefer to hear or receive advice or guidance from a person that has been through or has experience with whatever it might be.  Albert Schweitzer is credited with saying, "Example is not the main thin in influencing others, it is the on thing."  What a great quote and couldn't be more true and I believe this is what is meant by the idea that one cannot lead another where on has not gone himself.  The bible is full of versus that discuss leading by example and showing others only after you have done it yourself.  As that pertains to the work place or my current job it's vital, dare I say mandatory.  Being involved in health and wellness and not practicing it yourself is like asking me to trust a blind person to drive me around, just won't work.  I'm assuming some people aren't like me and they might listen and take advice from somebody who could have gained a great deal of knowledge from books and the such but I personally would and do prefer the real world education called experience. 

Mike Scales

Unit 6 Blog

1.  First of all some ideas that they call meditation feel an awful lot like prayer or affirmations to me.  I guess the title doesn't matter to me all that much but I wonder if I'm missing something if I feel they are all basically the same thing.  I found the exercises to be great things to practice.  The "meditation" in which we are to hope and ask for others to have health and wholeness is fantastic and a tremendous way to get out of my own selfish ways and to think of others, which I need to do more often.  The assessment in chapter 11 is another great idea as I feel that taking stock of ourselves and our lives is very important and helpful.  How can I fix my life, or at least try and improve it, if I don't know what areas I feel are not helping me make a happy and whole life.  Some ideas that work for me and help me with me make sure I'm thinking of others and trying to help others is to make a gratitude list when I'm feeling down or "off" for any reason.  Gratitude usually goes a long way in helping my moods improve, along with doses of humility.  I'm currently working on improving my interpersonal aspects of my life and making sure the people I do care about know I actually care about them.  Not by words but by my actions, I feel this is the way to show people I love them.  Words, in my experience, are said to much and there isn't enough action, which I intend to change. 

Mike Scales

Unit 5 Blog

1.  I found the loving kindness exercise very difficult for myself to follow the instructions and honestly wasn't able to keep my mind on the speaker nor follow the instructions.  The subtle mind exercise I was able to find the focus with my breathing and felt that, for the first time, I was able to complete the first mental exercise of the course.  Maintaining my breathing and using that as a tool to monitor and witness my mind appears to work for me as I found the exercise easy and dare I say enjoyable.  I think due to my small mental capacity up to this point I'll continue this exercise for a bit and go from here. 
2.  As I get a bit older and actually experience life I am feeling in my own life that I must have physical health, mental health, and spiritual health and I can't ignore any of them if I want to live a modestly happy and healthy life.  I'm seeing how a lack of even one can manifest itself in not so great ways in our lives.  I love that we can practice multiple things in life that we can work on all three at the same time as well.  Being in the gym, the beach, the golf course, and the ocean I am taking care of myself physically, mentally, and spiritually all at the same time.  I wasn't sure what I thought this class was going to be all about but the overall view of taking care of myself physically, mentally, and spiritually resonates with me and if I can help others view just how important they are in our lives we can all be better for it. 


Mike Scales

Unit 4 Blog

1.  Beneficial is something I'm not sure I find these mental exercises.  I find them more difficult, which annoys me, and I don't believe that is what is supposed to be happening.  I would never not recommend these sort of mental exercises as I do think, I do hope, people get something out of these.  I'm trying and the honest to God truth is I have a hard time with them.  I do recognize the analogy of working out in the gym is a learned behavior and I must apply the same sort of principles with these exercises.  I'm making an attempt to try to set aside at least 30 minutes a day to sit in quiet silence to think about being more loving and kind to my fellow humans. 


2.  The concept of Mental workouts is such that we all should be doing mental activites and exercises to strengthen our minds.  Research has shown, with proper work and training, we can actually change the chemistry and construction of our brains.  What a cool thing to be able to do.  I don't think it's as easy as they make it sound.  I don't think everyone can play professional sports and I don't believe that everyone is going to be able to have the same mental focus this sort of growth might call for.  I hope I'm wrong.


Mike Scales