When we talk about “wellness,” at Willow Legal Group we are referring to the idea of complete wellness. To us, wellness doesn’t just mean your physical and mental health. Those are certainly two aspects of complete wellness, but there are many other areas in your life where you can focus on wellness. In today’s blog post we’ll talk about three categories of wellness that go beyond physical and mental health.
Spiritual & Personal Wellness
Spiritual wellness is defined as expanding a sense of purpose and meaning in life, including one’s morals and ethics. Some of the benefits of spiritual wellness include the capacity for love and forgiveness, altruism, compassion, joy, and fulfillment. If you are religious, your faith, values, beliefs, principles and morals can define your spirituality and can help you find enjoyment in spiritual wellness. Some ways in which you can work on your spiritual wellness are to: explore your personal values, become aware of how your values develop and change from life experiences, search for the meaning or purpose of your life, develop integrity by acting in ways that are consistent with your values, and explore the issues related to morality and your own life and death.
Personal wellness focuses on all of your relationships. These can be the relationships with your spouse or partner, kids, parents, and friends. As we get older relationships often require more work than they did when we were younger. Everyday life often demands our attention and we forget to nurture the relationships that are the most important to us. Some ideas to focus on your relationships include dates with your spouse or partner, taking your kid for a special one-on-one activity, and family movie or game nights.
Financial & Legal Wellness
At its core financial well being is when you know what you have, where you’re headed and the steps to get there, and you feel good about all of it. There are four aspects of financial wellness that we can all work on. The first is the ability to have control over your day-to-day and month-to-month finances. Do you have a budget and know what expenses are coming up? The next aspect of financial wellness is the ability to make choices that help you enjoy life. For example, dinners out, family experiences or vacations. The next two aspects of financial wellness are looking towards the future. Do you have enough saved in the event of an emergency? What are your financial goals, including retirement, and do you have a plan to get there? Much like a personal trainer can help you reach your physical wellness goals a good financial planner can help you with all aspects of your financial wellness and especially help you plan for those future goals.
Legal wellness includes ensuring that you have an estate plan and that it is reviewed and updated regularly. An estate plan ensures that if something happens to you there is someone who is able to make health care or financial decisions on your behalf. It also provides direction and guidance of what to do with your estate upon your passing. We have a number of people that come to who say they feel so much better once they’ve gotten their estate plans in place.
Business owners have additional financial and legal wellness tasks to consider. It is important to ensure that your business is financially sound, has all the appropriate legal documents in place and that there is a succession plan to either carry on or wind down your business when you pass away. A good business coach and business attorney can help you get these items in order.
Environmental Wellness
Environmental wellness encompases both the physical space you live in as well as your community. Take a look around your home. Do you know what’s in your household products? Some products and goods include chemicals that can be harmful to your health if too much gets into your body. Becoming aware of potentially harmful chemicals and replacing them with safer alternatives can help keep you and your family healthy. Other home hazards are harder to find because they are invisible and include things like lead, mold and radon. More about these invisible hazards and how you can protect your home and family can be found in this article by the National Institute of Health.
The other aspect of environmental wellness is the community that surrounds you. Our lives are made up of a number of different communities, your neighborhood, friends, where you spend time, like your gym, and the city in which you live Being an active member of one or two of these communities can provide you with additional support and wellness. It’s always nice to be part of a community in which you can turn to for advice, support, or a good laugh. If you are a mom and looking for a community of other moms (with kids of all ages) we love being part of the Sixx Cool Mom’s Community that offers a place online for moms to connect and share and also sponsors a number of different fun activities for moms to get out and connect with each other.
If you are aiming to live a more full and balanced life with less stress, it’s important to look at all the different areas of your life and where you can make improvements (we promise you, there is room for improvement somewhere). Choose one or two areas to focus on, and once you feel comfortable with those two areas, move to another one. Over time, you will find yourself living the life you’ve always desired. If you are looking for additional wellness tips and a community to discuss all things wellness join our new Wealth & Wellness Facebook Group.