There’s a frequent and common response to the query, “How are you?” Many reply, “I’m doing well, thank you.” But are you? And do you know how medical professionals measure wellness?
The “doing well” response might be based on waking up pain-free, earning a recent promotion at work, receiving good news from your doctor or getting an unexpected call from an old friend. At that moment, assessing “wellness” is personal and subjective.
To help guide your wellness journey and achieve balance across all facets of your life, it might be helpful to understand what influences wellness. Healthcare professionals use the Eight Dimensions of Wellness to help them and their patients understand the connections between aspects of life and to be aware of habits and circumstances that affect mental and physical health.
Those wellness dimensions are physical, emotional, social, intellectual, spiritual, financial, environmental and occupational. Dr. Peggy Swarbrick, who studied occupational therapy, developed the wellness model to facilitate mental health and substance abuse recovery.
The model evolved during 12 years – comprised of only physical, spiritual, social, environmental and emotional dimensions in 1997. In 2006, Swarbrick added the intellectual component. The addition of financial and occupational dimensions in 2009 reflected a greater understanding of the impact being unsheltered and living below the poverty line had on wellness.
In explaining the inclusion and evolution of the eight dimensions, Swarbrick recognized the roles that individuality and subjectivity play in a person’s assessment of being well. She wrote, “This model conceptualizes wellness as a conscious, deliberate process whereby a person is aware of and makes choices each day to engage in activities and habits that support a personally defined lifestyle.”
Reviewing and understanding each dimension can help identify personal challenges to achieving wellness and developing a holistic approach to feeling and being well.
Physical Wellness
This component focuses on the body and the practices that contribute to preventing disease and enabling movement and cognitive function. To be physically well, it’s essential to make getting adequate sleep a priority.
Engage in exercise that strenghtens muscles and includes regular cardio workouts. Get regular disease detecting screenings and ensure your diet is composed primarily of whole grains, lean proteins, vegetables and fruits.
Emotional Wellness
Resiliency, positivity and coping are the foundation of this dimension that focuses on recognizing, handling and expressing feelings. Therapy and self-care are methods to help cope with stressful circumstances and maintain positive feelings about yourself and your outlook on life.
Being emotionally healthy also enables people to develop and maintain affirming, strong relationships which are an essential aspect of feeling happy.
Social Wellness
Finding ways to be with and connect with other people in meaningful ways promotes social wellness. Creating a community to which you can turn for emotional support and guidance to cope with problems or stress and with whom you can celebrate and share reduces feelings of isolation and creates a sense of belonging.
Intellectual wellness
Challenge your mind to protect your cognitive health. This dimension encourages learning, curiosity, mental stimulation and critical thinking. And it doesn’t mean choosing activities as arduous as an evening theoretical physics class or non-stop sudoku – unless that’s your preference.
Doing puzzles, traveling, impassioned debates with friends and reading all help prevent cognitive decline.
Spiritual Wellness
This aspect of wellness doesn’t require practicing an organized religion or living by its precepts. Instead, spiritual wellness hinges on a deep knowledge of personal values and living with a sense of purpose.
Community service, artistic creativity and a connection with nature are avenues by which some people cultivate spiritual wellness. Spending time alone to meditate, reflect and engage in self-reflection are options to discover what gives life meaning beyond daily routines and obligations. Engaging in such activities has been linked to reducing anxiety.
Financial Wellness
Worrying about having enough money to meet current basic needs, finance unforeseen emergencies or enjoy a comfortable retirement can create stress, affect relationships and contribute to a deterioration in mental health.
Financial wellness involves learning about essential money matters that equip people to invest, budget, plan for future expenses and amass adequate savings to provide financial security. A lack of security, a sense of uncertainty and feeling overwhelmed or hopeless because of inadequate income all contribute to fear and anxiety that prevent feeling financially well.
Environmental Wellness
The elements of environmental wellness might seem disparate but they are all connected to the physical space in which you live. Those components range from having access to adequate green space, to water quality, to noise levels and efforts to protect the planet’s resources.
People who engage in sustainable practices report feeling a greater sense of purpose, which is connected to spiritual wellness. Having access to clean water, quiet areas, an enviroment free of pollutants all contribute to a sense of safety, tranquility and a connection to nature which support emotional and social wellness via safe spaces for community connection and gathering.
Occupational Wellness
Occupational wellness encompasses feeling valued by an employer, balancing personal and professional life demands and feeling satisfied by the type of work performed.
McKinsey Health Institute reported that companies that create engaging and supportive work cultures can improve employee productivity and reduce their stress levels. A survey from the American Psychological Association echoed those findings and reported that businesses that make employee health had more workers report that they are more productive.
Those are corporate benefits. On an individual level, employees who want to experience occupational wellness can pursue it by seeking work that fulfills them, syncs with their personal values, provides a sense of job stability, provides opportunities for growth and skills development and contributes to financial wellness.
