New Year Resolutions Around The World – Balancing 7 Aspects of Wellness in Life (Part 1)

With the year 2011 closing its chapters behind us, we are once again redefining our strategies by making constructive New Year resolutions to face the challenges for another 52 weeks down the road. Behind each New Year resolutions being made, do you realize in a bigger picture that it spans around the 7 aspects of wellness in life? 

In fact, if we are able to relate our true desire behind each New Year resolutions to the 7 aspects of wellness, achieving the milestones will be more meaningful and will drive you closer to that goal as we are seeing a collective personal perfection rather than independent call-to-actions. So, let’s take a look at some of the most desirable milestones being enlisted in the New Year resolutions 2012 around the world and some tips to help kick starting them. 

 Contents at A Glance:

Part 1:

• Physical Aspects of Wellness
• Emotional Aspects of Wellness
• Spiritual Aspects of Wellness

Part 2:

• Intellectual Aspects of Wellness
• Social Aspects of Wellness
• Environmental Aspects of Wellness
• Occupational Aspects of Wellness

PHYSICAL ASPECTS OF WELLNESS

New Year Resolutions #1 : Lose Weight

Losing Weight has never failed to make it to the New Year resolutions list annually. But yet, it is always the hardest to be achieved. By understanding that physical wellness promotes optimum body functions in the long run, you will better value the importance of losing weight as an initiative to keep dire illnesses at bay while getting your shape back. You may rain check the New Year resolutions year after year but diseases will not be so merciful to wait for its attack. 

However, maintaining physical aspects of wellness does not necessarily mean starvation or vigorous workouts. Instead, you should:

• Eat More, Not Less – In a piece of advice by dietitian Johnilee Slark of Marshfield and Wisconsin Rapids Centers, eating more berries, peas and high-fiber food brings your weight down more effectively than eating smaller portions of high-fat and -calories food. Read more on this at Wisconsin Rapids Tribune. 
• Take Your Exercises Out of The Slimming Studio – If you realize that you skip lessons after lessons at the gym, you should consider blending weight loss program in your daily routine. Simple activities such as gardening and doing your favourite dance can also help you in shedding your excess pounds. Most importantly, NEVER sit or head to bed right after meals. Read more on this at Wellness Watchers MD.

New Year Resolutions #2 : Quit Smoking and Drinking

For those of you who finally include this in your New Year resolutions, congratulations! As power of intention is the first step to kicking the habits, consider tapering rather than abrupt quit because if your faith loosens grip, it tends to chain you to the addictions twice the fold. Some of the agendas to get you prepare down the road to physical wellness is:

• Setting a date to look forward to your “freedom” date
• Identifying the habit stressors and triggers and keep the checklist with you
• Changing your environment by discarding all materials that may relate or entice you to return to the habits
• Seeking your most comfortable medication approaches to help you alleviate \pain and pressure during the quitting challenge

We found some useful resources which may help you jumpstart your New Year resolutions to get rid of smoking  and quit drinking to regain your physical wellness.

EMOTIONAL ASPECTS OF WELLNESS

New Year Resolutions #3 : Spend More Time with Family

As a woman of modern family, multitasking between the roles of a mom and employee is extremely challenging and when being caught in the quandary between attending to an urgent work demand and family, our job tends to take the upper-hand. More often than not, the resultant feeling of inadequacy and inefficiency leave emotional scars which silently sow the seeds of depression and guilt. 

If you feel that this is one inevitable wish in your New Year resolutions this year, gather up and tell yourself in the mirror: “You are just a human!“. Only when you stop trying to be a perfectionist, will you start enjoying the things you have around you. Hence, the first step to reconnect with your family is by mindset-reprogramming. This will not only benefit your state of mental health but it resonates to your family as well. To help you in overcoming negativity, read more on Overcoming Working Mom Guilt and Anxiety.

Perhaps, you can steal some ideas below to achieve this are of your New Year resolutions: 

• Utilize what you already have – Instead of striving to spend more time with your family, put some thoughts on how you can spend quality time with them. There are a handful of tips on child-bonding available in 7 Great Child Bonding Tips For Working Mom.
• Fall in Love with your spouse again – It may be something you resist or never thought of doing but there is nothing more emotionally-fulfilling than dating each other to revive the passion of courtship. Take the candlelight dinner or date him over lunch if you cannot leave the kids behind. You will be surprised at how much youboth can reminisce about the past and have a good hearty laugh over what had changed during these years.

SPIRITUAL ASPECTS OF WELLNESS

New Year Resolutions #4 : To Attain Spiritual Enlightenment

Day in day out we see millions of people pursuing spiritual wholeness by reaching to inner self where many are working hard to attain spiritual perfection through community prayers. Brought on by the wave of 2012 that claim the coming of the New Age characterised by spritial enlightement, many people are putting this on their list of New Year resolutions, wishing to pursue the enlightened path.

However, the reason why most of us failed to connect is because we lack the understanding of the primary key to spiritual enlightenment – that is unconditional love. As Professor Mario Beauregard of Montreal University’s Centre for Research in Neurophysiology and Cognition said “Unconditional love, extended to others without exception, is considered to be one of the highest expressions of spirituality.” 

In an interesting explanation brought about by Psychiatrist M Scott Peck, the human Spiritual growth is developed through four stages: 

• Stage 1: Chaotic and disordered – People, especially young children who are usually self-centered do not understand and defy the greater power. Hence, they are not able to experience the power that love embraces.
• Stage 2: Blind Faith – People who are willing to  surrender and obey a subject of authority such as followers to God and children to parents without questioning their existence.
• Stage 3: Scientific Skepticism – People who strive to back beliefs and faith in things explainable by logic and reasoning.
• Stage 4: Embrace Nature – People who have holistic views about the great power of Nature out of genuine belief and are able to embrace the world and its subject without seeing them through a colored lens when it comes to giving out their hands to people in need.

Further reading can be accessed at UnconditionalLove.org. If you are also interested to develop your spirituality to promote well-rounded New Year resolutions, you may consider going for Yoga to tune and reconnect with your inner voice too.

Continue to Part 2 of New Year Resolutions Around The World to Balance 7 Aspects of Wellness in Life.