THE LIFESTYLE ENTREPRENEUR

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A Model for Wellness

I’m giving a wellness talk to my peer group in a month, so I’m dusting off all my previous talks and revisiting my philosophies on the topic.

I gave my first wellness lecture almost 15 years ago - when CrossFit St Paul launched it’s first nutrition challenge, called “The Paleo Challenge” at the time.

That first lecture was focused on nutrition - and I gave it 2-3 times a year for about five years. I also gave a fitness lecture for every prospect I introduced to my gyms, based on the principles laid out by CrossFit, Inc - which regardless of your feelings about CrossFit, details the best definition of fitness I’ve ever seen.

Here is the article if you feel like geeking out for a bit.

Eventually my talks transitioned into more holistic discussion about wellness, because exercise and nutrition are just two pieces of a complex puzzle - and I began giving “wellness” lectures periodically.

That background is just to emphasize that this has been an area of passion for a very long time. I take it seriously for myself, my family, and my friends and community.

I’m also deeply concerned with the decrease in overall wellness of our population as a whole since I’ve been born.

So any chance I get to help a person or group with tools to improve their wellness - which in turn improves their lives - I’m all over it.

The Human Energy Model

My latest wellness discussion will continue with the main elements of wellness I believe are fundamental to living a good life. These are meant to be inclusive of all activities that will improve our overall wellness, and harm it without working on.

Those areas of wellness are:

• Sleep

• Exercise

• Nutrition

• Stress Management

• Relationships

• Purpose

• Spirituality

• Mindfulness

Each of these elements is individually important, meaning improving in one area (without letting other areas deteriorating) will improve your overall wellness. And conversely, letting one area deteriorate will decrease your overall wellness.

This concept seems simple, but I often bump into people who say something along the lines of “so and so doesn’t ______ and he’s doing great”. That gets into comparing ourselves whole cloth to others - which is an extremely dangerous game - and generally unhelpful. Comparison to others on single variables can be motivating, but to a whole person is pointless.

To counter the above fallacy, I like to use some basic science. I’m very much not a scientist, but the basics of physics can help us understand how these areas make us better or worse.

Here’s the really short version - all matter is made up of atoms, which are made of particles that are constantly in motion. That motion creates energy - so since we just a collection of those atoms, we are almost entirely made up of energy. So when you hear your yoga teacher say “we’re all human balls of energy, that’s what she means”.

How our particles are moving is often referred to as “vibration” - and we vibrate in different ways depending on what’s going on in our bodies and lives. Research shows that emotions like joy, gratitude, and love are associated with more organized energy pattern; while stress, fear, and anger are associated with more chaotic energy states.

Based on this concept - when we’re feeling love, peace, serenity, we can be described as operating on higher vibrational frequencies. And when we’re afraid, mad, anxious, we’re operating on lower frequencies.

Higher frequency = good

Lower frequency = bad

If we buy into this concept - then we simply can work towards being in higher frequencies more, and life will be better?

How do we do that? Simple - we take care of ourselves. And if we do that consistently, it’s much easier to be in a higher vibrational state. Nobody is in high states all the time, but we’re simply trying to show up the best we can each day, and make it easier over time.

Bringing the elements of wellness into play

Asking ourselves how to make it easier to be in higher vibrational states without any framework to organize all our activities would be futile. Modern life is way too complex, and our environment is generally making it harder to be in those states.

That’s where the 8 Elements of Wellness comes in. It can be used to regularly track how you’re doing in each area, and prioritize habits and decision that improve your performance in each area, relative to you. The better you’re caring for yourself overall and within the 8 elements, the easier it will be to show up each day in your highest frequency.

Awesome framework Mike, what should I do with it?

Great question. I like to provide actionable information, not theory.

Trying to just get better at all areas generally doesn’t work for people, as your overall “score” is a cumulation of all your behaviors over the course of your lifetime. And also because there’s too many areas to improve all at once.

So I like to approach this like anything. Measuring, prioritizing, and taking action.

1. Measure yourself - give yourself a score of 1-10 on each element, which will give you a dashboard of individual areas and cumulative score

2. Pick 1-3 areas (1 is best less is more) that you want to improve the most, and set a goal to improve it over the next 90 days. Bonus - make it a SMART goal - Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant, Timely

3. Decide what the daily and weekly activities you are going to start or stop doing to reach that goal. Take action, and measure your progress each week.

I like to score myself each month, but quarterly is also good.

Ready to give it a try? The scoring part should take less than 10 minutes - and don’t get hung up on the score, just whatever comes to mind. The power is actually in repeating this scoring process each month to see the trends.

If you do this please let me know how it goes, and have a great rest of the weekend.

Talk to you next week,

Mike