decoding wellness

wellness is a funny word. it can mean so much. it can be polarising. It can feel completely out of reach for many. So how do you get to grips with what wellness means?

For me, I had to start by removing all of all of the stigma, all of my preconceptions (and there were a LOT of those) and to drown out the noise. Then, it was time to dial up the curiosity.

Because, if I am honest. I didn’t feel well at all. I was drained, completely of all energy. I was tired all the time. Irritable. My body felt bloated and just uncomfortable. My mind didn’t feel like my own either. I wasn’t sleeping and my eating habits were horrific! Wellness was not something that I felt that I had any type of relationship with.

It’s taken me years to learn what wellness means to me. That may sound a little strange, because wellness is all around us - in social media, there are 101 books on it, it’s on pretty much every magazine that you can think of. We literally get bombarded with wellness, there are 59, 280, 407 posts with #wellness alone on the gram!

That’s where this gets tricky. With so many people, all those articles and the noise, it can be hard to navigate. Becoming a health coach made me realise that I just enough information to know that I needed to seek out experts when I noticed something wasn’t right. I knew the basics and it gave me the confidence to trust my gut (pardon the pun!) when things felt off. So, when I realised that I was struggling, the first thing that I did was to find that expert. It was the best thing that I’ve ever done.

WHAT I’VE LEARNT SO FAR

I learnt some incredibly valuable lessons along the way. I learnt that there are no quick fixes. That seeking out help in the areas that I needed was essential. Most importantly, I learnt that there was no one-size-fixes-all and that self-knowledge and awareness was key. To get well, I had to go on journey (if you’re picturing a Lord of the Rings montage here then you are exactly where I was - soundtrack and all! Rightly so, it can feel like a journey of epic proportions!) and that journey meant making mistakes and realising that my wellness was how I felt. Head, heart and body.

So what can you do to wrangle your way to wellness?

KNOW HOW YOU FEEL

Well, start at the beginning. How do you feel? Write it out. Write down every single thing that you feel. If you want, draw diagrams, create word clouds, use colour, get descriptive! There aren’t any rules here.

Try sitting in stillness. When you stop, remove all of the distractions, you will start to hear what comes through. What is the quality of your mind? What is the quality of your heart? What is the quality of your body?

WHAT DOES GOOD LOOK LIKE

I want you to remove perfection - it doesn’t exist, even if it did, it’d be fleeting. So let’s start by taking that off the table. Now, think back to the last time that you felt really good. What did that feel like? What were you doing? What were you eating (or not eating!)? Write it all down, when you see it all, can start to see some easy steps that you can make.

MAKE SURE YOU KNOW YOU’RE LISTENING TO THE RIGHT PEOPLE

This is really, really, really important. You may have to do a little research on who the experts are, why you should listen to them and the message that they are giving. I spent a lot of time on this and did make some mistakes - know that it’s ok to make mistakes too!

You can change who you’re listening to as well. If you’ve gone to an expert and you’ve not connected with them, then change. This is an important relationship to have and often costs a bit, so make sure that you feel good about it.

Books are also great. I’ve used a few to really help me out like The Postnatal Depletion Book by Dr Oscar Serrallach.

GET CURIOUS

It can be hard when you’re not feeling the best to keep a curious mind. You’ve got low reserves and it can be incredibly frustrating to find your way back to wellness. Don’t give up, keep trying and keep going! If something doesn’t work, note it down and check with yourself to see where to go again. This is the self-knowledge part.

What is it that you struggle with the most when it comes to wellness? What is something that you’d love to get to grips with?