Health & Wellness is NOT just about diet and exercise!

How often when you hear about health & wellness does your mind immediately go to what your diet should look like and how much daily exercise you should be engaging in? If you answered, "most of the time," then you're like the majority of us. We stand in the grocery store line and the magazines all promote the latest diet to lose pounds quickly, get the body you want with some new strength program, ad nauseum. We hear it on the radio and on television. Doesn't matter if you're male or female -- the messages are taylor-made for all of us.

If you're like me, you know those quick fixes don't work. But you continue to search for the perfect balance that will provide you with the peace and calm you seek.

STOP looking for the perfect diet, exercise plan, latest organizational technique or decluttering method. Although they guarantee to bring you joy and happiness, I can pretty much guarantee that won't happen.

Instead, SLOW DOWN, take a deep breath, and start by asking yourself what's really important in your life. If you need some help in focusing consider the following 12 areas of health and wellness (suggested by Jack Travis and Regina Ryan in The Wellness Workbook) and rate yourself (1 being not at all satisfied and 10 being completely satisfied) on the following dimensions:

1. Self-Responsibility and Love -- How do you take care of yourself?

2. Breathing -- How do you allow energy to flow into and out of your body?

3. Sensing -- How do you balance your intellect and your body?

4. Eating -- What role does eating play in your life?

5. Moving -- How do you enjoy moving your body?

6. Feeling -- How is your emotional life?

7. Thinking -- How do your thoughts influence your feelings and your health?

8. Playing and Working -- How do you balance play and work?

9. Communication -- What is your ease of communication with others? yourself?

10. Intimacy -- How do you express closeness in your life? Do you have friends?

11. Finding meaning -- What purpose and meaning do you express through your life?

12. Transcending -- How do you experience the transcendent in your life? The beautiful?

Once you've rated yourself, take a look at where you're satisfied, take a deep breath and be grateful that those areas are bringing you joy and contentment. If there are areas that you have deemed less than satisfactory, spend some time thinking about how you can make one small change to bring you closer to your desired outcome.