Six Dimensions of Health - Essay Example

Six Dimensions of Health An individual is defined as healthy and well if he is living his life various purposes and is enjoying his life to the optimum level. An individual is even defined as healthy if he has selected a lifestyle which aims at enhancing various parts of health including social, physical and spiritual health. An individual is not referred to as healthy if he is living a life without any health issues, rather he is taking measures to ensure that he/she remains mentally and physically fit. There were various key individuals who researched about the topic of wellness; one of the key figures who worked on the issue of wellness was Dr. Bill Hettler. He manufactured a wellness model recognized as the six dimensions of wellness model. According to this model there are six dimensions of wellness; these include: social, physical, emotional, intellectual, occupational and spiritual dimensions (Hales, 2001, p.9). According to Dr. Bill Hettler, all these dimensions contributed to the well being of an individual. Emotional wellbeing According to Hettler, the emotional wellness refers to the degree to which an individual has an optimistic view point about himself and is passionate about his life. A person is said to be emotionally fit if he accepts the availability of different feelings inside him and feelings inside others. This individual does not experiences issues while expressing his emotions and is aware of how to control his emotions. This individual has the ability to take decisions in accordance to his feelings, believes, attitudes and behaviors. These people gain awareness about different stressors available in his work and personal environment and e even develops ways of managing these stressors. Stressors in an individual’s work environment include time stressors and situational stressors. Time stressors are caused due to less time availability and heavy work load. Situational stressors include changes in environment. An emotionally fit individual has the ability to manage time and adapt to changes in his environment. An emotionally fit individual has the ability to work on his own and to work as a part of a team. If an individual is not emotionally fit he might experience difficulties in adjusting with a team and he may prefer working alone. Teams are of great importance to any organizations and organizations give more preference to those individuals who can work with teams. A person who is not emotionally fit might not be accepted by organizations because of his inability to cope with teams. An individual is not completely fit if he has attained emotional wellness, individuals need to be fit in other dimensions of wellness to be pronounced as healthy. Intellectual wellbeing Intellectual wellness refers to an individual’s ability to obtain information from various experiences. A person is intellectually fit if he is ready to take new challenges and if he is able to obtain and analyze new information. Organizations give great preference to those who are ready to learn new things and take new challenges. This is because organizations are facing changes very rapidly and only those people are considered fit for an organization that are ready to accept and adapt to those changes. Organizations do not give preference to those who lack these abilities as organizations themselves cannot perform well if they avoid change. A person who is intellectually fit has the ability to learn new things; he uses this ability by implementing newly learned things to his work place. The activity of learning new things enhances the skills and abilities of an individual. Such an individual can perform various tasks and can become an important member of any team. Physical wellbeing An individual is referred to as physically fit if he becomes a part of physical activities which helps in enrichment of his physical existence. A person can conduct physical exercises to become physically well, these exercises may include running, walking swimming or visiting a gym for strength training. A physically fit person even gives great importance to what he eats; he tries to avoid food which consists of high amount of calories and tries to increase his intake of food which is rich in fibers. A person is considered as physically well if he avoids consumption of elements which can harm his physically well being. These elements include tobacco, alcohol and drugs. A person is not considered as physically fit if he does not gives importance to his physical health. This kind of an individual believes that exercising is a waste of time and does not gives importance to what he consumes. This individual consumes food which has high amount of calories and this person may even consume high amount of alcohol or use drugs aggressively. Spiritual wellbeing Spiritual wellbeing is achieved when a person has identified a purpose, aim or goal in his life. A person is recognized as spiritually fit if he has the ability to learn how to enjoy his life, remain in peace, feel the power of love and if he knows how to help himself and others achieve their goals in life. A person who is spiritually fit prefers living in peace with others and not having conflicts with others. According to Hettler, the spiritual dimension is a part of all the other dimensions. By achieving spiritual wellbeing, an individual gives importance to others and himself. To achieve spiritual wellbeing and individual will give importance to his occupational, physical, social wellbeing. A person who is spiritual fit can easily work in teams as in teams you have to be considerate about others and help others complete their tasks. In teams more importance is given to the task assigned to the team rather than individuals and if individuals help each other achieve individual tasks, the task assigned to the team can be achieved. Occupational dimension Wellness is achieved when an individual chooses a profession according to his own values and believes. This means that an individual should choose a job that is not conflicting with his personal values. He should choose a job according to his interests. If a person chooses a job which is against his interest, he will never be able to devote his full potential towards the job. A person can perform his job well if his attitude towards his job is positive; a person working with a negative attitude towards his job will never perform well and will always be in a conflict in his work environment. Social dimension This dimension has a positive stance on collectivism. This dimension encourages people to help each other, and gives importance to the fact that we are dependent on each other. An individual is known as socially fit if he does not only gives importance to himself, he even gives importance to the environment and people around him. A person, who is socially fit, prefers keeping his environment clean and makes sure that the people around him are leading a healthy life. The social dimension can prove to be very successful during the time of crises. In time of crises people need each other’s support and trust and by supporting each other they can solve various problems. Organizations even prefer people who are socially fit. An important part of an organization is being able to understand each other and helping each other. A socially fit individual is able to recognize the emotional cues of others and is able to react to them and help them. If an individual is fit in all the six dimensions, the individual is announced as healthy and such an individual can perform very well in the society. Bibliography 1. Hales, D. R. (2001). An invitation to health. Belmont, CA: Wadsworth Thomson Learning. Read More