How are you doing today? This question is asked by many people everyday. Most respond with nothing more than "good", "great" or "fine". But how are we really doing? I used to think that I was 100% healthy until I learned about the various dimensions of health. There are several areas that contribute to our overall health and/or wellbeing. Physical, psychological, spiritual, social, intellectual and environmental are all components of health (Hales, 2001).
So what is health? Dictionary.com (2000) defines health as a condition of optimal well-being. This being said, one might assume total health can be achieved by maximizing our strengths and controlling/eliminating our weaknesses within the dimensions of health. In this paper I will summarize my strengths and weaknesses within the physical, psychological and spiritual dimensions. I will also develop a plan that will allow me to reach and maintain total health.
Physical health may be the most well known area but it is often overlooked by many. I always thought I was in perfect physical health because I have always been actively involved in several sports or some other form of physical activity. Boy was I wrong. It was only in the past two years that I have actually started to listen to my body. Last November I broke my foot while playing basketball. This was the first time I had ever broken anything like this. Not only was I sidelined from sports for more than three months but I was barely able to walk and sleeping also became a task. .
My doctor recommended surgery several times and also referred me to a specialist for rehab. I declined the surgical option and missed every rehab appointment. There were two reasons for this; the obvious one was financial but there was also a bit of fear. If the surgery would have been performed I may have missed several weeks of work which could impact my finances. My fear was based solely on "what if". I have a small fear of losing the usage of my limbs and I felt having surgery may have opened the door for an accidental amputation.