AN INTRODUCTION TO HEALTH AND WELLNESS
When you hear the term “health and wellness”, what first comes to mind? Do you think about eating vegetables and drinking eight cups of water per day? Are you transported to your doctor’s office, waiting for your annual checkup? While all these things are tenets of well-being and taking care of yourself, the wholistic 360 degrees of health and wellness is a little (or a lot!) more than that.
WHAT IS THE DEFINITION OF HEALTH AND WELLNESS?
When it comes to defining the various dimensions of health and wellness, we think it goes a little something like this: health is a state of being largely categorized by physical, mental and social well-being. Wellness, while being positive, holistic and multidimensional, takes aim at our overall well-being and is, in certain instances, a matter of choice.
Health and wellness are terms that most people use interchangeably, though by dictionary definition they can be quite different. “Health” is defined as “the state of being free from illness or injury” and “wellness” is defined as “the state of being in good health, especially as an actively pursued goal”. According to the World Health Organization (WHO) These are some of the primary social determinants of health that are non-medical factors that influence health outcomes, which can influence health equity in positive and negative ways:
- Income and social protection
- Education
- Unemployment and job insecurity
- Food security
- Early childhood development
WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN HEALTH AND WELLNESS?
Though there are many factors to consider when discussing the difference between health and wellness, in short it can be said that health is referring to your physical or mental state of being in any given moment, and wellness is referring to the state of making conscious decisions and actions that over time can contribute to a healthy lifestyle.
When broken down further, health tends to be in reference to the state of our bodies and minds as it relates to being free from ailment, injury, illness or disease. We use the term “healthy” to describe ourselves when we are feeling optimal, we are not being affected by any medical condition, we are devoid of pain or discomfort, and we generally describe ourselves as “well”.
Wellness on the other hand is largely considered a choice. It’s the process of making intentional, thoughtful and most importantly conscious decisions that can contribute to your long-term health, well-being and goals. Wellness, like health, also has many layers. Wellness can encompass your lifestyle, your healthy habits, the environment you reside and enjoy recreational activities in and your emotional and spiritual well-being.
WHAT ARE THE FIVE COMPONENTS OF HEALTH AND WELLNESS?
According to this article from Roger Williams University, there are five main aspects of personal health, and they go on to say that in order to be considered “well”, it’s imperative for none of these areas to be neglected:
- Physical wellness
- Emotional wellness
- Social wellness
- Spiritual wellness
- Intellectual wellness
Let’s break down a little further what each of these components of health and wellness may mean to you.
PHYSICAL WELLNESS AS AN INDICATOR OF HEALTH AND WELLNESS
These are some of the steps you can take to maintain and enhance your physical health:
- Move your body every day. Even getting outside for a brisk walk can make a big difference in the way you feel physically and mentally
- Make healthy eating a priority. Eating high quality foods that are full of nutrients and vitamins helps you to feel optimally
- Prioritize 7-9 hours of good quality sleep each night and try your best to stick to a consistent sleep schedule
- Stay hydrated to support your physical and emotional needs by consistently drinking eight or more cups of water per day
- Keep up with your regularly scheduled medical appointments and checkups, including the dentist and eye doctor to ensure your body is healthy
EMOTIONAL WELLNESS AS AN INDICATOR OF HEALTH AND WELLNESS
These are some of the steps you can take to maintain and enhance your emotional health:
- Manage stress and do your best to keep worry and anxieties at bay. It's prudent to find ways to release heavy energies and feel light in your spirit
- Strive to become emotionally agile and look for areas in which you can learn more about how to respond more often than you react
- Engage in confidential sessions with a therapist or counsellor in which you can have safe space to share your thoughts, feelings and experiences
- Express your feelings in appropriate ways, like having difficult conversations rather than avoiding them which can lead to pent up resentment and frustration
- Find purpose and meaning in your life by seeking to find out what is important to you and placing your time, energy and efforts there
SOCIAL WELLNESS AS AN INDICATOR OF HEALTH AND WELLNESS
These are some of the steps you can take to maintain and enhance your social health:
- Seek to find a safe, trustworthy and reliable network of people that you feel comfortable being your authentic self with
- Respect, prioritize and love yourself. Work diligently to be in growth and learning about who you are and what you have to contribute
- Develop good communication skills and learn how to express your thoughts and feelings in a way that respects others and positively contributes to conversations
- Strive to be your true, authentic self always and refrain from putting on an act when it comes to how you show up in front of others socially and professionally
- Join a club, organization or hobby group with other like-minded individuals to help you grow your network of healthy and stable relationships
SPIRITUAL WELLNESS AS AN INDICATOR OF HEALTH AND WELLNESS
These are some of the steps you can take to maintain and enhance your spiritual health:
- Spend time in nature, connecting directly with the sights and sounds of the earth that can help you feel deeply connected to life and its purpose
- Volunteer and be of service to others, which is one of the greatest gifts we can offer others and ourselves in the pursuit of growth and true happiness
- Create a meditation practice and commit to becoming intimate with your inner stillness while seeking to quiet the mind
- Connect with your faith in a way that feels authentic to you, be it a church community, a support group or a trusted relationship
- Explore your spirituality by spending time with yourself in deep reflection about who you are, what you value and what you would like your legacy to be
INTELLECTUAL WELLNESS AS AN INDICATOR OF HEALTH AND WELLNESS
These are some of the steps you can take to maintain and enhance your intellectual health:
- Read for fun rather than for function and connect deeply to the joys of being able to learn and process new information
- Develop your own ideas, views and opinions and spend time researching them to grow your knowledge and understanding
- Continually challenge yourself to step outside the box by learning new skills and committing to the process of mastery
- Become a critical thinker by keeping an open mind and exposing yourself to ideas, thoughts, people and beliefs that are different from your own
- Master time management and learn to tune out the noise that can cause distractions that become time wasters
FIVE BENEFITS OF HEALTH AND WELLNESS
Though the benefits of making your health and wellness a priority are innumerable, here are five that we think are worth paying mind to:
- Your emotional wellness benefits from you taking care of yourself because you are less likely to be afflicted with severe bouts of stress and anxiety that can cause you to feel derailed. You're more likely to practice positive coping strategies and seek to better understand your feelings.
- Your occupational wellness benefits from you taking care of yourself because you may experience a heightened sense of satisfaction, pride in your contributions and a sense of worth and purpose professionally. Feeling appreciated at work and valued for your efforts is an essential part of health and wellness.
- Your environmental wellness benefits from you taking care of yourself because you may grow your sense of respect and responsibility for the world around you. You're more likely to make sincere efforts towards improving your environmental landscape if youre in communion and harmony with yourself and nature.
- Your physical wellness benefits from you taking care of yourself because you are more likely to make educated decisions regarding what is truly best for you when it comes to eating habits, sleeping habits and movement habits. You'll grow attuned to your body and its unique needs and are more likely to pay attention to signs that you need to slow down or prioritize rest.
- Your mental wellness benefits from you taking care of yourself because you are more inclined to feel fulfilled, accomplished and genuinely happy when you''re making time and space to prioritize yourself. It's prudent to true mental wellness to have a positive opinion of yourself and your worth.
TEN NATURAL WELLNESS PRODUCTS TO ENHANCE YOUR HEALTH AND WELLNESS STRATEGIES
Here at Saje, we create 100% plant-based and nature-derived products that allow you to have options when it comes to how you choose to take care of your physical and mental health. For almost 30 years we have formulated products to support everything from physical ailments like stress and pain to emotional afflictions like stress and some sleep issues, as well as natural alternatives for your skin and body care routines. Below we’re sharing ten of our very favorite natural wellness products to help increase your overall sense of well-being:
1. Liquid Sunshine diffuser blend: whether you’re feeling a little blue or you just love the fresh, uplifting, zesty scents of citrus, this might be the right blend for you! Citruses are known to help lift the mood with their clean, light and zippy scents that smell just like fresh juice in the summertime! This formula is blended with grapefruit, bergamot, orange, lime and mandarin and can be added to any diffuser of your choice for a boost whenever you need it.
2. Peppermint Halo: we wouldn’t be Saje today if it weren’t for Peppermint Halo! This is the very first product we introduced all the way back in 1992 and is still our top seller today. Cooling, soothing, tingling and balancing are some of the words our community uses to describe this warming and cooling blend of essential oils like peppermint, eucalyptus, rosemary and cajeput. Try rolling along the temples, across the forehead and over the back of the neck to feel instantly perked up and relieved.
3. Aroma Om white ceramic diffuser: we love this diffuser because it’s classic, timeless and chic, no matter where you place it in the home. The sleek, bottle-shaped design fits nicely into all home décor settings and offers as much value aesthetically as functionally. It has a run time of between 3-6 hours with both continuous and intermittent settings, as well as an optional LED light feature for creating ambience in your space.
4. Peaceful Warrior deodorant spray: stay fresh with this mineral-salt based spray deodorant that is free from aluminum chlorohydrate and aluminum zirconium, formulated to help reduce the presence of bacteria that causes odor. This fast-drying blend that won’t stain clothes or clog pores is also made from earthy, herbal essential oils like patchouli, fennel and sandalwood.
5. Stress Release roll-on: this relaxing and balancing blend was created to help calm and restore harmony to the body and mind in times of emotional and physical turmoil. Lavender, the most well-known of all essential oils for grounding and de-stressing, is paired with uplifting orange and stillness-inducing clary sage for a welcome relief from stress when applied to areas like the forehead, neck and shoulders.
6. Sleep Well roll-on: our most powerfully grounding blend for bedtime, this combination of essential oils like valerian root, lavender, jasmine, neroli and mandarin was formulated to help you feel relaxed and at ease so that you can more easily lull yourself to sleep at night. While we recommend applying to places like the wrists, temples and throat, you may also apply to the soles of the feet, massage well and cover with socks before climbing into bed.
7. Tingle Mint Jute & Joy: our best-selling body care product, the Jute & Joy is a soap filled wash pad made from an environmentally friendly and sustainable fabric made from jute, which helps to provide an invigorating scrub to the skin when saturated with water in the bath or shower. The soap inside is naturally scented with peppermint, rosemary and spearmint for a fresh and revitalizing cleanse for the body.
8. Deep Breath diffuser blend: this is a blend we reach for almost every day because of how opening, clearing, fresh and stimulating it is for the air in the home. Made from marjoram, lemon, eucalyptus, peppermint and lavender, this smell is somewhere between the steam room at a spa and the crispness you feel when you take your first deep breath outside on a chilly winter morning.
9. Muscle Melt body butter: just like the name states, this is a nourishing, hydrating blend that literally melts into the skin when applied. We particularly like this product after a bath or shower when skin is still damp and is more readily available to absorb what’s put on it. This comforting, decompressing formula contains shea butter, mango seed butter and cocoa seed butter to moisturize the skin and soothing, balancing essential oils like sweet birch, rosemary and ginger to stimulate the body and help you feel relaxed.
10. Mindful Edition Pocket Farmacy: a mindfulness must-have, this kit is easy to use on-the-go and contains five roll-on blends specifically formulated to support reflection, connection, confidence, energy and the gift of unwinding. You can expect to find these blends full of essential oil that are renowned for their harmonizing properties in aromatherapy like frankincense, myrrh, cedarwood, juniper berry and cypress.
FIVE TIPS FOR ACHIEVING OPTIMAL HEALTH AND WELLNESS
Though there is no rulebook when it comes to a health and wellness definition, there are certainly many reputable guidelines you can follow on your journey to feeling your absolute best. Here are some of our favorite tips and tricks:
1. Listen to your body. Every person is different, reacts to life’s situations in a unique way and has personalized needs. What works for you may not be what’s best for someone else and developing an intuitive sense of right and wrong in your body can serve you in many ways.
2. Refrain from harmful lifestyle habits like smoking and overconsuming alcohol. Smoking should be a definite no-no at all points in time and being mindful of the amount of alcohol you consume should also be a priority. Alcohol is a depressant for many people and can cause harm in other areas of your life by negatively impacting your sleep cycle and your relationships, for example.
3. Prioritize sleep. This cannot be overstated – all other areas of your physical and mental health are likely to be impacted negatively if you’re not consciously doing your best to sleep 7-9 hours per night, uninterrupted. Sleep affects mood, energy levels, digestion, ability to concentrate... need we go on?
4. Prioritize rest. Sleep and rest are not the same thing. Sleep is how your body repairs itself overnight and rest is making efforts to bow out of ‘hustle culture’, stopping the glorification of overworking and working to normalize things like taking a nap if your body requires it, saying ‘no’ to social engagements and setting boundaries personally and professionally in regard to your time.
5. Reduce sitting and screen time. As we continue to progress towards a tech-focused society, it’s more and more common to spend the majority of our time sitting at a desk behind a screen(s). Be intentional about breaking out of these habits by standing up frequently and walking around your space, taking meetings walking outside if possible or incorporating small stretch breaks into your day. Carving out dedicated time for face-to-face interaction sans screen is one of the best things you can do for your mental health.
OTHER ARTICLES WE’VE WRITTEN ABOUT HEALTH AND WELLNESS
If you’re interested in learning more about how you can prioritize self-care and in particular using natural wellness products to support optimal well-being, check out these articles below:
Daily Mindfulness Exercises That You Can Try At Home
5 Ways You Can Use Natural Wellness Products To Support Self Care
Practice Relaxation Techniques With These Good-For-You Natural Wellness Products
A healthy outside starts from the inside.
— Robert Urich
