1. Review your unit 3 personal assessment of your psychological, physical, and spiritual well-being. Reflect on these areas . How did you score yourself on a scale from 1 to 10 in unit 3? How do you score yourself now? Has the score changed? Why or why not?

Personal Assessment from Unit 3:

I think the main skill one would have to learn and understand to achieve this is meditation. Learnign how to meditate and keeping yourself aware of yourself and surroundings is the first step in transitioning from a linear thinking pattern to one of a more dynamic nature. The understanding of Holism is a necessary skill as well. Understanding that we are dynamic beings with a mind, body and spirit is the foundation of understanding behind the Integral Theory and practice of medicine. Coming to the understanding that we are a soul in a vessel is key to separating the parts of yourself for further analysis later down the road. In Dachers book, he separates: Biological, interpersonal, worldly and psycho-spiritual areas of human experience into a graph which made it a lot easier to understand this concept of us being intentional in our actions as in the Integral Approach to healing.

References:
Dacher .E. MD (2006) Integral Health: The path to human flourishing, Basic Health pubications

 

 

I think I have made great strides towards my goals I addressed in Unit 3.  I have had to in order to get through some stuff I am dealing with in my personal life. My understandings of Holism have also increased during my time in class.  I developed a broader understanding of Holism and also meditative practices through the use of Dachers audio supplements like: Loving-kindness and the subtle mind practice.



2.    Review the goals and activities you set for yourself in each area. Have you made progress toward the goals? Explain.

 

   I have started setting time aside for me to address every aspect fo my being.  I have a sign that I made which says: What have you done today for your mind? body? and spirit? This helps me ensure I am addressing all aspects fo my being in health.

 

3.    Have you implemented the activities you chose for your well-being in each of the three areas? Explain.

   I started participating in Yoga to help me with my physical and psychological healing. I also have started taking part in counseling to get over adn let go of past hurts holding me back psychologically.  i use hypnosis therapy at night to help with reprogramming my thoughts into healthy patterns and also like to use the subtle-kindness exercise as well as the loving kindness exercise to express gratitute which helps to heal the past hurts too.

4.  Summarize your personal experience throughout this course. Have you developed improved well-being? What has been rewarding? What has been difficult? How will this experience improve your ability to assist others?

       I feel like this course has helped me to better understand myself as a whole person.   This has helped me to have the courage to know that my instincts are usually right.  I learned that I tend to doubt my instincts and I give other people too many chances in my life which results in hurt.  When you do not report someone or allow them to suffer the consequences of their actions, then you take on those consequences in your own life. I have learned this spiritual lesson and am on the path to recovery spiritually from my experiences of the past.  The difficult part of my healing process is that I have to remember the bad things that have happened to me in order to re-assess them, do what is necissary and heal fully.  This is hard for me to face becasue I know deep down that people are good but throughout thier life, they pick up bad behaviors along the way which result in the hurt of others.  i will be able to assist others by giving support and understanding for why a person would react or act the way they do.  I can give support in that they are not alone and that what ever has happened to them, was not thier fault.  I have already started rebuilding a relationship with my cousin after settign strong boundaries and we support each other now.  We are both recovering from past hurts and now we have each other to talk to and support.  I cannot explain how much this class has enhanced my life as well in being able to communicate these ideas to others and understand them fully. It is also nice to know there is science out there to back up a lot of these practices and I know there will be more in the near future. Communication is the greatest hinderance in helping others and Dacher made a very valid point, which I will never forget and that was: We need to meet the patient where they are at along the road.  This makes a lot of sense to me and has been difficult for me to overcome in the past when others ask for my advice.  I come to them with a scientific standpoint and with too much info!!! This class has helped me learn how to be more attentive to the patient and their needs rather than what I beleive they need.

Sherry

Final Project - Creating Wellness - My Plan

 

Final Project

Sherry Slatosky

6/18/2013

HW420: Creating Wellness: Psychological and Spiritual Aspects of Healing

Professor: Beth Hart

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

            It is absolutely essential for a Health and Wellness practitioner to lead by example.  There is a saying: “Do as I say, not as I do.”  This sounds great but in reality when people learn from us, they watch by doing.   Most children watch their parent’s actions more than their words, I think because language is something that we develop later on in life.  It is in our human nature to study body language and when someone is not leading by example it discredits the practice itself.  If one is not living an integral life, they cannot show, talk or tell someone else about something that they have not experienced or are not experiencing in the present moment.  It is crucial for all practitioners to follow this integral path as they demonstrate for others what that road entails.

            We develop psychologically, spiritually and physically and each requires different attentions as far as treatment is concerned.  Personally, I would say the one area in my life that needs the most development is the Spiritual side as well as psychological.  I use mind/body practices such as visualization and hypnosis to work on the psychological side of myself.  Spiritually I have explored different religions and different beliefs and am gathering a firm understanding of my own spirituality. I was raised by Christians but did not believe everything they believed.  I decided that I would not call myself religious because that is a man-made thing.  I also found the beliefs I developed as a child fall along the lines of Buddhism and Judaism more than Christianity.   I have spent time at the synagogue helping to cook, as well as time learning about the Buddha ways.  I learned how to meditate in a meditation Center in Minneapolis and the energy I felt inside was amazing!

            Ultimately, my goal is to become a Naturopathic Physician.  I would like to go into research and advance our ideas of medicine as well as bridge the gap in communication from east to west.   To do this I must reach to the limitless potential of the mind and whole body in order to accomplish my goal.  I need to expand all these areas to a point that I can communicate what I know with others and we can develop more ideas and realities.   My ultimate goal is to help people for free or reduced fees to teach them how to become their own doctors.   I am not a money driven person, just need enough to get by and if I had extra, that would be great to be able to distribute to where it is needed.   There are obstacles in my past that have tripped me along my way but I got back up, stronger than ever and forged ahead.  I do not stop until I reach my goal and sometimes that goal is changed along the way only to be re-addressed at a later date.  One goal, that I was after, was this one of living in human flourishing (as Dacher would say).  I thought this level of consciousness would take me a lifetime to reach and one week about 3-4 years ago, I discovered it alone in my apartment.  There is unconditional love felt in this level of awareness that comes with understanding and deep inner peace.  I know what that feels like now and every day, do things to take better care of myself, than I use to in the past.  I love singing and this has helped me to build my confidence and telling the truth to myself and everyone else has also helped me along this path to wholeness.

            There have been times in my life that my physical health has been affected by my spiritual and psychological unhealthiness.   It wasn’t until it reached this point that I really started to take a look at myself.  I was very warn out and sick about 3-4 years ago and there was not a single doctor, I saw, who could tell me what was wrong with my physical body.   Being educated on psychosomatic disorders and psychology, I started to realize that this was psychosomatic.  I was the only one, at that point, who could help me.  I started getting more in touch with God and starting seeing more holistic type practitioners.   I saw a neuropsychologist and wanted to understand what he saw afflicting me.  In my heart, I believe, that the mind can cure the body.  

After taking this class, I can re-iterate that truth to myself in that I was on the right path.   It is hard for me to rate my spirituality, psychological, and physical health on a scale.  I do not reference myself to others but to myself and when I compete it, I try to push myself further than I went the last time in whatever it is.  I feel I am much healthier and more educated on life than the people I have met thus far who are still alive.  I feel like a very old soul deep inside with wisdom that I don’t even know where it comes from sometimes.  When I open my heart though wisdom pours out and sometimes I feel as if I need to tell others things to help them grow.  This helps me to develop my spiritual self.  I know these are all part of me, a whole being but I hope you can understand what I mean when I am separating these parts of my life.

 A quote I made yesterday says: “I am a combination of my life experiences, I am not defined by any one of them. “   Leaving quotes like this to myself helps me to develop my psychological mind.  I write them in places I see often like my bathroom mirror.  This one I wrote on my truck window, so, I can see it when I drive.  I also wrote above it: “Do not look back.”  This quote helps me to not fall back into old patterns of behavior or self-destruction.    I leave them vague so that at times I can think more about the words that I write and find all the meanings behind them. 

Physical development for me is easy to track since I have the most experience in this area.  I need my psychological and spiritual self to be calm and abiding though in order for me to focus on the physical.  I feel that our physical selves represent our internal selves and that our reality is projected out into the physical environment around us.   I have spent many years figuring out how to connect the dots on how our mind, body and spirit are all connected.  I know that at one point in my life, I realized when my car and apartment were disorganized, so was my mind.   I had developed false beliefs, irrational fears and phobias I am still overcoming to this day.  I used this as a tool in my life to keep organization out of chaos.  I would keep my things very neat and organized and would take care of my body as if it were my temple.   I knew that my mind and brain could take me far but I had to take of them too in order to get there.  I do Yoga, Pilates and play tennis now and this has helped me to develop more physically.  Singing also helps me develop physically in that it support more breathe and it encourages you to expand the lungs and exercises the muscles throughout your whole chest cavity. 

 Yoga has helped to realign my body from the slumped over position I developed to the tall, proud woman I am.   This has helped me decrease my need for a chiropractor as well.  These practices are designed for areas of ourselves but in reality they create a chain reaction to all aspects of our being and promote healing and wellness.

I have set goals for each area of development and have a hard time setting an exact goal because as I grow my ideas and perceptions of the world grow too and those goals have had to be re-evaluated and amended.  I think life is a continuous learning experience and by setting limits on ourselves, it hinders us from reaching our full potential.  When I make a goal, I work hard to reach it ASAP.  When I reach it, depending how much time I have left, I may raise the bar on myself.   I try not to limit myself to what is possible according to everyone else but rather go towards what I think is possible.  I once heard a saying that: “If you can dream it, you can build it.”  We can build things in our minds and later they can become part of our physical realities.  Spiritually a goal I would like to obtain is mastery of the law of attraction.  I would like to expand my psychic abilities as well as develop an attraction that I can understand and explain.  I would like to attract the positive things into my life that I have always wanted and by taking out the negative, I can do this.   The law of attraction works like this: Like attracts like.  If I am like the people I want to attract then I will attract them.  That brings me to my next psychological goal of removing all the: phobias, fears, false beliefs, negative emotions, pent up anger from my mind.  My goal is to have a clear mind, one in which I have purposefully and intentionally conditioned towards loving kindness.  My third goal of physical health would encompass my brain, body and it all starts with the diet.  I plan to eat mostly organic foods and more fruits and veggies.  I bought a juicer a few years ago and love to juice but sometimes am not so consistent.

 I plan to exercise regularly and take Yoga two times per week.  If I miss the class I will use the self-discipline I have to do the class at home on-line.  I will also stay away from sugar, preservatives, and caffeine because they cloud my thinking.   I will stay away from dairy and bread because I had consumed too many of those items throughout my lifetime thus far and have caused me some ailments. 

Some specific practices I began this past week with my psychological development are helping me a great deal.  I started using hypnosis therapy to build my self-confidence during this time of struggle in my life.  I am feeling much more confident and have started addressing things that I have put aside for many years.  The recording I have found to be the most helpful is this recording by Glenn Harrold, listed here on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7irn1Ga-Gyc .  The recording is called: Build Your Self-Esteem and is great!

I also started using the Subtle-mind practice to bring myself out of panic situations when my brain diverts back to the fight or flight mode.  When we are in this mode, we cannot fully think and understand things like the advances human beings.  In this mode, our pre-frontal cortex is shut down and we cannot think any more than our animal counterparts.  This practice helps me to bring myself into the present and realize what I am experiencing are memories of traumas and I am not reliving it again. 

I also play Lumosity, which is a brain enhancement game that can help to build the connections in the brain that deteriorate as we don’t use different aspects of the brain.  www.lumosity.com, helps build: focus, concentration, memory and has even helped me to stay calm and remember people’s names that I meet.  I use to struggle with names because I would be able to truly listen to the person until they already announced who they were. 

Yoga has helped me to avoid a chiropractor for the past 2 years now.  I have learned how to stretch my muscles and by using trigger-point massage, a tennis ball, and progressive muscle relaxation, can allow my body to re-adjust my back into the proper position it is meant to be in.  If I am creating my own reality, I don’t want to fight myself by seeing a chiropractor when my body is slowly shifting on its own as I develop and recover from the trauma’s I have experienced.   Yoga helps me maintain muscle tone, strength and stability in my body and practice this as I said twice a week for physical development.  It has also helped me to create a stronger core and feel more relaxed on a daily basis.

Another way I develop my physical body is by not consuming foods I know are un-natural to my body such as preservatives, sugars, chemicals, pharmaceuticals or any over the counter medications for that matter.   Just by eliminating these things from my body, I am becoming younger looking, more beautiful and my skin is gleaming.   My body seems to require little strenuous exercise when I can follow a 100% organic regimen.  I have no issues gaining weight but lots of issues losing weight.  I have had to take this process slow otherwise it would ware my body out.  I lost 60 pounds in four months when I first went 100% organic and broke two teeth out of the ordeal.  No matter how much I ate organically, I couldn’t gain any weight.

One other spiritual practice that I am going to implement into my life is praying more and demonstrating gratitude for things.  I use to be very grateful and giving and then somewhere along the lines, I got hurt and stopped being that way.  I am practicing more now and have come to realize the more that I develop psychologically, the more I feel like my old-happy-self again but in a new light.  I think I am reaching that Unity level of Consciousness as Elliot Dacher describes, but there is more beyond that.  This is where we are now but in the future, this paradigm with be expanding again.

During the next six months I will monitor my progress by making observations and journal entries that I can later reflect back on.  At every 3 month mark, I will go back and read my journal entries and analyze how much I developed since then.  I will judge the amount of effort I put forth in these goals and assess whether I can take on more stress or if I should back off just a little in some areas until others have reached a higher level of development.  I feel that I will be the most effective when all these areas of my development are in balance.  For example, if someone is intellectually over developed but emotionally under developed, there can be some big issues in building interpersonal relationships and growing in your intellect.  This can cause disturbances when one cannot properly communicate with another and has no one to talk to about ideas.   I am going to have a goal by three months of being steady in this yoga routine.  I want to be attending 2 days a week consecutively by that point in time.

As I mentioned before, all these practices affect each other in all areas for ourselves and I am eager to find out how much I can learn from this experience.   It is not always about the destination I have come to learn, it is the road in which we travel to get there and what we learn along the way that is the most beneficial in our overall health and wellness.  I plan to implement these practices and looking forward to the future when I can analyze myself and be proud of my development and observe and reflect on what I have learned along the way to the path of Human Flourishing.  

 

References:

·         Glenn Harrold, Build your self-esteem hypnosis, retrieved on: 6/15/2013 from: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7irn1Ga-Gyc

·         Dacher, E.S. (2006) Integral Health: The Path to Human Flourishing. Laguna Beach, CA: Basic Health Publications.

·         Brain Enhancement Games:www.lumosity.com

               

Unit 8- subtle mind practice

Review the exercises and practice sessions you have completed in this course. (Loving Kindness, Subtle mind, Visualization, meditation etc.) Choose two practices that you have determined to be most beneficial. How can you implement these practices in your personal life to foster “mental fitness”? Provide specific examples.

I believe the subtle mind practice was the best one for me to be able to calm myself down and relax while focusing on my breathing.  I have also decided since I started this class to encorporate visualization in manifesting my reality and dreams through this unit.  I found soem hypno therapy recordings that are created to help with all areas of development. I have issues with self-confidence and have recently started listening to a recording I found on YouTube.  I attached the link here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7irn1Ga-Gyc  This is a great exercise in subliminally conditioning yourself with positive affirmations and thoughts.   I also found some more on manifesting your abundance and happiness.  These hypnotic messages really do work and can help you to accomplish any type of goal you desire. It requires work as well but your mind will not stand in your way with the negative thoguhts some of us are conditioned to believe.

Sherry Slatosky

I would like to add to this blog that I am currently experienceing some health issues associated with my teeth.  I want to stress the importance of how yoru oral health is tied into your overall health.  I have always noticed a strogn correlation between my dental health and phsyical health.  In the past when I have had dental work done, I experienced mental health issues as well as physical issues.  I have tons of amalgam in my mouth and over the years I have noticed a decline in my performance, energy and over-all health.  Once I started detoxifying, I think my body was actually trying to push the heavy metals out.. DO NOT DO CHILATION THERAPY IF THEY ARE STILL IN YOUR MOUTH!!!! I want to stress this since we are all on the path of helping ourselves become healthier rather than relying on medical personnel.  Our health is our own and we should not expect someone else to take care fo that for us unless it is an emergency. I would like to help educate people moving forward on health and wellness and I hope that this blog reaches everyone well... After trying to get assistance from every organization I could think of to get this amalgam removed, I have coem to the reality that the only one who cares about my life is me.. These if left in my mouth will eventually kill me with th psychological side effects I am experiencing but do not be alarmed because I am workign on that and have a plan to remove them one by one.  I have a tooth which was root canaled in the military and filled with amalgam and that one will be the first to go.. I have already lost two teeth over the past 3 years and things for me mentally are gettign much clearer.  I have bouts of emotional upset but overall my health is improving.  One thing we need to realize is that disease comes from holding things in and back emotionally.  When we release these toxins, we are also releasing the emotional pain behind it as well.  Do not be afraid.. this is normal to be emotional and up and down since these toxins have been our bodies for so long.. I dont want to get started on the government is out to get us because that is untrue.  There are "good and bad" people in every organization and this is no exception.  It is our job to elect those officials and take them out of office if need be.  We can't blame our issues n the governemnt when they are the ones here trying to help us the only way they know how.   Yes, the US is a scientific place because if the government makes a call and they are wrong there are huge consequences to pay.  They may be slow but at least they make sure they are thorough.   Two years ago the governemnt gave NCCAM which is a division of the NIH 2.1 billion dollars to do scientific research on the effectiveness of alternative therapies.  I think a lot of people are driven by fear adn Ithink part of that fear is having this heavy metal in our mouthes! 90% of the population has at least one mercury/amalgam filling in their mouth.  So, instead of running out to the doctor, have faith in your god and ask for guidance on this natural path adn lets do something different.  Do not go do the same thing that got you into this position in the first place... (run to the doctor and ask for a quick fix).  health and wellness is not a quick fix and requires changes in all areas of your life.  If this is not the path for you then keep stepping but for most of us here this is the proper path.  I know there are a lot fo people who are well and helathy but there are a lot who aren't and those people need to take responsibility for their health (nicluding me) and do somethign about and it.  Figure out what led you to this point of disease.  When did it start? look for environmental factors which may have attributed.. check on your detoxification process!! AND ABOVE ALL MOVE SLOW! You cannot do everything at once.  True helaing comes from within but like I said before the bad has to come out too and make sure you are in a position to handle this because if you have been traumatized liek I have, it is almost like reliving the experience again but then it is gone.. the memory comes back and you talk yourself through it and then you feel a weight lifted off your shoulders.. I have to get ready for the day today and head to the dentist and a horse stables to do some reiki work with some abused horses.  I hope to hear from you all soon! and CARPE DIEM!!!!

OBAMA CARE

To me this is OBAMA SCARE.. that is what I am going to refer to OBAMA CARE as from now on.. In a country were people are starting to look within for healing and learn from the east and their practices for overall health and wellness the more health insurance here goes up. I can tell you money is a powerful incentive and with healthcare so high in cost, people are driven to naturopathic care because it is less invasive, sustainable and helps the patient grow in all aspects of their being: mind, body and spirit. We have freedoms in this country and what about our freedom of choice? Is OBAMA Care going to supply benefits to all healthcare practitioners or is it just the few the government deems is a "real doctor"?  Why are we so money driven? could we still be traumatized as a society from the great depression??? I thin we need to start addressing trauma in our medical health persuits.. 

 I think money has been our incentive to be more self-sustaining in our healthcare needs which is a good thing on an individual level. With this too one can become a doctor and build a network of practitioners without ever needing health insurance once they reach optimal health. So, it is funny that in a time when we are transitioning to less healthcare and wellness the government is trying to make those healthy people pay and it is almost feeling like a punishment and surely not a reward for staying healthy. What year do we live in again? sometimes I feel like it is still 1900.... Why is our country so far behind the times in medicine compared to the rest of the world? because our medical industry is designed as a business not as an integrated healthcare network  With such high paying position and prestigious titles.. the wrong types of people are being attracted to these fields who are not doing the job to help people but for the money.. . There are Dr.'s far and few between who are great but a lot just follow the Shepard like sheep in the night.. This is our countries CASH COW right now and we need to change that or else we are all going to perish here. No one can take care of anyone but themselves.. people can be guided on their path is they need help but no one can "fix" someone because they aren't broken! They are exactly where they need to be in their path in life and diseases teach us things they are not meant to hurt us. This is the bodies natural healing process!! it is not to be stopped and drugged to prevent from running its cycle.. if you are sick make sure you are seeing a doctor.. I don't want anyone to just go off and not see a doctor.. Naturopathic doctors can treat the whole person though and they will not rush you out the door.. The standard initial visit to any type of Naturoapthic doctors office is 2 hours. That is purposely so they can take the time to get to know you before they make a diagnosis and help you on your way. They look at the big picture and devise a treatment plan you partake in. I have heard Naturopathic Dr's will be incorporated into this healthcare plan but I am sure there will be restrictions.. and there are some healers out there who are spiritual and psychic healers and cannot be verified... OBAMA CARE is not all encompassing! So, we will be paying up the shnauz for that and out of pocket when need be and the government decided the healer you want to see is not "ligit". What about this issue Obama? What about our freedom of choice in healthcare? Why do the people who want to evolve and get healthier have to pay for those who are killing themselves whether it is subconsciously or consciously through abusing their bodies. I think freedom to chose is a bare minimum right to have in this country where freedom is what our country was founded on.. We need to create an independant medical system.. not co-dependant.. government is not our parents.. they are here to protect and speak for us.. they are the voice of the people.. SO SPEAK UP PEOPLE>>> this isn't final yet as far as I know..

      After completing the Meeting Aeslepius I felt so much lighter and less tense.   During this exercise I visualized Jesus as the wise person in my visualization.   I thought this was a great exercise to let go of worries and fears and allow yourself to feel as he had felt in his life.  After reflecting on the this exercise, I realized during that I had some false beliefs to address too about my perception of this person.   The more I meditate, the calmer I become and more balanced. I feel like it boosts my self-esteem because I take the time to slow down and reflect on things. It helps me to feel like a more complete person when I make this a priority in my day and utilize these types of exercises.  I also plan to religiously do Yoga now and that is another meditation practice that incorporates movement and also helps to build core muscle strength.

     "One cannot lead another where one has not gone himself"
This phrase means that in order to help others one must help themselves first.  You cannot lead someone somewhere that you have never been because you have no idea what to expect on that path and you couldn't help them on their journey.  It is wise, as I have been told many times, first help yourself, then help others.  I also noticed a good doctor, starts with their family first.  If a doctor has a good loving healthy family with good healthy relationships then that is probably someone who one would go to for advice and help.  You cannot know the path unless you live it and it is different for everyone.

     In Health and Wellness, it is important to practice what you preach because the industry is so new and as with any doctors, you must set the example.  I noticed, no matter what you tell your kids, they are going to watch you and do as you do.  There is an old saying: "Do as I say, Not as I do."  This is not a good statement because that just means this person is pretending to be something they are not.  I think in the Health and Wellness profession, doctors should be passionate about healing and the first person they would have to address is themselves.

     It is very important for us as a practitioner to keep our own practice of health and wellness going as well as psychological and spiritual development for the same reason as I advised before.  We cannot lead someone somewhere we have never been! I think psychological and spiritual growth should be an aspect of everyday.  I am not sure if anyone has heard of Jon Kabatt Zinn, but he has many videos on youtube regarding mindfulness.  He talks in one of his videos about taking care of our bodies in every aspect.  One part of a lecture he asked: What are you doing to day for your body? your mind? and your spirit?  
This was a great exercise because I wrote it on my window in front of my computer, so, that I can make sure everyday I am doing something for my mind, body and spirit. 

     Another way I incorporate psychological growth is by playing Lumosity.  Lumosity is an amazing brain enhancement game and gives great tips as well on Neuroscience and how each game helps to exercise and strengthen different areas of the brain.  I use to read a lot of psychology books as well but now I get a lot of my information from the internet.

Sherry S