Unit 7

1. Complete the "Meeting Asciepius" exercise on track #4 of the Dacher CD. Describe your meditative practice(s) for the week and discuss the experience. Explain how mindfulness or meditation has fostered an increase in your psychological or spiritual wellness. How can you continue to apply these practices in your life to foster greater health and wellness?

I enjoyed this exercise more than the first. I found that I was peaceful and calm during the entire process. I also found it easy to create an image in my mind of a special person and I noticed that I could keep this image in my mind during most of this exercise. Mindfulness or meditation has fostered an increase in my wellness by making me more patient in some situations, it has helped me feel more of an overall sense of calmness, and it has helped me to be more loving and forgiving towards others. I should continue practicing the art of meditation or mindfulness each day in order to foster greater health and wellness.

2. Describe the saying: "One cannot lead another where one has not gone himself (P.477) How does this apply to the health and wellness professional? Do you have an obligation to your clients to be developing your health psychologically, physically, and spiritually? Why or why not? How can you implement psychological and spiritual growth in your personal life?

"One cannot lead another where one has not gone himself" (George, 2005 pp. 477). This means to me that one must know what lies ahead from experience, not research. If health and wellness professionals are not practicing what they preach, so to say, they cannot begin to properly teach others. I do have an obligation to my clients to be developing my health psychologically, physically, and spiritually because I will want them to also do the same. I can implement psychological and spiritual growth in my personal life by practicing meditation on a daily basis.

George, L. (2005). Transformation of the Healer: The Application of Ken Wilber's Integral Model to Family Practice Medicine. In M. Schlitz, T. Amorok, & M. Micozzi, Consciousness & healing: Integral approaches to mind-body medicine (pp. 465-477). St. Louis: Elsevier Inc.