Wellness refers to the condition of good physical and mental health, especially when maintained by proper diet, exercise, and habits. Nutrition refers to the nurturing of our body, in our ability to keep it healthy and functioning as it is supposed to do. Our ability to provide the body with all the necessary food, vitamins, and minerals so that we continue to thrive in our daily life processes. But what makes us well?

The first place to start would be with the examination of your eating habits. Since we are a product of what we eat, if our eating habits are unhealthy, or do not provide for the nutrition we need, we’re not going to be healthy individuals at the end of the process.

• Do you take in more calories than your body needs?

• Are you supplementing your vitamins and minerals to make sure you are getting your recommended daily allowances?

If you’re not making the most basic of efforts to take care of your nutritional needs, you aren’t a well individual.

Next, you might want to look at your exercise habits, if there are any. If there aren’t any exercise routines to examine, no wellness. Everyone, no matter what their age, benefits from exercise. Whether it is organized exercise activities, free weights, or simply establishing a personal routine, exercise is an excellent wellness tool. It keeps our bodies conditioned, our mental sharpness working at top speed, and thanks to the physical aspect, we get a boost to our cardio health, extra calorie burn, and more oxygen to those cells!

Being able to deal with and handle the daily stresses of life keeps us well. Making sure we take the time to accommodate our needs for stress relief, such as downtime, therapy time, massage time, or simply take the time for a nice, hot bath. The body tends to retain stress in the muscle of the shoulder and back. Taking the time to relax, do relaxation exercises, and combine this with physical exercise for the entire body, and you shouldn’t have any trouble maintaining a state of wellness.

Our personal habits either keep us well or prevent us from being well. If you smoke, drink, or lose sleep to excess you’re not the well individual you could be. Smoking, drinking, and loss of sleep work to our detriment, and it takes extreme discipline to stop. Smoking fills our body with carcinogens, and works to keep us tired and lethargic.

Giving ourselves adequate time to devote to all areas of our physical needs, from our nutritional intake needs, to our physical fitness needs, to the need for quite time contributes to our level of wellness. How well we allocate time for these needs, and the choices we make in fulfilling these needs, keeps us well.

There are so many occasions to stop and question our efforts at maintaining optimal health, that we usually don’t even take the time to begin the examination. But it is beneficial to our overall health, the quality and quantity of our life, to make every effort to be well, healthy, individuals.