A Healthier Year
“Rowing harder doesn’t help if the boat is headed in the wrong direction.” — Kenichi Ohmae Happy New Year and welcome to the January 2021 edition of TotalWellbeing, your guide to the 8 dimensions of wellbeing. Let’s start the year off on the right foot and talk about some resolutions and wellness related goal setting. Resolutions can seem superficial but having real and concrete goals can help you stay focused and motivated. This is why it is important to set goals that are specific and measurable. Don’t aim for the moon! Set goals that you know are in the realm of possibility and then measure your progress. Adjust as you go and if you hit your goal set another; if you fall short readjust and keep going! Use the tips below to help you set your actionable goals and make 2021 a great year for your wellbeing. As a quick reminder, with MINES you have access to free professional wellness coaching sessions to help you set, track, and reach your wellness goals! Also, your online portal, PersonalAdvantage, has helpful articles, tips, and resources on wellbeing, setting goals, and stress management. Please call or log on today for articles, self-help tools, health assessments, and more. To your total wellbeing, The MINES Team Stay Healthy: Practice Prevention Medical advances and technology can detect diseases earlier than ever before and save lives but making prevention a part of your everyday life is just as important. Follow these tips to help stay mindful of, and safeguard, your wellbeing. Maintain a Healthy Weight: Being overweight increases your risk for heart disease, diabetes, cancer, and high blood pressure. To stay at a healthy weight, you need to balance the number of calories you eat with the number you burn off in physical activity. You can reach a healthy weight and stay there by eating right and being physically active. Exercise Most Days: Physical activity can help prevent heart disease, obesity, high blood pressure, diabetes, some cancers, and mental health problems, such as depression. It’s a good idea to aim for at least moderate activity, such as brisk walking, bike riding, housecleaning, or playing with your children for 30 to 60 minutes most days of the week. Generally, the more active you are, the better you’ll feel today and the healthier you’ll become tomorrow. Stop Smoking: More than 440,000 Americans die each year from smoking and smoking-related causes. Smoking causes illnesses such as cancer, heart and lung disease, stroke, and problems during pregnancy. Take Medicines Correctly: Always be sure you know important information about a medicine before you take it. This will help you get the full benefit of the drug. It also will help you avoid taking too much or too little, which can be dangerous. Get Your Shots: You can prevent several serious diseases by getting immunized. Check with your health care provider to be sure you’ve had immunization for measles-mumps-rubella, tetanus-diphtheria, whooping cough, and influenza. If you are at risk for hepatitis A, B, or C, you should be immunized against them. People older than 65 should be immunized against pneumococcal pneumonia. Get Checked and Screened: Checkups and screening tests help find diseases or health problems early, when they’re easier to treat and cure. Read more here. Remember, your Employee Assistance Program is here to help if you maintain your wellbeing and manage your feelings around health concerns or any other stressors life throws your way. This includes counseling, self-help tools, wellness coaching, and more. If you need additional information, or to access services, please call MINES and Associates at 1-800-873-7138 today. Also, PersonalAdvantage has a ton of great resources and FREE webinars.
The Art of Resolutions This time of year everyone is thinking of personal Resolutions or writing about making resolutions. How do you choose what is the best resolution for you? And how do you make sure you follow through with whatever resolution you decide on? And with 2021 starting off amidst COVID, how do you achieve your goals and/or resolutions? There are many ways that you can look for, and choose, your yearly resolutions and there is merit to each way. S.M.A.R.T. Goals First, you can set a SMART goal that is specific, measurable, achievable, timely. By having a SMART goal, you are able to track and document your success and you can see where you are struggling. You can also adjust or fine-tune your goal in this model as you need to since you have 5 points of adjustability. What may start as an achievable goal in January may not be achievable in the same way in September. Wellbeing Focused Goals You can choose resolutions around one aspect of wellbeing for the whole year or one each month. This means you could make a resolution for the whole year to focus on your financial wellbeing or you could address one of the eight dimensions of wellbeing each month, so you have a well-rounded improvement of your wellbeing. Child-forward Goals It is important to remember that whatever resolution or goal you come up with, it is essential for it to be beneficial or enjoyable for you so that you want to stick with it. Whether it is a way for you to smile more, connect to others, create something from nothing, or explore a new activity, resolutions only work when you like what you are getting out of them. Center Your Focus Whether you choose to label your goals as resolutions or not, and whatever you choose to pursue in 2021, do so with your whole heart, stay focused, let others know your goals and resolutions so they can support you, and remind yourself that there will be ups and downs. Don’t be too hard on yourself when you fail. Be accepting of what changes need to happen so that you are able to accomplish your goals even if it isn’t to the extent you originally wanted. Focus on what really matters and the rest will fall into place. MINES is proud to offer wellness training, coaches, and comprehensive wellness tools to help you and your household members reach their wellbeing goals. Feel free to outreach us if you would like a boost to your mental wellbeing or any of the other 8 wellness areas. Call us at 1-800-873-7138 to see how we can help you achieve your goals and resolutions.
Question of the Month What is one realistic health or wellness goal you want to achieve this year? What can you do to make sure you achieve this goal? How will you measure progress? How will you handle setbacks?
If you or a member of your household needs assistance or guidance on any of these wellbeing topics, please call MINES & Associates, your EAP, today for free, confidential, 24/7 assistance at 800.873.7138.
This Month’s Focus Free Webinar: What Stress and Diet Have in Common MINESblog: New to TW? Check out our past Blogs! The Art of Resolutions National Alzheimer’s Awareness Update Important Links COVID19 Resource Page Visit our BLOG MINES and Associates Current Training Catalog Balanced Living Magazine LinkedIn MINES Archives Contact Us Email MINES
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This time of year everyone is thinking of personal Resolutions or writing about making resolutions. How do you choose what is the best resolution for you? And how do you make sure you follow through with whatever resolution you decide on? And with 2021 starting off amidst COVID, how do you achieve your goals and/or resolutions?

There are many ways that you can look for, and choose, your yearly resolutions and I think there is merit to each way.

SMART Goals

First, you can set a SMART goal that is specific, measurable, achievable, timely. By having a SMART goal, you are able to track and document your success and you can see where you are struggling. You can also adjust or fine-tune your goal in this model as you need to since you have 5 points of adjustability. What may start as an achievable goal in January may not be achievable in the same way in September. It is a good idea to have a couple of options planned out on how to achieve this goal so you can continue doing it no matter what happens in your life. For example, if you want to lose 30 pounds, maybe you can plan to work out either by finding ways to do so at home or by changing your diet vs. relying on the gym as how you are going to achieve it. It is important to review this model often and adjust so you will be successful.

Wellbeing Focused Goals

Secondly, you can choose resolutions around one aspect of wellbeing for the whole year or one each month. This means you could make a resolution for the whole year to focus on your financial wellbeing or you could address one of the eight dimensions of wellbeing each month so you have a well-rounded improvement of your wellbeing. Our monthly newsletter works well for reference for those who want to do one per month. You can also look at how different areas of your wellbeing affects each other, like how your physical wellbeing affects your occupational wellbeing. Just remember to take into consideration that you need to be flexible in how you might achieve each wellness goal. (Our wellness coaching services can help with that too!)

Child-forward Goals

Thirdly, it is important to remember that whatever resolution or goal you come up with, it is essential for it to be beneficial or enjoyable for you so that you want to stick with it. Whether it is a way for you to smile more, connect to others, create something from nothing, or explore a new activity, resolutions only work when you like what you are getting out of them. So, as you design how you will achieve the goal or what your goal will be, keep this in mind. There are great webinars, trainings, and websites on common goals/resolutions and fun ways to tackle them. For example, if you want to walk more, find a beautiful area that is near you but you haven’t been to before and walk there. Or if you want to achieve financial balance, maybe consider downloading a game that is about money to help you think how you might best spend fictional money. Whatever you do, just remember that your resolutions and/or goals, should be something you want to achieve, and you will find the journey enjoyable.

Center Your Focus

Whether you choose to label your goals as resolutions or not, and whatever you choose to pursue in 2021, do so with your whole heart, stay focused, let others know your goals and resolutions so they can support you, and remind yourself that there will be ups and downs. Don’t be too hard on yourself when you fail. Be accepting of what changes need to happen so that you are able to accomplish your goals even if it isn’t too the extent you originally wanted. Focus on what really matters and the rest will fall into place.

MINES is proud to offer wellness training, coaches, and comprehensive wellness tools to help you and your household members reach their wellbeing goals. Feel free to outreach us if you would like a boost to your mental wellbeing or any of the other 8 wellness areas. Call us at 1-800-873-7138 to see how we can help you achieve your goals and resolutions.

To your wellbeing!

Raena

The MINES Team

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For me, I choose to make “going to the gym” a habit, and I stick to it by simply blocking out specific time during the week. For example, I go to the gym every Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday from 6:00 to 7:30 pm, and if I can help it I will not let other events get in the way. I know that there is only one way to get results, and that is to actually go to the gym – So I try not to think about what I’m going to do, how I’m going to do it, or what might get in the way, I just simply go. Once I’m on the way, I will come up with a game plan and decide what muscle groups I plan to work on that day, as I try to rotate between back and biceps, chest and triceps, shoulders and legs. I also take into account a short, warm-up run (3-5 miles). Again, I can’t stress enough how important it is to just go! Don’t over think it, remember you only get results when you go, and you can always worry about the details along the way…

Here are some helpful motivating tips I found from Britt Hysen

Ian Holtz,
Manager, Business Development

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The answer that I gave him was that it was a “gift of energy” to promote health and well being. Okay, maybe that was a little too esoteric for him to understand but it made me think about it that way! I thought about how great it would be if I could just get a little “shot” or a “booster” to help me through the many times when I faced a challenge or task with dread, trepidation, or even that paralyzing fear of failing.

Come to think of it, every time I engaged the help of an executive coach or sought counsel from a mentor, it was as if I was getting a booster shot to help me meet the challenge I was facing at the time.  And those coaching sessions were a “gift of energy” because they gave me the structure, tools, and built-in accountability that I needed to reach my goals.

My challenges have changed over the years from training for a marathon, getting a master’s degree to move forward with my career, and trying to find that optimal balance as a working mother. While the challenges have changed over time, the value of those coaching sessions  remained steady and was something that I could count on to help maintain a sense of well-being. I’ve appreciated every booster – be it a “shot it the arm” to help inoculate myself and manage my expectations about an event, or a gift of energy packaged as sage advice that gave me some new insights to work with.

It’s been incredibly valuable to have a coach help me see the potential in myself that I might have minimized or underestimated. It’s been priceless to have someone push me, encourage me to “stretch,” and challenge some of my limiting beliefs and irrational assumptions. It’s been invaluable to partner with someone and be able to think out loud about possible obstacles and setbacks and then develop strategies to overcome them so I reach my goals.

I’m a big believer in the merits and benefits of coaching. It’s one of the areas that I’m most passionate about when it comes to my role in BizPysch. We offer executive coaching and are always interested in partnering with people to help them achieve their goals in their professional development – it might be the perfect booster and gift of energy needed to promote your well-being!

Marcia Kent, MS
President, BizPsych

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The questions are:

What would you do if there were no way you could fail; if you were 10 times smarter than the rest of the world?

• Ferriss suggests creating two timelines, one covering 6 months and another covering 12.
• On each timeline, list up to five things you dream of having, doing, and being. No judgments, just list them.
• Drawing a blank? Many people do not have defined dreams that they are being held back from.

What would you do, day to day, if you had $100 million in the bank?

What would make you most excited to wake up in the morning to another day?

• List one place to visit, one thing to do before you die, one thing to do daily, one thing to do weekly, and one thing you have always wanted to learn.

What does “being” entail doing?

• Convert each being into a doing to make it actionable.

What are the four dreams that would change it all?

• Use the timelines to highlight the four most exciting or important dreams from your list.
• Determine the cost of these dreams and calculate your Target Monthly Income (TMI) for both timelines.  The worksheet and calculator can be found at the website: http://www.fourhourworkweek.com

Determine three steps for each of the four dreams in just the 6-month timeline and take the first step now.

Many times performance suffers because we fail to act and act now. Tim Ferriss is a master at challenging assumptions, continuously learning, and being his own best guinea pig in his life journey.  You can be the same for yourself.  Remember, no one can do your pushups for you.

Have a day filled equanimity,

Robert A. Mines, Ph.D.
CEO & Psychologist

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