Small Steps to Well-being: Bringing Focus to Financial Wellness

There are so many aspects to wellness that it can be challenging at times to feel like you are juggling them all in balance. I'm sure you have seen this image of the "wellness wheel", which breaks down the different areas of focus for your balanced well-being. The main categories tend to focus on the following key areas: Spiritual, Emotional, Intellectual, Physical, Social, Environmental and Financial wellbeing. Of course, your personal wheel may vary a bit depending on your unique life. 

When finding yourself out of balance with a certain area of your wellness wheel, it helps to first bring awareness and focus to that area with a sense of compassion. Observe and ask what that area needs in order to feel/be more in balance and well. Do your best not to attach to any judgement arising from the current situation. Instead, focus on what that area needs in order to be nourished so it can flourish and flow. 

Now, you may look at this wheel and find that more than one area, if not several, are in need of a nurturing tune up. However, I invite you to choose one at a time. Focus on that one that is calling just a bit louder for action than the others. Once you've chosen that area, follow these simple steps to resolution!

In the brilliant book, The Kaizen Way: One Small Step Can Change Your Life (Maurer, 2004), the main lesson is centered around making small steps for success. It's concept is very similar to the familiar phrase, "take it one day at a time". The greatest example I can share from this book relates to creating financial wellness. The identified piece of the wellness puzzle is financial and the identified balancing component for this example is to create savings. We all know it can be a challenge at times to save money, especially during the holiday season. However, the ease of this task comes with the small steps it takes to be successful. Since we have 365 days in the year, we can use this one day at a time mantra to our advantage. Start by committing to saving just $1 a day. Having a daily commitment of just a dollar a day will get you in the habit of saving up those dollars one day at a time. At the end of the year, you will have a guaranteed $365! It may not seem much to some, but to others that is a great success. And the achievability of reaching this goal with ease will bring a positive energetic flow to your relationship with money. It will allow you to enjoy and engage in the art of saving. If you are artistic, it can be fun to decorate a savings jar. If you are more into electronics and seeing those dollars raised online,  create a separate savings account for your fun 365 dollar adventure. Be sure to mark off your daily success on the calendar, it will give you a good dose of happy success endorphins. 

If $1 feels too easy, start with $2 a day or choose one month where you change it to $2 or even $3 a day just for that particular month. Whatever you choose, be sure that it's small enough to commit to over the long haul. Success and habit creation are the keys to this wellness equation. 

This daily commitment can apply to any area of your life. You can add something in once a day or take something away once a day. Maybe you could benefit from taking one less sip of caffeine each day. Or how about squeezing in one extra sip of water each hour. Make it something you commit to and be sure to checkmark your progress. 

Happy wellness balancing folks!

~ Liz Myers, Rooted Living Wellness
  
Maurer, R. (June, 2004). The Kaizen Way: One Small Step Can Change Your Life. Workman Publishing; New York. 

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