The National Wellness Institute (NWI) states that there are six areas or dimensions of wellness The way these dimensions work is if you incorporate all six of these dimensions into your daily lives it will add overall wellness and fulfilment to your life thus, giving you a better quality of life. The dimensions are emotional, occupational, social, physical, spiritual, and intellectual.
For those who are very health conscious, you work hard every day in taking efforts to contribute to a healthier lifestyle. You switch to organic foods, you take the stairs instead of the elevator, and you wake up 30 minutes early to spend a little time for meditation. Those are your ideas of taking wellness.
Your idea of wellness might be totally different than your other family members ideas of wellness, and that’s okay. The main thing is that your family is taking the effort. Although your family might not see eye to eye on what is considered overall wellness, there are wellness activities that you all can do as a family that will work for each member of your family. Check out these different ways your family can bring wellness into your summer plans.
Bring Culinary Classes Home
Figuring out what’s going to be for dinner is the toughest question of the day, with the kids being in school, but once they get out for summer break, parents are going to have to get extra creative in figuring out what will be for breakfast, lunch, and dinner!
Trying to figure those three meals out can lead to boring and repetitive meals. As a fun way to figure meal plans out together as a family, your family should consider taking cooking classes! There are family-focused cooking classes out there that specialize in healthy meals.
This is a great way to end the monotony in meal prep. Taking a cooking class can show you that there is more than one way to prepare broccoli! A great way to take advantage of the cooking class is to bring the cooking class home. This will not only be fun for your family but cooking at home has many health benefits versus eating out.
Have different members of your family take on a particular night of the week to prepare a healthy meal for the whole family. You can even get a little competitive with it and turn it into a family version of Iron Chef!
Family Meals to Try Out
Some great meals that your family can make together are:
- Spaghetti or lasagna with the noodles made from either zucchini or squash.
- Chicken salad made with avocado instead of mayonnaise.
- Taco Wraps. You make the taco fillings how you like, but use lettuce leaves instead of taco shells.
- Cauliflower Pizza. The crust is made from cauliflower and you can still enjoy your favorite pizza toppings.
Get Physical with Competitive Sports
Summer is the perfect time to engage in outdoor sports. For adults and kids, there are all kinds of engaging activities to participate in that contribute greatly to wellness and fitness. The key here that will engage kids is the factor of fun.
Sports not only provides kids with physical fitness, but they have fun while doing it, not even realizing that it’s keeping them fit. With it being summer, there are all kinds of camps going on for kids to maintain wellness through physical fitness.
A sport that contributes to overall fitness is tennis. By enrolling in tennis summer camp; your kid/kids will be able to learn and play the game of tennis, all while incorporating a cultural awareness with language studies.
Incorporate Wellness While on Vacation
Being a wellness-focused family, when it comes to summer travel, you want to still incorporate wellness into your vacation. A great way to do that is to look into hotels and resorts that offer wellness-focused programming.
It might sound like more trouble than it’s worth, but the health and fitness “trend” is growing in its popularity and the hospitality industry is taking note of that by making more accommodations for people who live a healthier lifestyle.
It’s pretty easy to find hotels and resorts that are accommodating to adults in that nature, but it may seem like it would be harder to find those types of accommodations for kids and teenagers. Well, it’s actually not.
Parents can breathe a little easier in knowing that hotels and resorts are making updates to their activity programming by enhancing some of their existing programs. They’re introducing these new options to the younger crowds to showcase activities that:
- Promote mindfulness
- Self-expression
- Meditation
- Self-discovery
- Artistic expression
These types of activities will be a different type of approach on the fun at a resort, and it’s also great because it speaks to the teenagers. Typically, activity programming at hotels and resorts are mostly for smaller kids, with scavenger hunts and arts and crafts classes… this programming opens more doors for the tweens and teens.
Article Submitted By Community Writer
