I heard it said the other day that discomfort is the price of admission to a meaningful life. It’s very true. Struggle is a part of life and things that are truly worthwhile to us involve struggle. Whether it is our own family, our own health or it is our work and our career. But how do we address that struggle? How do we lean into it? In a way that we create the life that we want for ourselves? We tend to think in a much too myopic way. We tend to think about our need to get in better shape or I need to eat better or I need to manage stress better but we don’t take a comprehensive enough approach. At the end of the day, we often rely too much on others. We think others are going to give us what we need. We are going to go to that gym or if we just take that class or if we meet with that nutritionist, etc.
The reality is at the end of the day, you need to take control and you need to become the expert on you. Yes, it is great to seek guidance through podcasts and the books that you read, but that needs to be filtered through the one expert who knows you better than anyone else. You.
So how do we do that? How do we take a more systematic approach? One way to do that is to use some of the tools out there that have been developed to help us think more comprehensively about our lives. The tool that I like to use is the Wheel of Health. I am most familiar with the Duke Wheel of Health for obvious reasons, but there are others out there.
It is a way of looking at the different components of our life so that we can make different choices. Healthier choices for better outcomes and a more enhanced way of living.
If certain parts of the wheel are ignored, for example if you are not eating well, then the wheel won’t roll properly.
Dr. Adam Perlman 