Why Commit To Wellness Training?
Wellness Training is an opportunity to assess the overall state of your health using the five pillars; physical (always the utmost in our minds), psychological (usually considered when in crisis), relational (also focused on when in disarray), intellectual (hardly ever ‘think’ about), and spiritual (again when thrust into crisis becomes critical).
Grand adventurers cause heightened suspense even in the most experienced traveler. The confluence of fear of the unknown and excitement revs our body’s defenses and focuses our minds. When a journey is ‘out of the norm’ for a person, anxiety based on fear is normal and occurs to a larger or smaller degree but is still present! WHW understands this and is part of the logic of the twelve-week training program.
Women from all over the world and fitness levels sign up yearly to Walk the various Global Walks. We designed the Wellness program to ensure you begin the Walk confidently and enjoy the experience from start to finish. It can have many benefits and facilitate positive lifestyle changes. Your support team thoughtfully calculated the hours and distance you would walk and will be there to assist in every aspect of this journey. Then you can thoroughly enjoy all aspects of the experience. Being prepared reduces unease. What is the best preparation for your mountain trekking challenge? Get ‘Wellness’ fit and get answers to all your questions!
Completing a 12-week wellness program before a challenging trek can help individuals prepare for the adventure within each component of Wellness:
- Physically
- Psychologically
- Relationally
- Intellectually
- Spiritually
Physical Preparation
- Sleeping 7-9 hours
- Eating nutritionally rich foods
- Drinking enough water
- Actively moving your body for at least 30 minutes daily
- Managing stress
One cornerstone of physical Wellness is how your body works, how you move, and your strength, flexibility, and endurance. Is your body healthy? Can you sustain physical activities? Regular training will increase your enjoyment when you’re on the Walk, help prevent injury, improve your overall health and well-being, and hopefully create a lifestyle shift by adding regular exercise to your daily routine.
Mental Wellness focuses on your internal state. It is a measure of how well you understand and negotiate your emotions and cope with life’s challenges.
Trekking in the mountains can be mentally challenging. Individuals may face unexpected obstacles, such as harsh weather conditions, difficult terrain, challenges socially, or different sleeping or eating patterns. Adjusting can be stressful. Developing the necessary mental toughness to persist when fatigued is a skill that can serve you well in many aspects of your life. “Not giving up” is a jewel of a skill. The Wellness Training can help you develop mental resilience, emotional regulation, stress management skills, and positive coping mechanisms to deal with challenges. It can build self-confidence, motivation, and a positive mindset for the trek.
Reflect on your current psychological Wellness. Are you aware of any predispositions? What are your triggers? What are your coping strategies, and are they productive or destructive? How can you slow your life down and allow for more contemplative time?
We are communal beings programmed to connect. This instinct does not mean we are born with or learn the skills to do this well. How well we attach can bring joy or distress, comfort or sadness, support or loneliness, and ease or tension. Our environment informs us but does not define patterns for a lifetime.
Trekking with 29 other women can be socially challenging. Our Wellness Training helps individuals become more aware and accepting of both their and others’ beautiful differences and challenges.
You can begin to develop social skills, empathy, and effective communication strategies to build strong relationships with fellow trekkers. It can also help individuals understand and respect cultural and personal differences, essential for a successful group experience. Tolerance of self and others is a key mindset.
Reflect on your current relational Wellness. Being skillful creates resilience in connecting with others. Think about your existing relationships. Are they contentious, based on stress and anger? Are they close and supportive.? Consider why they are not all you hope them to be. Do you feel secure and worthy of your social connections? What would be needed to change them to be mutually satisfying?
This area considers how you take in information, solve problems, use creativity, and activate your mind. How curious are you? The intellectual area also considers your vocational choices and how meaningful and satisfying they are for you. Financial stability is included here.
Knowledge is power, particularly self-knowledge and knowledge of the region. A wellness program can provide individuals with the necessary education and training on navigation, wilderness survival, and first aid. It can also help individuals develop critical thinking and problem-solving skills to handle unexpected situations during the trek and life.
Reflect on your current intellectual Wellness. In what ways do you challenge yourself intellectually? What creative outlets bring you joy? Do you create and use analytical and critical thinking skills at work? Are you sufficiently validated in your workplace? Do you feel financially secure?
Spiritual Wellness speaks to how you see yourself in relationship to the larger view of the world. What gives your life meaning, safety, comfort, and inner peace while framing your purpose in living?
Trekking in the mountains can be a spiritual experience for some individuals. A wellness program can help individuals connect with nature. You will have time to contemplate questions about meaning and purpose in your life and participate in discussions. We hope you are able to develop a sense of gratitude and compassion. It can also help individuals develop spiritual practices and rituals that enhance their overall Wellness and connection.
Reflect on your current spiritual Wellness. Do you find hope in organized religion? Can work or creative endeavors bring solace and serenity? Can contentment be gained by immersing yourself in nature or helping others? What are the messages from your family, and do they carry messages of peace?
Working within each pillar allows Walkers to explore more about themselves. By improving self-knowledge, we can better understand our strengths and challenges and forge a pathway forward based on thoughtful, personal values toward the goal of creating a strategic, achievable plan. Wellness is much more than the absence of illness. It is a proactive take charge of your life active process to create a heightened state of health through informed choices. Only by educating ourselves can we truly generate alternatives. Life is dynamic and always changing. As the earth revolves, it is in continuous motion, and every unique day presents a variety of pleasures and tests.
Culture & Heritage
This Walk was conceived and implemented with this framework in mind. By exploring our own Culture and Heritage and sharing it with others, we begin to profoundly appreciate where we are from and what it means to be uniquely us. Additionally, by better understanding at both a cognitive and a visceral level, we connect more deeply to the country in which we live.
Health & Wellness
A strength-based Health and Wellness vision is the bedrock of this program, and its principles are woven throughout a three-month process. This multidimensional approach focuses on expanding personal strengths and developing a more stable life through work in five areas: Physical, Psychological, Relational, Intellectual, and Spiritual. As human beings, we are not singularly our physicality, intellect, connections, beliefs, and emotions. One area cannot and does not define us. The balanced integration of these different components creates a more precious, vibrant life in which we can achieve the heights of our aspirations and be our most genuine. It is useful to consider the current roles we play in our lives and how these affect each Wellness area.
Community Building
Community Building is a primal instinct. We are programmed to seek out others for comfort and protection. In today’s digital world, we are more superficially connected but often isolated and alone. Through the Zoom calls, you can also help individuals build community and camaraderie with their fellow trekkers, enhancing their overall experience and acknowledging achievements.
Strength and Leadership
Strength and Leadership center in self-knowledge. It is the physical and mental qualities required to face internal and external adversity. Strength and leadership are built from the inside and tested in the outer world. The Women’s Heritage Walk forces walkers to look honestly at their skills, abilities, personal integrity, accountability, and ethics. It further develops the courage, commitment, and persistence required to push through barriers. Confronting and mastering fears and obstacles also improves the skills necessary to inspire self and others, get clarity of goals, and create pathways forward. To build confidence, one must be aware of individual strengths and challenges and be able to confront and correct them. It all begins at the end of our comfort zones. Stretch past what is comfortable.
Culture & Heritage
Health & Wellness
Community Building
Strength and Leadership
Know Your Wellness Fitness Level And
Create A Path Forward
There are many ways to train, and you can adjust the training programs provided to fit your lifestyle and personal preference. Please reference the training handbook in the Walker’s Platform to determine your level.
Understanding how fit you are now is an excellent place to start. Knowledge is POWER in all aspects of your Wellness Journey. Self-knowledge helps you create a vision and a concrete plan to move from where you are to where you’d like to be.
A Wellness Program Plan is intended to improve and promote balanced health. Targeted interventions include preventative physical and mental health screenings, smoking cessation, addiction counseling, diabetes management, cardiovascular health, and weight loss programs. If you are experiencing these troubles, please see a professional without delay.
Identify both strengths and challenges. Be honest with yourself; it is the only way to create a tailored wellness plan.
Be Your Authentic Self
Psychologists will tell you that authenticity is one of the pillars of happiness. “In a nutshell, authenticity means being true to oneself,” states psychologist Petra Kipfelsberger of the University of St. Gallen in Switzerland. “There is a plethora of authenticity research showing the importance of it for well-being.”
Give each component a ranking from 1-10, with one being “can’t be worse and ten being can’t be better”.
But remember, each one relates to another, so you won’t necessarily benefit from focusing all your attention on one to the detriment of others.
Set goals
Use a five-pronged formula by asking yourself:
1. Are they detailed and specific?
2. How are they measured?
3. Are they attainable?
4. Why are they relevant to me?
5. What are the identified time frames?
Track your progress
Create a support network
Remember how meaningful social connections are, and let others motivate
you as you support them.
Update your wellness plan
Every month, every six months, then every year as you notate and define challenges and find success. Ask those close to you, “How am I doing.”Your health and well-being affect those you love.
Each individual’s recipe for the Secret Sauce of a High State of Wellness is different. How do we know how much we need or where we are deficient? Some of us come from the factory with appropriate amounts of some components and less of others. We may acquire other ingredients as options or add-ons later in life. One of the best things we can do through self-knowledge surveys or diagnostics is to clarify our values because it helps to determine what is most important to us and what we may be lacking or deficient in.
Don’t wait until twelve weeks from the start date; begin training as soon as you sign up. Once you become a ‘Walker,’ you will be given access to the Walker Platform and all the training material to get you started.
