Level Two. What and When.

Level Two – What and When.

By Michelle Lloyd.

What did it mean to be well?  New One heard the term mentioned an awful lot. He thought it could mean how healthy you were but then he got confused because those who looked quite health conscious to him, would start asking about wellness and how they could improve on it.

At school and at home New One started to listen out more and more for the word of wellness. New One was astounded at how his mum could keep up with so many different things in a day. Off she went to the plant and pot where she would be found most days and he knew that there she would keep up with every need and demand of the people with who she worked, then at home he would notice her keeping up with everything that his dad and he would ask about or for and then to top it off she would keep up with the messages her friends would send her for this or that…New One’s mum seemed to him to be the number one keeper upper ever.

New One watched as his mum would keep up with chores, needs and then a last minute ask from his school to bring in some extra plants for a display they would be having. It was frantic, frenetic and fast! New One found himself rushing just to keep up with his keep up mum and before he knew it he was lagging in what seemed to him to be a keep up with it keep up competition.

At school New One tried to put his well learnt keep up practice into what he did and so he put his hand up with everyone else, tried to do more, say more and be in more games than he ever had before. Surely if his mum did it then it must be something he should aim to accomplish too and New One fought to keep up with everyone at everything.

How did it apply to those he knew and what he might take from it became important. Soon New One learnt that when his Mum went to her fitness classes, the word signified what other areas of life you were feeling in control of, for example if one of her class buddies said it then they meant how alert were you and happy about life. New One was aware that many of his Mum’s buddies were very aware and alert, like his Mum, they all knew what their children were doing at seemingly all times. When asked, his Mum put her awareness or wellness down to meditation and calming exercises…it was certainly something for New One to think about.

New One’s Dad was a wellness person he was sure but when he asked him what the term meant, he explained that at work wellness signified if you had a good night’s sleep or not and if you were tired, feeling hungry or out of sorts at all. If you could say no to all three then according to Dad you were part of the wellness club. If New One took that train of thought then being rested and full meant he was full of wellness. Again, he decided this was an interesting idea.

New One looked and studied his dog, Lana, for signs of wellness in her. If being happy was part of it then she certainly seemed to have mastered the art. Walkies or long walks were what made her leap about and wag her tail and without being able to gain more of a verbal answer from her than that, he decided maybe that was what wellness meant to her. It was something to give him pause for thought or paws for thought!

In the end, New One took not one but all three notions of wellness. It seemed to him that wellness could mean many situations to many but as long as one felt that they were being put into a happy, healthy or positive state, or all three, then that was what it was all about.