After doing some research, my definition of well-being is:
Well-being is the process of improving, maintaining, or creating the combination of six dimensions including, but not limited to: mental health, physical health, financial stability, personal relationships, goals, and your environment.
This definition is not measured along a single continuum. You can vary your well-being by being stable in some aspects and not in others.
Within the term well-being, I have formed several dimensions that, to me, are important in maintaining a good well-being.
- Mental health – This includes being mentally stable and sound. This means if you struggle with mental health you are addressing it and working toward bettering it. If you are not struggling, you are continuing to do things (i.e. having a hobby, taking a vacation, reading a book) that improve and maintain your current mental health status.
- Physical health – Continuously striving to maintain a healthy and active life. This can include eating the correct amount of food for your body and being active for a reasonable amount of time. This dimension can be tricky as people tend to eat more/less than they should or be active more/less than they should. It’s all about finding a happy medium that is good for your happiness and your life/body.
- Financial stability – Having the means to live comfortably (i.e. paying your bills on time, having little to no debt, not struggling to buy food, etc.) within your current environment.
- Relationships – forming and maintaining current and new relationships. These relationships could be with family members, friends, significant others, etc. Your relationships should make you happy in terms that they are fulfilling the role in your life that you need them to. Make sure all of your relationships have empathy, on both sides, to assure that you all understand, relate, and are there for each other.
- Goals – Continuously working toward a goal. This could be in life, along any of these dimensions, within your career, etc. The process of working towards a goal, after setting one, is most important and should be awarded much focus.
- Environment – You create or reside in a stable and healthy environment. This could mean your home with you family is loving, your relationship with your significant other is not abusive, and your friendships are not one-sided. Environment includes relationships, but is not limited to it because your environment can also be what you create for yourself. If you live alone your environment would not be based on other people, but more so what you do to keep yourself happy and maintain your well-being.