Gallup has uncovered 5 common elements of Wellbeing that transcend countries & cultures — elements that differentiate a thriving life from one spent suffering. These core dimensions are “universal & interconnected elements of wellbeing, or how we think about and experience our lives. When these factors are fully realized, people thrive — and so do businesses.”
The five broad categories that are essential to most people:
* Career Wellbeing: how you occupy your time — or simply liking what you do every day
* Social Wellbeing: having strong relationships and love in your life
* Financial Wellbeing: effectively managing your economic life
* Physical Wellbeing: having good health and enough energy to get things done on a daily basis
* Community Wellbeing: the sense of engagement you have with the area where you live
- from Wellbeing: The Five Essential Elements — Gallup Press
What excites me about this research is that finally, in ways that business can finally begin to appreciate and wrap its arms around, there is acknowledgment that what is good for Individuals is actually good for Business!
Work is how individual human beings expend their precious life energy – it has far, far, far more purpose & meaning to both individuals and society as a whole than simply creating a company’s bottom line and/or stoking the engines of commerce/capitalism – the shallowest of purposes at best. The Bottom Line has always been a false king. This narrow view of the purpose of work has directly contributed to the current crisis of meaning that is devastating our society.
This more holistic view of Wellbeing supports the sea change that is already beginning to sweep through the world of work, albeit haphazardly at present. This concept of Wellbeing allows us to begin to consciously connect with a larger vision of how Work serves this much larger, more meaningful purpose that supports a healthy society. It is an Rx to healing our broken relationships with each other, and to reestablishing true meaning in Work.
Who You Are does matter – it matters at home, it matters at school, it matters at work. Who You Are is more than who your parents were and what they had (or didn’t); it’s more than the culture and community you associate yourself with. Who You Are constitutes the very fibers of your being and the unique-to-you ways you show up in the world: your interests, talents and abilities, your strengths and weaknesses, your natural preferences. All of these parts of you are valuable, and are what make you unique in all the world.
Yes, of course you are also shaped by the experiences of your life, but you come into this life with a special set of abilities and preferences that are specially designed to serve you and challenge you, too. Although it may appear that some people are endowed with ‘more’ abilities, or ‘better’ preferences than others — the fact is, every single one of us comes bearing a unique-to-us set of traits that are exactly what we need to succeed in this world.
“So, where’s my owner’s manual?” you may ask! Wouldn’t it be awesome if we each came with one – a reference manual that would tell us exactly how we work best? The fact is, WE DID! Although it’s not in print form or google-able, we actually do have ways to learn about our own personal operating systems and what makes us ‘tick’. We just haven’t been taught how to do it – until now!
Our first, and by far most important way to access our personal O/S is by paying attention to our bodies – they actually have a lot to tell us, and they are trying to communicate with us All The Time. We just have to learn our own body’s language – how our body speaks to us. Of course it can’t use words – but it can communicate, and is always telling us what is true for us in any given moment. The more we learn its language and pay attention, the more we are able to make decisions that align with a deeper part of us that knows more about what works for us, and what doesn’t, than we’ve ever given it credit for before.