As we enter this New Year, research in the field of health promotion and occupational health and wellness is faced with many challenges in finding an optimal way to address individual as well as population health. I think one of the basic reasons that this has become a great challenge is because of the way health is approached, both at the individual level as well as at the population level. Both the individual and the population react only after sickness and/or an epidemic has occurred. The next step in such a process is to undergo some kind of treatment using allopathic medicine (i.e. diagnosis-treatment-medication), which probably seeds another round of sickness/epidemic in the future due to side effects from allopathic approach. My point is this: we are somehow trained to react to sickness by searching for hospitals and doctors to fix it, just like we take our car to a mechanic to fix it when it’s making a funny noise. As long as such as reactive attitude toward health exists, it is not surprising to see the demand for medical professionals as well as see more “mechanic shops” in your neighborhood.

 

If you will, we are relentlessly working and focusing much of our attention and energy towards forming and reforming healthcare and building new “mechanic shops” that address sickness and indirectly promote being reactive and irresponsible. While I acknowledge the advancements in the field of allopathic medicine, medicine should be viewed as a necessary contingency plan, just as in the field of safety and its relationship with emergency preparedness.

   

A part of such a responsible approach is to first understand that a reactive approach towards health is an irresponsible strategy, be it at an individual or at a population level; and begin to think about embracing a celebrative approach towards good health. An example of a celebrative approach is to think about increasing calmness as opposed to reducing agitation, increasing relaxation as opposed to reducing stress, increasing energy as opposed to reducing energy drain, and increasing resilience as opposed to reducing rigidity.

 

I hope you would have figured out the meaning of a celebrative approach by now –it is about embracing your positive health factors and celebrating them. 

 

I wish you all a healthy year ahead.