Workplace Wellness that Works: 10 Steps to Infuse Well-Being and Vitality into Any Organization

Introduction An Overview of Workplace Wellness

People are designed to move. As hunters and gatherers, we moved up to 20 miles a day. We had to move to survive. We're also designed to eat food—real food, not processed food. We're designed to perform under pressure and then renew. We're designed to love and be socially connected. And we're designed to find happiness and meaning in life. These essentials are at the root of what we've been seeking through the ages, told through the voices of philosophers like Aristotle and Viktor Frankl to poets like Pablo Neruda to pop singers like Lady Gaga. Today, more than ever, we're talking about these ageless questions, but grasping to find the answers.

Wellness, at its core, is about getting back to doing what we naturally do. Increasingly, however, we're being culturally asked to do things that we're not biologically designed to do. We're born to move, but we're culturally mandated to sit. We're biologically programmed to eat whole foods, but our busy schedules and toxic environments prompt us to eat processed foods that are immediately gratifying, but never satisfying. We're hardwired to alternate stress with relaxation, but the society we live in idolizes being busy and always on the go. We're born to be with others, but many of us are feeling isolated in a sea of hard-driving competition, despite our ever expanding virtual social networks on Facebook and LinkedIn. We live in a world that exerts pressure to be available 24/7 and dishes ...