Week Four: Intellectual Wellness

Week Four of Seven Disciplines of Intentional Living: Intellectual Wellness

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(transcript from Youtube)

Hello everyone, and welcome to week four of the social media series “Seven Disciplines of Intentional Living.”  If you have been following along, then you know I have a passion to help people achieve a Get F.I.T. Mindset.  Yes, I want each one of you to be Focused, Intentional, and Thriving.  We must challenge ourselves to be balanced in every aspect of our lives.  There are seven major areas: Occupation and Finances, Emotional, Spiritual, Intellectual, Physical, Cultural and Social, and Environmental.  I felt it was important to cover these areas starting from the outside, working our way internally, and then finishing externally again.

Today I am discussing Intellectual Wellness.  Intellectual Wellness means staying curious, learning new things.  Engage in creative activities.  Read for pleasure.  Be aware of social and political issues.  Or join a club that focuses on enhancing intellectual interests.  These are just a few ways to keep yourself intellectually stimulated.  In order to challenge yourself intellectually, you must get out of your comfort zone.  It’s impossible to walk boldly in your purpose, settling.  Your destiny is not to be ordinary but to be extraordinary!

When I was preparing to retire from the Navy, I knew that I wanted to pursue motivational speaking as a second career.  To ensure I put my best foot forward, I purchased a “How to be a Motivational Speaker” book and I did a lot of research.  I studied the craft of public speaking and even earned my bachelor’s in communications.  In addition, I found out about Toastmasters International, which is a global public speaking and leadership organization.  I also started reaching out to networking groups in my area.  I knew it was necessary to surround myself with those that could inspire me to be the best version of myself.  My planning, goal setting, and developing a strategy paid off.  I have been with my Toastmasters club, Talk of The Town for almost 8 years.  I stayed focused and intentional and was able to earn Distinguished Toastmaster award or DTM, and all my hard work to improve my public speaking skills gave me the confidence to ask and receive my first five figure keynote speaking opportunity.  Don’t get me wrong, things haven’t come easy, but I have been willing to learn by asking questions, observing, and researching.  I challenged myself to grow intellectually.  In the bible from Proverbs 27:17 “As iron sharpens iron, so one person sharpens another.” This is one my favorite scriptures.  Keeping this in mind, who are you attached to and how are they making you better? If you must think long and hard about the answer, then I would encourage you to find a new circle of friends.  This scripture encourages me to be intentional about who I surround myself with.  Overall, we should desire to grow and succeed.  But if you surround yourself with people who have a crab in the barrel mentality, who deplete you, and don’t push you to be your best, then you will stay stagnant, stifled, stuck.

To discover ways, you can achieve Intellectual Wellness, evaluate your Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats.  By doing a personal and professional SWOT Analysis, it will help you gain clarity in these four areas so you can develop strategies to move your Weaknesses and Threats into the Strengths and Opportunity areas.  You can go to my website www.inspirationallyspeaking.com to my blog, GUMBO and download the SWOT Matrix.

Ask yourself:

• What resources do you need to gain Intellectual Balance?
• What are your peers doing in this area?
• What strengths are unique to you?
• What threats does your weaknesses expose you to?
• How committed are you to putting a plan in place to achieve Intellectual Wellness? If your motivation to change is in the Precontemplation stage, what will it take for you to get into the Action stage?

Remember, if you don’t know, you won’t grow!  Balance and wellness is key to having a Get F.I.T. Mindset.  When you achieve this mindset, you will gain personal peace, purpose, and power.

Thank you for tuning in to this live video.  My name is Jennifer Foxworthy, I am the Founder and CEO of Inspirationally Speaking, LLC.  I hope this week’s information will be helpful.  If you missed weeks one through three of the Seven Disciplines of Intentional Living, you could always go back and see previous videos and posts.  Reach out to me if you have any comments, questions, or concerns.  I am here to help you.  We are on this journey together.  I am cheering you on.  God bless!