How to start a Wellness program

Living healthy can be a chore for many well-meaning persons, unless they surround themselves with like-minded support.

Many might give themselves the best chance for a good life by starting a Wellness Program. A Wellness Program, also known as a Wellness Club is a grouping of like-minded persons who gather together and pool their resources to support each other in weight and health management.

Types of wellness programs

1. Staff wellness programs

2. Neighborhood wellness clubs

3. Wellness Clubs for circles of friends

Call up some friends today and start to create a schedule. Call your first meeting to hammer out the details, then start meeting your way to great health. Below are some guidelines – a policy framework of sorts – that can guide you in establishing your own Wellness Program or Wellness Club:

Sample Wellness Mission

To develop a support community of health seekers who will collectively encourage, support and make resources available to each other in pursuit of health.

Sample Wellness Vision

To develop a community of health seekers who have gained knowledge, insight and power to make the right choices and to consistently live the right way to achieve health and weight management goals.

Selecting your Wellness Club foundation members – Friends/neighbors category:

Pitch the idea for your Wellness Club among your closest friends who you know could either benefit from or have an interest in achieving or securing health and weight goals.

It’s not a good idea to choose persons with whom you have interpersonal problems. Give your Club the best chance of survival at the beginning. It may be important to select a mix of persons who are at different places in their wellness journey. For example, if your group consists of ‘strugglers’, (i.e., those who are lagging in meeting their wellness goals) its good to integrate persons who have achieved some measure of success in their own journey. If you are all fairly strong in your wellness journey it’s good to co-opt some strugglers so that you can impart principles and reinforce lessons in your own lives.

Selecting wellness program members – Workplace category

Wellness Clubs in your workplace may not have the benefit of an exclusive selection process. In these instances, it may be necessary to create open invites and select a pre-determined venue for your meetings. In these groupings, as well as the neighbourhood groupings, it may be quite important not to share too much of your personal lives, and to keep group activities, including talks at the impersonal level.

Making a start

1. Call the troops together
2. Sit down as a team to set your group and individual goals.
3. Brainstorm a name for the wellness program that stamps it with a unique identity. Names can range from the serious to the sublime to the quirky to the downright funny. The sky is the limit.
4. Identify executive members who hold responsibility for key deliverables, otherwise, your club will flounder without direction, and often without meeting. These positions are of your own making but Wellness Guides JA recommends that you choose

a. A group leader
b. Someone in charge of notices and communications
c. Someone in charge of outreach, events, seminars.

5. Set down on paper the different activities you would like to implement together over a six month period (or longer if you wish). Make sure your activities help you achieve your group goals, and to a certain extent, individual goals.
6. Agree on the date and time of your first meeting and get this off the ground. Making a start is important and doing it well is even more important as it sets the tone for the rest and helps people make up their minds about your Wellness Program.
7. Some groups may wish to rotate venues, while others may wish to stick to one venue that is faithfully available for your group activities. The option is dependent on the group and the individuals comprising the group. It’s good to set the venue or venues from day one and to issue periodic reminders so that that matter is settled expeditiously.


Setting rules and regulations

This is not set in stone, because the idea is to make the Wellness Club fun and carefree with zero tolerance for stuffiness. But there are some general rules that could help to enhance the comfort of Club members:

1. Members undertake to keep any personal information, including goals within the group and will not share this information with outsiders to the group.
2. Some Clubs may advise Members not to share personal information that they would like to keep privileged. If you can’t bear to hear it in public circles, don’t share it at all. Otherwise, share away.
3. Stronger members of the group should never ridicule or revile Club members in perceived areas or weakness, either in speech, written or electronic communication. The group must maintain a supportive, loving and welcoming environment at all times.
4. Do not allow the Club activities to overwhelm individual and family lives or you may have TROUBLE on your hands. Wellness Club activities are supportive units but should not take over the lives such as to overwhelm or compete with family life. As such, set periods for group activities – This may be once per month or once every week or once every two weeks. Limit activities to the most at once per week, with clear time schedules.


Group Communication

Regular notices, flyers and newsletters keep the Wellness Club uppermost in the minds of it’s members, helps generate sustained interest in its activities and can help keep group activities well subscribed. Here are some ideas for keeping communication fresh:

1. Create an e-mail list that you can use to easily swap online articles, testimonials etc.
2. Create your own group newsletter to report on activities, individual progress upcoming activities and to share information such as recipes and tips.
3. Create special flyers for upcoming group activities or special meetings
4. Create notices for regular meetings that are circulated a few days before the meeting.
5. Create your own blog using free blogging services to chronicle the publishable adventures, opinions and updates on group activities to share with the worldwide web users. They could use your ideas and you could end up being an inspiration to persons across the world.

Some interesting group activities to keep things lively and effective

1. Invite interesting speakers to address your meetings. These could include overcomers, doctors, raw foodists, gourmet vegetarian cooks, alternative health practitioners.
2. Some sessions could include demonstrations such as massage therapy, reflexology and other safe, non invasive procedures.
3. Arrange mutually available times for supportive exercise sessions
4. Swap recipes and low fat cooking methods/tips with each other.
5. Create accountability partners who you can check in with when you are having moments of weakness.
6. Arrange cookouts where healthy recipes can be prepared and shared. In time this can become an open house session for other friends to share your information. Roster the cookout sessions and post email flyers to each other with the featured dish/menu.
7. Arrange meals out where the focus is on choosing healthily from the menu
8. Arrange shopping sessions where you learn from each other how and where to shop for the best produce.
9. Be on the hunt for healthy lifestyle camps, seminars, fairs and others sessions. Arrange group outings. If all members cannot be present, arrange notes and handouts to share.
10. Spread the concept of the healthy lifestyle club. You will do others a favor if you tell them of your successes and challenges.
11. Be prepared for a truly great and healthy period in your life.