wellness initiatives

It sure isn't pretty. It's an old, seldom used room. It's in the basement of my office building. There is an overhead projector, for crying out loud. But, it's got a sound system, a projector, and a dvd player. Therefore it's my gym every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday mornings.

In the past few months at my job, we've had a few changes. One of those is adding support staff (that's me - Student Ministry Team Coordinator) to our staff teams. I chose to be on the Staff Life Team. What does that mean? I'll tell you this, it's far more than a party planning committee. Within the SLT, we have divided into smaller sub-groups. I am a part of the Wellness Team. We focus on the environmental, physical, spiritual, and social wellness of our 50+ person staff.

I bet you can't guess what my specific focus is... Yeah, I run point for the physical wellness aspect. You're shocked, right?! :) In that vein, I started a few initiatives for my coworkers. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, we have a walking group. We leave our desks for about half an hour to get outside and move around. Nothing too intense, just 2mi or so. Enough to get the blood pumping.

On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays we get together for a T25 DVD workout. As Shaun T says, it's only 25min...who doesn't have 25min for a full body workout?! Consistently, we've had 4-5 of us show up. Many have said they wouldn't do it alone, but knowing there are people waiting on them pushes them to make it in the morning. I'm so grateful that people come, too. I am not a morning person (how many times have I tried to be a morning runner, only to have it last about 3 weeks at the most?) but knowing that I need to have the DVD ready to go at 8am gets me up and out the door.

I love that I have a place to work that cares about the whole person and that encourages us to continue to develop these initiatives. It is such a blessing. Here's to continuing to foster a healthy staff environment at GC!