The complementary therapies this semester have given me the opportunity to truly evaluate my health on a holistic scale. I was able to see the areas of my life that were not as balanced as I had thought they were. Because of this I was able to choose the areas that needed more attention and then work to improve them. I have chosen to focus on the physical and intellectual areas of well-being. I chose physical because since high school my activity level has dropped tremendously and I've maintained all my bad eating habits. In high school I played one sport year round and never had to worry about getting out of shape. Thanks to my activity level I could eat whatever I wanted whenever I wanted because I burned all the calories during workouts. Coming to Mount Mercy I chose not to play any sports. While I don't regret this decision, I began to notice changes in my body tone. These changes made my already low confidence level drop even further. To do something about these insecurities, I decided to limit myself to eating only one dessert or one portion of sweets per day in the hopes of eventually being able to limit it to a smaller number per week. I also decided that I would train at least three times a week. This goal was to help my physical appearance but I will also benefit mentally from a workout. Training gives me time away from stressful situations I may be experiencing and time to simply think. It's something that I've actually really missed in my life, but I feel like I don't have time to do it anymore. My reasoning for choosing the intellectual field was because while I feel really prepared and involved in my classes and studies, my involvement and ex......middle of paper......I hope to continue to do exercise and slowly decrease the amount of sweets I eat each week. I would really like to be able to watch the news every day. Maybe when I move out of the dorms and no longer share the television with a roommate, this will be easier to do. I would like to use more massage therapy. I think this would really help the neck pain I commonly experience and the headaches that come with it. I know that the massages offered through Mount Mercy are reasonably priced and I would like to take advantage of this opportunity. Aromatherapy also intrigues me and I would like to try it sooner or later. I think this is another one I should put off until I'm no longer living with roommates since they will most likely be participating too. I really enjoyed this course and learned a lot about different and less expensive ways to improve your health.