Certain times of the year are ripe for contemplating life choices and new horizons. As 2015 winds down and a fresh start beckons, new ways to live, work and promote personal truths can manifest. It takes courage to make life and work choices that reflect the person we really are.

Dr. Bill Hettler, co-founder of the National Wellness Institute (NWI), says it is better to choose a career that is consistent with our personal values, interests and beliefs than to select one that is unrewarding. Additionally, according to a new study conducted by the NWI, the secret to career fulfillment is finding a job that involves helping others. Many whose careers are dedicated to promoting alternative healing and natural health and wellness options are doing just that, and the work they do can help others find ways to live their passion.

2016 is almost here. Our local natural health and wellness providers offer advice to help you face this new year filled with passion and purpose.

Clearing Blocks

Identifying obstacles to living our passion is a first step to clearing the way. The blocks will impede the path, but can be cleared. Charlene Dortch, owner of Dortch and Associates, is a wellness and healing consultant offering empowerment and energy healing services that can help clients clear obstacles and reach their goals. “My specialty is working with people who would like to clear their blocks and bring lightness and flow into their lives to enable them to live their truth,” says Dortch.

She uses intuitive, energetic, spiritual and practical tools to achieve results, including meridian tapping techniques, spiritual response therapy, Healing Touch, yoga and hypnotherapy. Her clients have commented that they develop greater clarity, feel more at peace and are more empowered to discover their true path and engage in their life’s work.

Nutrition

Josh Sessions, a certified health and wellness coach with Oriental Medicine Specialists, focuses on food and diet to help people set and reach personal and professional goals while cultivating a healthy lifestyle. His job is to help clients identify their specific health goals and find the motivation to create positive change. He asks what being healthy looks like to them and why they should be healthy. He says that answering these questions, finding focus and discovering what we want to be usually requires a shift in perspective. “There isn’t any aspect of your life that isn’t connected to food,” says Sessions. “If clients can shift their views of food from limiting to boundless health, significant positive changes can occur.”

Sessions often starts with a carefully monitored, customizable detox program because it is a great way to kick off a new healthy eating program. He encourages clients to use a food journal and calendar for planning and tracking meals. He has found that when his clients make positive changes with their nutrition, it often affects other areas of their lives for the better.

Physical Fitness and Self-Care

A person’s connection to their body and level of physical fitness and self-care can greatly affect goal-setting and clarity regarding one’s purpose in life—with increased strength and energy, goals can be met more quickly and effectively. Lethargy, stress and illness can slow down our process to living with passion.

Diva Boot Camp owner and instructor, Kiara Fuentes, wants women to embrace their bodies and find wonder in what they can accomplish. She is also a massage therapist and believes that, “Being healthy and feeling well spills over into your life, affects your happiness, your self efficacy, your confidence.”

Fuentes says, “With all the demands of a busy life, it can be difficult to make self-care a priority. Taking time for yourself allows you to recharge so that you may do that self exploration or so that you may give back to others.” She stresses the importance of self-care with exercise, meditation, self-massage and by expressing gratitude.

To keep herself charged, she also turns to the wisdom of people she admires who stress pursuing passion and self-acceptance, such as writers Elizabeth Gilbert, Gretchin Ruben and Brene Brown.

Tips for Finding and Living Your Truth

Identifying and clearing obstacles, good nutrition and a fit, healthy body are terrific advantages toward living a life of passion and truth. When local natural health and wellness providers were asked for tips on how to live an authentic life, the following ideas surfaced:

• Look at challenges as puzzles and find fun, creative ways to solve them.
• Journal. There are so many benefits to this practice.
• Practice flexibility. If we veer off the strict path, be okay with it—we can give ourselves permission and enjoy the experience. Guilt and shame are far worse for our health than the occasional brownie or ice cream.
• Embrace the unknown. It takes courage to pursue our passion.
• Take plenty of time for ourselves, but also find the fellowship of honest, supportive, like-minded friends.
• Continue to ask “Why?” Why did I pursue this? What’s my end goal? Make adjustments as needed.
• Operate from joy—find beauty in the difficult and gratitude in the mundane.

Life is a journey, and a passionate and purpose-filled life path that aligns with an individual’s unique truth is a vision to behold. There are many resources to help us define and attain that vision—each day presents opportunities to access them, and each new year is ripe for making a plan and taking the first step, naturally.

For more information, email [email protected] or contact Charlene Dortch at DortchAndAssociates.com or 804-839-3123; Josh Sessions at JoshSessions.com or 804-358-7071; or Kiara Fuentes at MassagesByKiara.com or 804-537-0641.