The concept of wellness is becoming increasingly popular, and with good reason. Wellness of body, mind, emotions, and spirit is essential to leading a healthy, happy, and balanced life. In fact, from 2013 to 2015, the wellness industry grew by 10.6 per cent to a staggering $3.72 trillion, creating demand for professionals in all areas of the sector such as personal trainers, nutritionists, and wellness counsellors (Hill, 2016).
If you have a passion for health and love helping others achieve their goals, wellness counselling could be your ideal career path. Keep reading to learn more about wellness counselling and how it helps clients achieve balance, health, and fulfillment.
Grads of Wellness Counsellor Training Courses Help Clients Reach Their Full Potential
Wellness counsellors provide positive guidance, support, and encourage accountability with their clients in order to help them achieve their physical, emotional, and spiritual health goals. In your career as a wellness counsellor, you use a holistic approach to help your clients achieve meaningful and lasting change. A holistic approach recognizes that all aspects of a person’s wellbeing are interconnected. Wellness Counsellors work to uncover the root of any emotional problems that may be affecting a client’s overall wellness.
If a client is suffering from stress at work, for example, that stress might be negatively impacting their eating habits, and they may binge on comfort foods filled with fats and sugars. By uncovering the underlying causes affecting a client’s health, wellness counsellors address the reasons behind an unhealthy habit, rather than simply trying to correct the habit alone.
Although similar to other counsellor training courses, wellness counsellor training also emphasizes a holistic approach to education. Students are themselves empowered to work on their own wellbeing through unique exercises included in our experiential learning model. In fact, students in the wellness counselling program will even complete training in core conditioning, yoga, and spiritual practice so that they themselves have adopted a holistic approach to their wellbeing.
Wellness counsellors help clients achieve their goals in all aspects of their lives
Wellness Counsellor Training Courses Are Well Suited to Health Professionals
Because of wellness counselling’s holistic approach, this training is often beneficial to professionals currently working in fitness and nutrition. For many yoga instructors, personal trainers, and nutritionists, the added training of a wellness counselling program will help enhance the feedback they provide to clients, and add a counselling dimension to their work. In support of this, Rhodes Wellness College provides scholarships to select professionals in the fitness industry wishing to pursue an education in wellness counselling.
However, previous experience in fitness and nutrition is by no means a prerequisite to enrolling in wellness counselling. Your unique life experience, past careers, and educational endeavors all help prepare you for wellness counsellor training. In fact, just like in the fields of life coach training and life skills training, many students in wellness counselling will specialize or find a specific niche that makes the most of their unique perspective. You might find that your life experience makes you especially talented at working with teenagers or business executives, for example.
Graduates of Wellness Counsellor Training Courses Play a Preventative Role in the Health Care System
If you’re looking for a career where you can improve the health of those in your community, becoming a wellness counsellor is a great career path. The habits your clients develop will have lasting benefits to their health, as well as the health of the nation.
The average Canadian has a minimum of one chronic disease risk factor, which can be changed by making better lifestyle choices (Public Health Agency of Canada, 2011). Bad lifestyle habits like indulging in unhealthy food, not getting enough exercise, and smoking put stress on Canada’s health care system. In fact, about 26 per cent of all deaths in Canada are a result of smoking, 12 per cent are due to poor nutrition, and 24 per cent are the consequences of not getting enough physical activity (Kozicka, 2016). In addition, approximately 6.7 million, a total of 23 per cent of Canadians over the age of 15, reported feeling that their days were “quite a bit” or “extremely stressful” (Statistics Canada, 2015). Given that stress can lead to cardiovascular disease, obesity, eating disorders, and high blood pressure, this reality is troubling (WebMD, 2015).
Fortunately, wellness counsellors are ideally placed to promote lasting change in each of these facets of wellbeing. Whether they’re encouraging clients to develop healthy eating habits, or are educating clients on mindfulness and emotional wellbeing, they can help prevent these risk factors from causing harm to their clients.
Do you want to learn wellness counselling skills in Vancouver?
Contact Rhodes Wellness College today to learn more!
Works Cited
Hill, L. (2016, October 26). The Global Wellness Industry Hits $3.72 Trillion. Retrieved from http://www.welltodolondon.com/the-global-wellness-industry-hits-3-72-trillion/
Kozicka, P. (2016, April 16). Canadian life expectancy: This is how much our bad habits cost us. Retrieved from http://globalnews.ca/news/2886224/canadian-life-expectancy-this-is-how-much-our-bad-habits-cost-us/
Public Health Agency of Canada. (2011, January 1). Healthy living can prevent disease. Retrieved from http://www.phac-aspc.gc.ca/cd-mc/healthy_living-vie_saine-eng.php
Statistics Canada. (2015, November 27). Perceived life stress, 2014. Retrieved from http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/82-625-x/2015001/article/14188-eng.htm
WebMD. (2015). Stress Symptoms. Retrieved from http://www.webmd.com/balance/stress-management/stress-symptoms-effects_of-stress-on-the-body#2
