When we become more holistic, we can understand things in greater clarity and wisdom.
By Darrel Hammon
Over the years, I have discovered that human beings are not one-dimensional or one-sided. Rather, we are a holistic lot and possess great skill sets in holistic dimensions. What makes up a holistic you? Well, that depends on the person and their experiences, but they usually hover in and around the following six areas.
Family
My wife, daughters, sons-in-law, and grandchildren, siblings make up my immediate family. I love them, and they have become the biggest part of my life. Not all of them live close, but thanks to airplanes, cars, the Internet, text, Zoom, and, yes, even letters and cards that I actually write in, I can see or connect with them as often as I want. Family is an important part of my holistic journey. They have helped me become who I am!
Faith
My faith is incredibly important to me. It is the foundation of all my thoughts and actions. I know I am a child of God, a loving Heavenly Father who loves me and wants me to become like He is. As a result, when I was a young 19-year-old country boy from Idaho, I decided to serve a mission for my Church. I was assigned to southern Chile and spent two years teaching the gospel of Jesus Christ. It was one of the most incredible journeys I have ever been on. Fast forward a couple of decades, and my wife and I served an 18-month mission to the Caribbean and lived in the Dominican Republic. Fast forward another few years, and we served as mission leaders in southern California for three years—all on our dime. My faith has increased, I learned that my Heavenly Father loves me even more than I previously thought, and I have elevated my holistic views of so many things.
Education
Post-secondary education was not necessarily something my parents insisted on. Yes, obtaining good grades was always important. My dad had dropped out of school, went into the military, and then earned his GED after returning home. Fortunately, I had incredible friends who knew they were going to college. I remember well a hot day in the summer when I was 14 years old, moving sprinkler pipe in a large potato field in eastern Idaho. Mud caked me from head to toe, mosquitos were trying to suck the blood from me—and being quite successful—and I was hot and tired. I just stood there on top of a rock pile in the middle of the field overlooking a little pond of water and listening to frogs croak. I thought to myself: “I do not want to do this for the rest of my life” and determined to go to college like my friends. My epiphany that day opened my eyes to an elevated level of understanding my future. My openness to learning has made me more holistic to learn new things and become a lifelong learner.
Leadership
For some reason, I have been blessed to be a leader for most of my life—In my youth as a youth leader in Church, as a Boy Scout (I earned the Eagle Scout Award), as a young missionary in Chile, in my workplaces, including becoming the president of two community colleges and a mission leader for my Church. Being in leadership positions has definitely elevated my holistic understanding of people, systems, missions, plans, partnerships, communities and strategies. As an emerging leader, I tried my best to be observant and watchful of adult leaders. Some were decent, but the overwhelming majority of them were spectacular and were my mentors growing up, into adulthood, and even now. I still watch and observe leaders, young and maturing. I believe all people are born leaders. Some live up to their billing, and others do not. Some squander the leadership capabilities, trying to hide their talents or choosing not to perform. The key to leadership is to continue to learn from your mistakes and becoming more holistic in your approach to solving problems and challenges and creating opportunities for others to succeed!
Talents and Gifts
Every single person on the planet Earth has been blessed with gifts and talents. Most of them are latent until we utilize and learn more about them. For me, I have always liked to write and majored in English at college, thinking I was going to be an attorney and write my way into the history books. Alas, that did not work out, and I maneuvered through the teaching ranks and into administration, although I always taught along the way. Another gift I possess is the ability to stand in front of people and talk. Yes, I am always nervous, but that subsides after I get going. A talent/gift that I would love to have is watercolor painting. Yes, I have taken a couple of watercolor classes. I am still not very good at it, but I keep trying and see a bit of improvement along the way. I have learned so many things from my classes, from K-12 through undergraduate and graduate school, three degrees and a boatload of continuing education classes and reading books. These have made me more holistic in my thinking and doing and becoming.
Fitness and Health
Fitness and health are things that many people do worry about. When we were kids, we lived in the country, had access to fields and woods, rode bicycles everywhere and fished, and played a lot of basketball and softball. Even until my 40s, I played basketball at 5:00 a.m. three times per week. Now, unfortunately, I cringe just thinking about playing basketball. Yes, my wife and I still exercise close to five days per week at our local recreation center, ride our bikes in the summer, and walk along our local river trail—all this to just to maintain our health and stay moderately fit. Trying to be fit has raised my sights about being healthy, thus allowing me to be more holistically engaged in so many areas that many are not able to do.
To become holistic, you must plan ahead, make goals, and, especially, create strategies to enhance your life and elevate your thinking and doing. When we become more holistic, we can understand things in greater clarity and wisdom. When we understand our holistic selves, we are more grounded and simultaneously, more elevated in our thoughts, our choices, our comings and goings, our actions, our fitness and health, how we treat people and how we live our lives. Becoming holistic enhances our lives.
I invite you to seek your holistic self and strive to enhance the way you think, live, and function.
Darrel L. Hammon has been dabbling in writing in a variety of genres since his college days, having published poetry, academic and personal articles/essays, a book titled Completing Graduate School Long Distance (Sage Publications), and a picture book, The Adventures of Bob the Bullfrog: Christmas Beneath a Frozen Lake (Outskirts Press). He also was the editor of the Journal of Adult Education (Mountain Plains Adult Education Association). Most of his essay/article writing has focused on topics about growing up, leadership, self-awareness, motivation, marriage/dating, and educational topics. Some of these articles/essays are in Spanish because Darrel is bilingual in Spanish/English, having lived in Chile, Dominican Republic, and southern California, and having worked with Latino youth and families all of his professional life in higher education. He has two blogs, one for personal writing at http://www.darrelhammon.blogspot.com/ and one for his consulting/life coaching business (http://www.hammonconsults.blogspot.com/).
