Be kind to your skin.

The Global Wellness Institute defines wellness as the active pursuit of activities, choices, and lifestyles that lead to a state of holistic health.

Wellness as a trend is pretty new but wellness in practice goes back centuries. In the past, it might have been referred to as ‘balance’ or ‘enlightenment’ or ‘being present’ or even ‘being well rounded’. In more modern terms ‘everything in moderation’ or ‘don’t put all your eggs in one basket’ apply. The core concept of Wellness is to ‘do a little bit of everything and not too much of anything and be conscious of it so that over time, you become more at ease with life.’

That’s actually not ‘oversimplifying’ Wellness. It’s supposed to be simple. To make it even easier, it’s displayed graphically as high-level categories in The Wellness Wheel you see here. Take a second to look at it.

The basics are simple and anyone can use The Wellness Wheel because your commitment level is totally personal. There are a number of categories of life activities, usually varying from 4 up to 12 with items such as Physical, Emotional, Social, Intellectual, Occupational. Some wheels feature Nutritional and or alternates like “Career” or “Financial”. Tap or right-click to download this wheel or do a Google Images Search for more. Drawing your own is fine, too, but not if it’s just a circle that says ‘yoga’ in the middle. If you leave off the things you don’t ‘love’, it defeats the purpose.

To get started, take some time out (right now) to consider how much time/effort you spent in each category over the last 24 hours. If you went for a walk, for example, you did an activity in Physical. Did you vacuum? You worked a little on your Environmental. Did you skip lunch or eat? Was it fast food or healthy? Physical/Nutritional.  Did you spend the entire day at work and not with family? Or was it 80/20? Score in Occupational, but are you neglecting Social/Spiritual/Emotional? The goal is to more equally and sanely divide your time & energy amongst all the categories in your wheel for better balance and a healthier lifestyle.

Most people will notice right away that humans tend to focus 100% on things we love to the exclusion of things we don’t. We might be an exercise fanatic but maybe our home is in disarray because we don’t ‘love’ cleaning. That might lead to feeling ‘like a slob’ despite having shredded abs! Why? We are spending too much time on Physical and none on Environmental. Wellness simply says, “It’s ok to love the gym [Physical], but let’s make 20 minutes a night to speed clean our home [Environmental] and consciously leave the gym early to make it a reality.” As you distribute your efforts, you’ll find yourself more at ease with life.

There are as many answers to the question “Can I tan with tattoos?” as there are tattoos. In fact, tattoos vary so much there is no ‘right’ answer. There are many factors to consider: the age of your tattoo, how recent you got them, the amount of detail, the color, location and size, would all play a role. Two things we can all agree on: a lot of people have tattoos now and some basic common sense is what is in order for exposure to sunlight and UV.

First, if you are really worried about tanning your tattoo, be safe. Cover it when in direct sunlight or UV, whether indoors or outside. ‘When in doubt, sunblock it out.’ Apply sunscreen daily. If your tattoos are new, please be sure to follow the advice of the tattoo artist who did the work. Most will advise at minimum days or weeks out of any direct UV light. Follow their instructions as they may be specific to your tattoo.

Always stay hydrated and moisturized. Most online advice would agree that moisturizing and hydrating extend the artistic quality of tattoos.