What does it really mean to be healthy? If you are fit and can do all your work reasonably well, then does it mean you are healthy? Is fitness health?

Most people equate health with health of body. This is not exactly wrong, because until some years ago, that was the concept and meaning of health that we had in mind. We thought that health of body means that you are healthy. People believed that if you are free from disease, it meant they were healthy.

But, these are old notions. In today’s world, it is not just enough to be free from disease to be healthy. The view has definitely widened.

Today, health has various aspects to it. Experts speak about the physical, the mental, the spiritual and even the social aspect of health. Health is no longer just absence from disease, but you have to be free from any mental, psychological and social disorders too to be counted as healthy.

Think about a criminal. A person who does something against society does so because they are not well in the mind. Though they may not have any disease hounding them, they are definitely not healthy. They need to be cured; and hence even corrective methods used by governments and law agencies are modes of treatment.

There are so many signs of ill-health that parents completely ignore in their growing children. They see things like sickness and disease, but they completely ignore their mental grown and development. A child who lies needs to be corrected.

A child who finds happiness in troubling their parents and teachers needs some kind of help. These are not issues of the body; they are issues of the mind. They need to be tackled early on, because like any other disease, they can grow to serious proportions.

In the past, health was something that was individual. If you did not take care of your health, it was only you who suffered. But, with this widened definition for health, the scope has definitely increased. If you don’t take care of your health now, it won’t be just you who suffer.

Think about the child whose habits are difficult to control. Such a child probably grows up and becomes a torment to society in some way or the other.

Health and wellness do not mean the same thing as they did a decade ago. In fact, even medical practitioners include various interpersonal and social methods of treatment. It is all a part of a much larger game.