don's report archive

by Donald B. Ardell, Ph. D.

Wellness in the Headlines
(Don's Report to the World)

A map of the world that does not include Utopia is not worth even glancing at.
Lewis Mumford

Without the Utopians of other times, men would still live in caves, miserable and naked.
Anatole France

As a former professional urban planner (MCP from UNC-Chapel Hill) and long-time wellness promoter, I sometimes consult on the design of new communities. My role, usually carried out in two-day brainstorming sessions with architects, bankers, developers and others, is to describe the nature of the wellness concept and attempt to translate such a mindset to the design of upscale, exclusive, resort-like communities. The goal is to create well environments that promote, encourage, facilitate or otherwise reinforce a good and healthful life. 

Throughout this week, I'm participating in such a brainstorming session with developers in Texas. My "charge" or role in the process was outlined to me last week in a letter from the director of the brainstorming team. 

• Take your principles and dynamic presentation and translate that into how you would approach the planning, design and programming of this new community.  
  
  
• The overall objective of your contribution is for participants to see how wellness can be experienced at this community and woven into homeowner lives.
  
  
• Please integrate the concerns of multicultural families and generation X types with such issues as aging, heart disease, obesity and retirees seeking meaning and purpose.  
  
  
• Tell us how the philosophy of wellness can be translated into tangible ideas. Think in terms of the design of homes, the use of green space, the community center or recreation center, arts center, transportation, education and so on. 
  
  
• We want to leave your presentation with a strong sense of how your philosophy of living an epic life can be experienced by the future residents of this community.
   
  In summary, what ideas and suggestions can we consider that would actually change the way people live here? How can it become a model wellness community? As usual, you will have 30 minutes for your presentation.

Piece of cake, don't you agree? Hahahaha. 

Well, all journeys of a thousand miles, and even 30 minute presentations, must start at the same place, namely, a first step (or initial words), so mine will begin with the Lewis Mumford quote, above. The word "utopia" has become synonymous with unreal and impossible, yet, in another sense, utopia can mean an ideal or vision of what could be that makes the world not only tolerable but exciting. Mumford described well communities in dozens of books on the history of cities, inspiring generations of city planners to "create well communities into proud cities, aiming bravely at the good life." His books on the history of cities were a major influence on my choice of city planning as a profession. Many years after graduating from planning school, I realized that the core of Mumford's ideas about great cities were wellness concepts. 

I will begin my 30 minute presentation with a brief reference to the nature of the wellness philosophy but then move on to a summary of Mumford's work. I'll mention that, "like us here today, Mumford desired environments where citizens could most naturally pursue healthful, meaningful lives." Then I'll point out that Mumford's ideas about communities "free of disquieting negative stresses in harmony with nature" were extensions of the same concepts of good living advanced by earlier utopians. These included but were not at all limited to such thinkers as Hippodamus, Plato, Sir Thomas More and, in his own time, Patrick Geddes and the father of high level wellness, Dr. Halbert L. Dunn. My mini-history overview will conclude this way: "We meet here today as part of a long, unbroken tradition of Utopians seeking to enable, promote and design environments for the good life, for others. In doing so, we enable the same for ourselves and our successors."

This, alas, will take about ten to fifteen of my precious thirty minutes! The next essay, set for Saturday of this week, will summarize what I offered regarding the five bullet points of the charge, given above, as well as my response to "ideas and suggestions for changing the way people live here, that is, how it can become a model wellness community."

To finish in time, I think I'm going to have to talk very fast.

Be well. Always look on the bright side of life.

(Note: This essay will be filed in the archives in the MEANING DOMAIN under the skill area of applied wellness. Additional articles related to this theme may be found there.)

(Ed. Note: Views expressed in this and other columns are those of the author and not necessarily those of the SeekWellness Editorial Board.)

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