Factors of Intellectual Wellness

Introduction

Intellectual wellness in its simplest terms is an individual's ability to utilize the available resources in order to expand their knowledge base and skills. Intellectually individuals are those who are open to new ideas, engage in critical thinking, and take on new challenges presented to them by different situations of their lives. These refers to the ability to be always curious, learn more, do things creatively and never stop their quest for learning. An intellectual student for instance tries to relate what he or she learns in a classroom in order to be practical and make sense out of what they learn.

Discussion

To start with, this essay discusses critical thinking as one of the factors behind intellectual wellness. Critical thinking is an individual's ability to engage in skillful conceptualization, application, analysis, synthesizing, and evaluation of information obtained by means of observation, experience, reflection, and reasoning as a guide to belief and action (Wener and Sharon 13). By this factor, it implies that an intellectually healthy individual is able to examine elements or structures of thought and reflect on assumptions in order to arrive at justifiable conclusion. The individual looks at implications and possible consequences of their actions to rationalize their actions. This ability varies according to its use. An individual may engage in calculated reasoning and manipulation of ideas in order to gratify their own self-interests. On the other hand, one may engage in critical thinking founded on fair-mindedness.

Secondly, is the ability to solve problems. This refers to an individual's ability to spot or identify problems, look for possible solutions and implement these solutions in a way that they feel gets them to their desired goals from where they are. This intellectual ability empowers an individual to accept the fact that there exists a problem and try to fix the problem. This factor considers acceptance as the first step to solving a problem. This process involves reflecting on one's position relative to what they desire to be. That is the goals they have set in life. The process of problem solving may involve, among others, brainstorming, lateral thinking, analogy and abstraction (Wener and Sharon 13).

The third factor of intellectual wellness is that of creativity. By this, we refer to the ability to create or formulate, design in a new form or do things imaginatively. This ability is characterized by one's ability to have originality of thought and imagination in their actions or conversations. Such individuals exhibit a great deal of adaptive flexibility. This means that they can easily manipulate their ways to solving problems. They also excise a great deal of flexibility to problems and challenges. For such individuals, they see each challenge as an opportunity to exercise their creativity (Gordon and Eric 7).

People, events, places and situations change, therefore, for an individual to be considered intellectually healthy, they should be able to adapt to these changes. This ability enables one to accept that they can always maintain their status quo and that things are subject to change from one place or time to another. Therefore, this essential factor ensures individuals stay a brace with their changing world and situations in their lives.

Intellectual wellness involves learning new things and relearning. Thus, for an individual to have new knowledge and skills it requires that he or she access the necessary resources. This ability, therefore, encompasses another factor of intellectual wellness. For an individual to stay informed of what is happening within and without their environment, it requires that they access the necessary type of resources that will furnish them with this knowledge (Gordon and Eric 7).

In conclusion, it suffices to say that an individual requires a range of abilities to be considered intellectually well. Looking at these factors closely, one cannot fail to spot some level of interrelatedness between these them.