A. Professional Presence Most things improve and become more detailed and advanced with time. The sciences, arts, technology, understanding and thought processes are just a few. The more time that humankind spends on earth the more it learns about itself, others, nature and countless other things. This includes the way we think about ourselves in terms of health, well-being, medicine and their effect on ourselves and others.
Health and healing are always evolving. The 19th century’s use of toxic mercury to treat most ailments, and surgery and medication used almost exclusively to treat the sick was what was known to practioners as best practice at that time. Today there are more methods to treat, heal and improve health than I can name. Some of these merge faith and wellness, others deal solely with the mind to heal the body others deal strictly with the body and there are infinite combinations between them.
There are three models of health and healing. They are categorized by Dr. Larry Dossey as Era I, Era II and Era III. Era I began in the 1860s, and is described as plain old mechanical medicine. It sees the body as a machine and the doctor as a mechanic or technician. The technician uses whatever tools available to fix the problem the machine is having. In Era II or “Mind-Body Medicine, we recognize that thoughts, emotions, attitudes, and feelings can be used to make people healthy. So Era II recognizes the impact of thought, feeling and belief within an individual. Era III adds the psyche. The consciousness plays a role over and above the brain and body (DiCarlo 1996). Era I and Era III are the most different. Era 1 sees medicine emerging, crawling from infancy into the next early adulthood. Era I is the time from the mid-1800s to the mid-1900s and was an important time for the development of medicine. Medical schools were just beginning, there were no national requirements that you even attend medical school to be deemed a doctor. Most doctors learned from working with other doctors and reading whatever books someone determined applicable to the field of medicine.
Era III is the now and the future. It is a time that we see consciousness playing a role in health and healing. The role of consciousness will eventually be seen as an important tool to be used with medication and other therapies in the maintenance and improvement of health and healing. As human beings we are more than a brain and a body. We are a combination of our thoughts, beliefs, energy, desires, dreams, and fears along with our brain and body that manifest and attempt to understand the non-tangible aspects of our being.
I was raised as a Southern Baptist attending church services a minimum of twice a week with Sunday being a marathon session from Sunday school (8 a.m.) to evening church services (5:00 pm). Faith and prayer have been and is an integral part of my life and who I am. My beliefs and views conflict with those seen in Era I. I see human beings as more than body and brain. I feel human life combines mind, body and soul. I still claim Christianity as my faith but as a mother I want to ensure my children are exposed to seeing and doing good things in many forms. We pray as a family for ourselves and others. Some we know, some we see on the street or on television. We attempt to give our time to local charities as much as possible. I encourage my children to smile and say hello to others often. In the past year my family and I have attended meditation at a local Buddhist temple. The lessons provided at the Buddhist temple are to teach us how to treat ourselves and others well. It encourages us to eat well and live well. Our temple suggests giving up meat at least once a week to help the environment, animals and humankind. The meditation is to help us center ourselves, slow down our minds and bodies. We focus on breathing and in turn may reduce stress, blood pressure and hormones that may affect us negatively. We are able to declutter our minds and allow for something positive to come in. I believe the above contributes to making the world a better place, to making life more fulfilling and making the individual and active participant in improving humankind.
I am a fairly new nurse with four years working experience. In those four years I have worked in skilled nursing, medical-surgical/telemetry at a county hospital, non-profit public health nursing, nurse case managing and am currently working as a school nurse. There has not been one job that I have not prayed for at least one patient. I prayed in silence with several patients at the county hospital. I believe in the power of prayer, the Bible says “If two of you agree on earth about anything that they may ask, it shall be done for them by My Father who is in heaven (Matthew 18:19, New International Version). I personally have had prayers answered.
My belief system is part of my professional presence. It allows me to see beyond the printed diagnosis and verbal prognosis. There is no refuting numbers and data however I believe that the final answer lies in God’s hands. On a daily basis I see children who are in the lowest rungs of society. I do my best to ensure that they have all of the resources that I can find as well as provide as much attention, nurturing and caring as I can in our brief encounters. I have driven sick students and their parents home, bought uniforms and given my lunch away. These are things other school nurses may or may not do. I feel it is my duty to help when I can. My professional presence influences my nursing practice daily and I feel it’s for the better. It helps me look past the face and body I see and try to determine who the person is on the inside. What they feel about their health, safety and their future.

B. Personality Preferences
Welcome to your Keirsey Profile page. Your Keirsey assessment results indicate that your personality type is that of

GUARDIAN

There are four kinds of Guardians: Guardian-Supervisors (ESTJ), Guardian-Inspectors (ISTJ), Guardian-Providers (ESFJ), and Guardian-Protectors (ISFJ). The first step to take is to read your free Keirsey report (this is clickable below). We offer several different reports, and the first one is on us. Let's get started by taking a look at your first report. If you like what you read and want to go deeper on the specific kind of Guardian you are, you can do so by purchasing one of the other reports we offer below. Thank you for taking the Keirsey Temperament Sorter! Name Date Temperament & Type
Yolanda W Sep 14, 2015 Guardian

I was determined to be a guardian by the KTS-II. Most of the descriptions fit me and my personality. I am good at maintaining my immediate and extended family. Being a mother is my first and most important job and I pour my heart, soul and energy into it. I am the mother of three, an eight year old girl and 20 month old twin boys. I make sure my children lead enriched lives and drive an hour for my daughter to attend a school I feel is the best fit for her. We are blessed to have our neighbor come to our home to watch our boys to ensure that they have limited exposure to unknown adults. I am active in organizations that I feel even the playing field between the have and the have nots and protect, strengthen and enhance the lives of girls. I have a very small circle of friends but when I am with them I enjoy myself immensely. I would like to work on making new friends and strengthening existing relationships. Most people assume that I have a lot of friends because I tend to be bubbly. However, I am truly introverted and enjoy people watching versus engaging in social activities. As a guardian I try to be part of the solution. I prefer visible, tangible results. I may find it most difficult to work with artisans. While I appreciate art I find it can express particular issues but it can’t address or solve those issues. I feel artisans are on-lookers or observers, willing to provide a commentary but no solutions. Idealists tend to be more focused on the existence of a future utopia versus working on the betterment of the current state of a situation. I am conservative and working with someone who has different views can make communication uncomfortable or may feel unable to trust an idealist.

C. Mindfulness Practice
The physical aspect is the most important aspect of the whole person. If you do not take care of yourself and are not alive the others do not matter. This includes what we consume, how often we exercise, keeping our bodies clean and fresh, as well as our posture and how we carry ourselves (Handel 2009). I would like to think that I am progressive in my way of thinking about myself, others and our roles in society. I like to observe other people and see how they handle situations and take what I feel positive and try to incorporate in my tool box of I take time to self-reflect and actively make changes to areas I see as flawed. I am overweight and have been for about seven years. I am committed to exercising at least three times a week. I have a gym membership and do moderate to intense cardio when there. I am concerned about my children becoming overweight and take various steps to keep them active and eating healthy foods as much as possible. My goal is to increase the frequency of gym visits to 4-5 times per week for a minimum of thirty minutes per visit and increase the intensity of my cardio work out. I plan to go every day before work.
In order to become healthier I plan on making small changes to my diet. I currently eat fast food 4-5 times a week. My goal is to bring my lunch to work daily and eat fast food a maximum of once a week. I bought a lunch box. I will eat 1 vegetable serving and 1 fruit serving at lunch. I will set my alarm for 8:00 pm to signal myself to make my lunch for the next day.
I feel that since being married and having children I have focused less on my vital life force. There are more tasks to be done than time to complete them. I randomly quiet myself in the car before walking into the gym or into work. However, this is a sporadic act that I do when I can remember. I will make a conscious effort to do a morning quiet time for at least five minutes. I will practice 1 minute of taking long and deep inhalations and exhalations to enhance my relaxation response before I pick up my daughter. This will allow me to be open to listen and receive what she tells me about her daily activities and her feelings about them. I have been under immense stress lately partly due to the decline in my mother’s health. I would like to reduce my stress level. I have begun to receive daily Bible verses to help me begin my day on a positive path. Throughout the day when I find myself worrying about a situation I will switch my focus on positive things and/or things I can control. I have been told by a close friend I need to control my better control my emotions. I will use these two methods with others to think before I speak and/or act.
In order to help heal myself and progress I will say and write three things I am grateful for/blessed to have. While I am sure initially the list will rely heavily on my children eventually I hope that it will encompass all aspects of my life and help me realize my some of my goals.

D. Healing Environments
An optimal healing environment is a framework that shows how social, psychological, spiritual, physical and behavioral components of an organization effects healing. There are four domains to an optimal healing environment. The first is internal environment it includes two components. Developing healing intention is a conscious effort to improve your health or someone else’s. The second factor is experiencing personal wholeness, when mind, body, and spirit are working together towards healing/well-being. Next is interpersonal environment. It is comprised of creating cultivating healing relationships with like-minded individuals. Next is behavioral environment, practicing healthy lifestyles and using a combination of traditional medicine and alternative therapies. Finally, external environment is building healing spaces to help improve outcomes and ensuring the spaces are environmentally friendly. Southern California is a leader in new alternative therapies and therefore there are several hospitals that provide optimal healing environments. University of California Irvine Health’s Integrative Medicine Program. This program offers a patient-centered approach to health and wellness with focus on treating the whole person including mind, body and spirit. The program integrates Western scientific medicine with broad therapeutic approaches for patients to achieve optimal health and healing. Those approaches include art, music, poetry and dance performances in the lobby of the medical center.