In Wellness and In Health

For Better or For Best: A Wellness Champ’s Love Letter

In an effort to add another layer of accountability to my health habits, I became a Wellness Champ shortly after joining the company barely a year ago, and now I am the healthiest I have been in two long decades. To paraphrase one of the newest members of the CSAA Insurance Group family, Frank Zhang, the company’s Wellness Program is “Life changing.”

Take the Group Exercise Class program, for example: it blends so seamlessly into our work schedule that employees can fit in one workout each day without negatively affecting the quality or quantity of their work; in fact, both are made better, since employees can relieve stress and be energized and re-energized to tackle the tasks at hand. My own biggest success in the Wellness Program has been an ever-elusive consistency, made possible by the variety inherent in the Group Exercise Class Schedule—I can exercise once a day, every day, without having to repeat the same workout in the same week, sometimes for weeks, depending on my work schedule.

Aside from the daily exercise classes, my favorite activities have been the Heart Walk & Fun Run and the Fitness Flash Mobs: they have added higher levels of excitement and motivation to keep moving and, altogether, turn mere work-life balance into true work-life integration—for CSAA Insurance Group’s culture integrates things that employees value, be it social causes, volunteerism, well-being, and more. Rather than just “balancing” work with non-work, employees can bring what they love and integrate it into their work.

In honor of everyone who makes the Wellness Program possible at CSAA Insurance Group, of my fellow Wellness Champs, and of those yet to become Wellness Champs, here is a simple thank you:

Thank you, Chris Myers, for exploding out of the starting line during the Fun Run: I might never match your speed—or Ken Mejica’s—but thanks to you, my personal record (adjusted for age, ahem…) is right now shaking in its sneakers, for it knows its days are numbered.

Thank you, Lexie Hicklin, for being so darn competitive: I might never match your swiftness, but every time I try, I become swifter and truly curious about what it would really be like to work out so hard so as to experience exercise-induced nausea.

Thank you, Eric Chen, for being so resourceful: in the absence of a fitness instructor, your coming up with a workout routine from memory has made the difference between ending the week on an endorphin-induced high and a bitter low—you are proof that a well-structured Wellness Program can practically run itself, when necessary.

Thank you, Liz Brandt: your dogged determination to do handstands is hands-down inspiring, and you have inspired me to check off one of the long-standing items in my long bucket list, at long last.

Thank you, Paula Downey, for leading the Heart Walk and for showing up to yoga: great leaders do not merely talk the talk—they lead by example, walk the (Heart) walk and, I suppose, pose the (Yoga) pose.

None of you may be Wellness Champs in title, but you are in spirit and in deed.

Thank you, Evita Betpera, Kristine Chin, Jennifer Noia and Dimitar “Mitko” Yossifov, for consistently showing up to work hard and doing so with a smile—showing up is 90% of the battle, and success is 99% perspiration.

You are all exemplary Wellness Champs.

Thank you, Tracy Pajer, for creating the Thriller Fitness Flash Mob routine that will start me on my way to checking off that living-dead item on my bucket list.

Thank you, Kevin Jack, for pushing us all so hard: I might never match your strength and power, but every time I try, I become stronger and more powerful.

Thank you, Lauren Hooper, for your awesome, unmatchable enthusiasm: if people had a fraction of your positive attitude, the world would be a much better place.

And, thanks to all those of you who make this life-changing Wellness Program possible: if you ever have any doubts as to whether or not you have made a positive difference in anyone’s life, remember people like me, whose lives have been positively transformed for the better.

Finally, to the entire CSAA Insurance Group family: let us work together to take the company from one of the Healthiest Employers in the Greater Bay Area and one of the Healthiest Employers in the Nation to THE Healthiest Employer in the World.

We are already well on our way.