Note: this is Part II of The Power Within: Taking Command of Your Physical, Mental, & Spiritual Health series. If you haven’t done so, please visit this page for physical health.
Caring for our mental health is equally important as our physical health. Our mental well-being affects how we think, feel, and act in various situations. Taking time for self-care, managing stress effectively, and seeking support when needed are all vital aspects of maintaining mental health. Nurturing our mental well-being daily can lead to improved focus, emotional stability, better decision-making, and stronger relationships. It also helps build resilience to cope with life's challenges and promotes a positive outlook on life.
While physical health correlates with mental health, I would say maintaining mental health takes more effort. Due to culture, background, upbringing, and personality differences, conflicts with others are almost inevitable in our everyday lives.
In a spiritual sense, we are not all communicating at the same frequency. Therefore, unless one possesses high emotional intelligence, misunderstandings will take place. Understandably.
Mental Health
I started making my mental health a priority when I suffered a minor stroke working for a boss with a behavioral health issue. Despite the effort I put in by reading multiple books on ways to communicate with him, the ongoing stress, as well as my lack of spiritual health development, eventually caught up with me. I will never forget the day when my middle school aged son cried, "Mommy, is that jerk more important than your health?"
No shit!
Not just that, is the job more important than my family? Toxic behavior wasn't just hurting me. It hurt my family as well.
According to a study, as much as 90% of illness and disease is stress-related. This is why we should never neglect or prioritize our mental health over anything else.
Toxic relationships with family or colleagues can have severe and lasting effects on mental health. These types of relationships are characterized by unhealthy dynamics, emotional abuse, manipulation, lack of respect or support, and more. It is essential to recognize and acknowledge toxic relationships, and to take steps to manage them in order to safeguard one's mental wellbeing.
Tips for Maintaining Your Mental Health
Below are some of the ways I've used to protect my mental health:
It is important to recognize when a relationship is toxic and, when possible, remove yourself from the situation. This applies to ending a conversation, a meeting, an employment, a relationship, etc.
Educate myself on self awareness. It takes time and courage; time to foster such a habit and courage to stay true to myself.
Similar to the one above, once self awareness is established, I know what my boundaries and limits are.
I embrace bad days instead of self-diagnose myself with depression. We all have bad days, and we all have days where we just want to give up and cry all day. It's normal. It's part of life. Crying isn't a bad thing nor a sign of weakness. To me, it's a type of detoxification.
Focus on the solution and how I can prevent, or do better should I encounter a similar issue in the future.
Here, I will tell you that meditation doesn't work for me. In fact, when I tried to meditate in the past I ended up feeling worse. Dance it out works for me. Grab my karaoke microphone and sing like there is no tomorrow works for me. Taking a long walk and listening to some famous operas works for me. Crying over endless soldiers coming home and surprising their families YouTube videos works for me beautifully.
Protecting our mental health does not mean we are weak or unwilling to be hurt. It is about holding ourselves accountable and getting out of the rut, or getting up fast and moving on.
