Most of us these days have an awareness that mental health is vitally important to living a full and happy life. If you are aware of this but you think you might not be doing everything you could to really look after your mind, then you might want to consider some of the things that you can do to improve that. As it happens, it might be easier and simpler than you think, though it is going to require some care and attention for sure.
In this post, we are going to take you through some of the main things you may want to consider in order to ensure you are taking control of your mental wellbeing as well as you can. These are all going to help in their own way, and you should find that they are hugely important for living your life fully and healthily.
Understand What Mental Wellbeing Is
First off, it will always be helpful if you can understand what mental wellbeing actually is, because people often develop all kinds of ideas around this, some of which may be less helpful than others. Overall, mental health is all about having the flexibility to deal with whatever happens in life. It’s not about controlling those things, or maintaining a consistently happy state, or even avoiding all stress. It’s much more about managing stress and feeling connected, and having a sense of purpose.
Overall, it’s about a resilience that supersedes all states, not having a need to be in any particular state at all. It fluctuates, just like physical health, and it cannot be fully commandeered – even though there are things you can do to gain more control over it. If you have this understanding, you are already working from a strong place.
Start With The Basics
Before you start trying to bring in lots of different exercises and practices to your life, you should bear in mind that you can often improve your mental health through some simple basics, and these are normally quite easy to bring into your life. As long as you are covering the fundamentals, you are going to find that you feel much better already, and it’s really amazing what this can do for you.
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So what are those fundamentals? An important one is sleep – if you are getting consistent, quality sleep, your mental resilience is going to be much stronger, and you will find that you also tend to have better moods. Without proper sleep each night, pretty much everything becomes a lot harder to handle. So anything you can do to work on this is certainly going to help you a lot, especially if you are not currently getting the sleep you need.
Another important element of the basics is movement. Exercise doesn’t always have to mean that you go to the gym. It can be as simple as taking a thirty-minute walk, dancing around your living room, or having sex. Even some simple stretching counts. It’s amazing what this can do for your general wellbeing, but also your mental health as well.
You should also make sure that you are eating as healthy as possible, because nutrition is another element of the fundamentals that is really going to make a huge difference. What you eat affects how you feel considerably. You don’t need to obsess, but you should make sure that you are eating a balanced diet if you want to be mentally strong.
If you are carrying out those basics, you are already going to be in a much better place, and it’s amazing what you are going to find out about yourself as a result. Actually, that act of self-discovery is another very important part of taking control of your mental wellbeing.
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Watch Your Thoughts
That’s why you need to make a point of watching your thoughts closely. This is a practice that can dramatically transform your life over time, and which has helped many people in the past to really grasp the reins of their own mental wellbeing as well as their entire life in general. If you are able to watch your thoughts, you will be amazed at what you might learn about yourself – which may well go much deeper than you had ever imagined.
This is partly important because of the very real and powerful way in which your internal dialogue shapes your experience of the world. This includes not only inner words but images, ideas and so on too. If you are not aware enough of what those thoughts are and what they’re saying, you are going to find that you’ll struggle to appreciate how they might be affecting and colouring your perception.
You can start by trying to notice your self-talk in particular: does it tend to be helpful, or harmful? Is it largely positive, or is it overwhelmingly negative? It doesn’t need to be positive all the time, but you will find that it’s a powerful place to be if you can learn to challenge the voice that always tears you down.
Over time, this gets easier to spot, as you become more accustomed to viewing your thoughts for what they really are. If you want to help this along, you may want to consider a journaling practice, or taking up online therapy that takes insurance, or simply talking things through with a friend. This can help untangle the noise, and that’s hugely powerful in achieving psychological balance.
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Set Boundaries
You have to be aware that your mental wellbeing doesn’t just exist in a vacuum. You are in a world with lots of other people, and you need to make sure that you are building relationships in a way that is beneficial for all, including yourself. Mental wellbeing depends a lot on how you manage your energy, and the main drain of energy will always be other people. For that reason, you have to learn how to set your boundaries clearly, firmly and with resolve. A lot of us find that difficult, but it’s important to do if you want to make sure that you are looking after yourself effectively. To set boundaries, you have to learn how to say no when you mean no. That in itself can be a challenge for a lot of us, but it’s amazing what it does for you when you learn to do it.
Just try to remember: this is not being selfish, it’s just about self-care. And it’s a vital part of making sure you are taking care of your mental health.
Build A Support Network
Just as other people can be a drain, they can be your main support, and most of us would be nothing without the people around us that we really need. It’s important that you build a support network if you want to take care of your mental wellbeing, because having even one or two people to talk to can help a lot. Don’t wait for a crisis to reach out – connection is a kind of maintenance, and you need to make sure you are doing all you can to keep up with it.
If you have enough support in place, you are going to find that you are much more able to look after your own mind too.
Those are the main things to consider when it comes to taking control of your mental wellbeing, so make sure that you are thinking about these in particular.
