Mental health is the overall wellness of how you think, regulate your feelings and behave.
Our mental health is one of the most important aspects of ourselves. When we are doing well mentally…
- We feel competent in our personal and work life.
- We realize that imperfection is human.
- We feel independent and connected.
- We can regulate our emotions.
- Our thoughts are clear, helpful and purposeful.
- We communicate with those we love in healthy ways.
- We nourish and exercise our bodies.
- We sleep 7-8 hours a night.
It is important to understand that wellness does not occur in a vacuum. It is the culmination of many things, it takes effort and affects many different aspects of your life.
One of the most effective tools I have encountered on my mental health journey, is mindfulness and meditation. The following are four key concepts that were game-changers for me:
- Brain science behind stress
- How to live in the present moment,
- I am not my thoughts
- There are no bad emotions
Once you understand and can embrace the previous concepts, life, work, and relationships become much easier. You can let go of so much unnecessary baggage.
Mindfulness alleviates so much unnecessary stress like time spent worrying about the future or past. It teaches us to understand how to manage our minds. It helps us to pay attention to the things that create more joy in our lives. It is the foundation for emotional intelligence and this has to be learned and practiced.
Project MIndful wants to positively affect as many people as possible and we believe that these stress management practices are extremely effective. We have already taught them in schools, churches, hospitals, and businesses. For the month of May, we are focusing on the workplace because for many people work is a big source of stress as this recent article states: https://local12.com/health/health-updates/survey-shows-workplace-stress-adding-up-still-not-easy-talk-about-office-mental-health-work-job-career-burnout-support-coach-counselors-human-resources
After all, we spend over 40+ hours a week there. Would it not be wonderful to have employers who valued the overall wellness of their employees? We can learn specific tools to help us manage stress in general so that we can thrive in the workplace and in our personal lives. Stress is inevitable so let’s learn how to manage it.
I invite you to begin this journey wherever you are. Mental health is delicate, it is uniquely your own. Take the steps toward wellness instead of illness. May you be healthy, may you be peaceful, may you accept yourself just as you are and may you find joy in the moment!