Filling Your Mental Wellness Toolkit

[Music] [Music] welcome back Richard it's good to see you this morning good morning good good day good morning good week good weekend yeah absolutely and and once again happy uh mental health awareness month we are spend this month talking about mental health mental Wellness um and we're going to continue that again today um you know the first couple weeks we've talked about um just some regular routines that people can do um to to make their lives a little bit more mentally healthy and we're going to continue that conversation today that's right this time of the year can be a challenge um interesting that they chose may I guess May and December maybe May December and January would be the graduations um the ending of another school year U all the end of school year activities and uh graduations and all the things that many families are going through at this time and it strains puts strains on your life and so um maybe maybe it's a good time to sit back step back and uh take another look at mental health so mental health May is mental health awareness month so that's right and when you think about mental health there's sort of these there sort of three things that you think about right you think about being able to manage and carry out your everyday activities that's right um you think about managing relationships and you think about managing stress because we all experience stress and and again we we've talked about stress before you know stress is a pretty we tend to think about it in in somewhat negative ways but stress is sort of an everyday life thing I mean there there's positive stress and there's negative stress but having healthy mental Wellness is all about managing that stress exactly right those are the three areas your day-to-day activities your relationships and being able to manage your stress um that really is foundational to a good mental health right and as it turns out the National Institutes of Health um NIH has developed a what they call a mental Wellness tool kit um probably a good thing to pack uh if you're leaving because contains very um very specific um detailed suggestions for improving and maintaining your mental health um and these include there there's there's six uh that they list and um we don't want to spend too much time on each one because you're going to get the idea we have actually three articles that we found that um that address um how to how to improve and maintain um Mental Health health and so this is the first of the three yeah and there's six in this one is build resilience yeah resilience me must you know resilience is the ability to bounce back from disappointment and we all experience disappointment at some point and at some level but resilience is the ability to keep going in the face of disappointment how do you collect the pieces and start to put Humpty Dumpty back together again right again okay absolutely and and you know it is something that we've talked about that begins in childhood you know you want your kids to experience some disappointment sometimes so that they can build that ability to uh bounce back that that resilience that we need to to recover from disappointment or or heartache or chall different challenges that we have so um so it's great that building resilience is the first on their on their list in this toolkit right you have it's it's essential that children um experience disappointment or loss or failure or something um when they're young and when they have support parental support Family Support to manage those disappointments you have to become resilient to overcome your disappointments absolutely the second of course is to reduce your stress um you do this by avoiding chronic stressors um and two of the ways that we talk about reducing it is through things like meditation or exercise or yoga anything that helps you get rid of some of that stress you're going to encounter stress it it doesn't matter who you are you're going to encounter some type of stress uh you have to learn how to rid your body of those stressors absolutely and the third is um is just getting quality sleep and again we talked about this in in previous podcast just the the importance of good quality sleep it helps not only does it help um manage chronic stress you know getting good good night's sleep helps you helps relieve stress um but it's just good for your overall overall health anyways right I'd like to I'd like to check the I don't know how you'd ever determin it how many people are taking sleep medications we we are a nation of poor sleepers uh we do not sleep well in this country kids don't adults don't the elderly don't no age group sleeps as much as we should uh we're notoriously bad sleepers and we really should address that yeah well not only are we not are we bad sleepers but we sort of um you know wear the badge you know we're very happy and we we you know somewhat braggadocious about uh uh being poor sleep I only got three hours sleep last night right thing yeah like it's a badge of onor you know no that's a problem that's like I only had six drinks up no no that's not a good thing right don't wear it as a badge of honor not getting enough sleep is a serious problem and we need to take it seriously absolutely and of course coping with loss you know we all experience loss but also the two things that I like about this is they talk about strengthening your social contacts number five is strengthening social contacts we talked about that uh in the past two podcasts about the importance of social interactions you remember um in the first podcast we talk about what what makes people really happy you know how do you define happiness one of them is with um improving your social interactions with with other people not online interactions but face-to-face interactions yeah that is to be more mindful be more thoughtful about the life that you really want to live right and organize yourself so that that's the life that you have don't don't let life pass you by yeah absolutely yeah number six in their list is is being Mindful and I think of all the things that of of all these things because you know all of these are really important and we encourage our patients that we work with um to to do all of these things but be mindful I think it's it's so underrated I I was just working with a patient yesterday about the importance of being mindful of where his mood and his symptoms are at any particular time that you know sometimes just and and he was able to provide some examples where over the last couple of weeks he he was just working to be mindful of how his mood was doing and what his what it was sort of contributing to his behaviors and just by noticing it it helped him regain some control and into eliminate what could have been some really negative um experiences and so just being mindful of where you are how you're thinking how your feeling can be can be extremely powerful in in helping with maintaining your good mental health yeah what what do you want your life to look like and make those things happen before we leave these six um I just want to add the note that with each of these six NIH provides specific things that you can do specific ways that you can improve these six things so if you're interested in taking a closer look I'd encourage you to to check this out it's from NIH free document and they give very very helpful very specific suggestions for improving each of the six right absolutely and and we'll have a link to to that toolkit in the in the show notes but as you mentioned there are three articles that really cap captured these topics today and the second is from the guardian and and the it offers that one offers 12 ways to improve so you know it's one of those things like we talked about with it makes me think of the U marriage um you know keys to a healthy marriage that we talked about a couple weeks months ago now um and one thing said there were 12 things another was six another was three there's 12 ways to improve mental health right and and guess what the first three are you know so one two and three are of course nutrition sleep and ex exercise absolutely no not surprisingly okay so when we tell you to redo your nutrition your sleep in your exercise please we're not the only ones advocating this um everybody says the same thing yeah four and five four and five are smoking and drinking okay stoping stop doing the things that are bad for you right six is social relationships stay connected your social relationships and we've discussed this over and over and over again so the first six the first half of this are topics that we've already covered before okay yeah absolutely seven yeah seven is interesting because it is something that um uh that that that we know is important and and is especially important for some people um is to get a pet and we know that you know we have this well actually over the past decade or so we had this influx of you know everybody wanting to have an emo support animal um and so we know that having a pet improves our mental well-being it it decreases stress and it helps us um you know relax and and cope better when we have a pet with us not only that but it gives you something else to think about you know if you have a pet you you even if they're fish you have to feed them and you have to clean the tank um but but a pet takes you a little bit out of yourself and gives you something else to think about and something else to focus rather than yourself because I think what happens to many people as we become isolated we begin to focus and you begin to notice every ache and every pain and every emotion and every depressive State and everything gets magnified but if you have a pet or two you're also thinking about them and so again thinking about something else is good for you and having something else or someone else to take care of is very good for everybody AB absolutely absolutely now number eight is um you know stress relievers you know just like we talked about before managing stress um but nine is to is to find a good work and personal life balance and and again you know it's it feels like this is something that we say sort of almost in passing like um you know hey we need to have a good work life balance but it's so critically important right so we we need to make sure that you know you're you're working you know we have this tendency you mentioned a minute ago as a country we are not very good sleepers well we're not very good at at life balance either we we tend to work much more and um you know engage in um you know good good personal time and making sure that we take vacations or we take time off or that when we leave work that we leave work at work you know that we go home and we spend time with family and in that personal life and so so yeah it's really important to have that good balance yeah um all of us are work um every anybody who's working today is probably working harder and more hours um I mean whether you're teaching or you're in health care um what we do what most people are doing is fairly exhausting and stressful and so you have to have some balance between your work life and your personal life and you can't just if you just focus on your work life you're going to stay in a stressful environment for too many hours per day whether you're productive or not you're going to be exposing yourself to a stressful environment and we know that's bad right and so you move to your personal life to start to relieve the stressors so you don't want your personal life to also be stressful I mean some people take vacations and they have to come back to work to relax and and to recover well then you're taking the wrong kind of vacation do the personal thing it's it's like when we talk about medic meditation not medication but meditation right you have to find what works for you what type of meditation works for you and it's the same with taking vacation time or downtime what really works for you many people they want to sit around and watch movies well if you're a person who needs to exercise to get rid of your stress then lying around watching movies isn't going to be your stress reliever so be mindful about the activities that you do that take you away from work and that really are relaxing and stress relieving absolutely and now I think we said that this I think I said that this article has 12 but this article actually has 10 um that list things on their on their list because the 10th one is to seek professional help and and I think that once again you can't overstate the importance of getting support if you need support you know certainly going back to number six was it was social relationships and lots of times we can deal with stress and we can manage things a little bit better if we are communicating and interacting with friends and and we have those social connections but when we're really struggling with something there is really nothing that nothing better than working with a professional who is trained and understands and and can help you work through the stressors or the issues that we experience in life um and so you know if some of these other things aren't helping and you're still feeling sort of mentally unwell um not necessarily that you have a mental illness or anything like that but that you're just feeling mentally unwell or overstressed or overwhelmed seek professional help and get the assistance that you need yeah what and you have to know when you need to consult with a professional um you can talk to your friends and and family members and other people but at some point you may want to consult with a professional if you're stuck if you just if you feel like you're really stuck and you can't get out of it seek professional help they they have lots of good advice absolutely now the third article the first article was from the National Institute of Health uh the second was from the guardian um Guardian Life and the third is from the National Institute of Mental Health um and this one many of them are the same suggestions and I guess that's sort of the point here is that no matter where you're pulling information from the recommendations are all pretty much the same whether it's the National Institute of Health um it's Guardian Life as like an insurance um company um the National Institute of Mental Health they're all sort of saying the same thing now National Institute of Mental Health adds a couple of other things that are worth noting um like um finding a relaxing activity um you know hobbies are so important and if that hobby also includes something that's or is also relaxing to you that's that's like sort of a a double whammy it's like a double double benefit you know and I I'll ask people I'll say well what do you really like you know people with anxiety or depression I'll say well what do you what do you really like to do what do you find really relax oh I love I love to fish when was the last time you went fishing um a long time ago they don't here's the activity you've already identified what helps you to relax what's good for your stress to relieve your stress and yet you don't make time to do it when we talk about being Mindful and being careful about your life planning things and organizing your life so that it works for you these are the kind of things we're talking about is if if you've already identified an activity is being relaxing then structure your life so you build that activity into it you're going to get stress reduction you're just going to feel better okay so so identify what the relaxing activities are but then make time in your schedule to do them absolutely and another recommendation that they add is to set goals and priorities and once again you know sometimes sometimes the stress that we feel is really um a feeling of being overwhelmed because we feel like we have so many things to do and and we don't really have things prioritized you know everything is sort of at the same level and many things in our life you know you should do a before you do B and so setting up priorities setting up goals so that you know what you need to accomplish what you want to accomplish in any particular time or any particular day and then after that so and to me what setting goals and priorities does is it just organizes your life just being organized can resolve and and relieve so much stress um so so you take a a list of all the things that you have to do and just take a moment and and prioritize things just so that you can get yourself organized right um I see so many people especially young people in their 20s and early 30s who haven't really set any specific goals or priorities um you know they say well I want to retire when I'm 50 or I want to do this or I want to travel I want to they have these sort of vague goals and things but they don't they don't structure their lives to achieve those goals when it comes to priorities yeah you should think about what you want to do those are those are some of your priorities you know these are the things that are important to me I want to spend time with family I want to spend time at the beach I want to spend time doing these things but there are also things that you should do and don't forget the shoulds okay you should exercise and you should eat more carefully and you should sleep better so put those in your priorities too not just what you want to do but what you should be doing to be mentally healthy right now every year around November the near the end of November we we in celebration of Thanksgiving we talk about being thankful and showing gratitude well as we say every year that that shouldn't be something that is restricted to that week of November so again something else on their list is showing and practicing gratitude being just a acknowledging what you have and what is going on around you so that you can be grateful and show that gratitude for what you have instead of focusing on what you don't have or what you need or what you're missing and that's very difficult to do in our culture right because because the message is you need more right you want more and you need more um I mean how many cappuccino makers do you really need do you I really struggle with this because I'm I'm grateful for what I have right I'm glad that I have more than one pair of shoes I'm glad that I can live in a house with air conditioning right could I live in a bigger house yes could I live in a more expensive house yes but I'm very grateful for the one that I have and I think we lose sight of that because the culture we live in is you need more and more and more and more and better and you should have more of everything that's the message that we're constantly being bombarded with and today you don't even have to look for things they come flying into your computer because of algorithms okay so you don't even have to search for what you want you're being told for what you want people who read this ordered this okay so the cornicopia is in front of you every day but every once in a while uh I would say daily step back and be grateful for what you have you know there are some religions where three times a day you thank God or somebody for the food that you're eating okay that's probably a good habit to develop is no it's not caviar but I'm grateful for the food that I do have okay and practicing gratitude expressing gratitude is another way to make it makes you feel better that you are happy with what you have and you're not lusting for something else or something more absolutely and and the last one that we'll mention that is sort of an addition on the on the National Institute of Mental Health list is um challenging your negative and unhelpful thoughts and and again something so important to do to to say think positively and to when you have those negative thoughts when you have those things that come to your mind that aren't really helpful that that really are just there hurting you making you feel bad or making you feel that stress and feeling overwhelmed challenge those push those away not try to not necessarily try to ignore them or try to distract yourself from them because you know sometimes that's helpful but other times challenge them by saying you know am I really lonely or am I really you know that bad off um you know does is it true that nobody likes me while at the same time your phone is ringing and somebody's calling you to to spend time with you it's you know challenge some of those negative thoughts and and face it with reality that you know no I do have people that love me people that want to spend time with me things that I want to do I have I have things that I need in in my uh life and again showing gratitude or thinking about gratitude will help with that but you got to challenge and get rid of that some of those negative and unhelpful thoughts right um students come in as there I don't want to do homework nobody wants to do homework there's a hundred other things yeah I don't want to go to work today of course you don't want to go to work today but you know that's how most of us feel most of the time but you can't dwell on I don't want to uh whatever it is uh think about the positives you have a job you get to go see people you get to go out and do things you make money so focus on the positive you can it's a choice you can focus on the positive or you can focus on the negative it's like gratitude you can be thankful for what you have or you can be sad and depressed for what you don't have that's entirely up to you absolutely so we reviewed three articles today um for the most part they all kind of say a very similar message and and we could we could have included many more um websites in in conversation today but when you when you kind of boil them all down you you you get to just a couple of things things that are really important and and that is stop doing the things that are bad for you know if you want to feel better if you want to have good mental health stop doing those things that are not good for you right then there's a long list you know smoking and drinking but also um stop worrying stop doing things you don't want to do if you really don't like to go to dinner parties then don't go to dinner parties okay you do have an option so do what you want to do if you want to spend more time with certain kinds of people spend more time with certain kinds of people but first of all stop doing what's bad for you okay right whether it's drugs or alcohol or or or being with people you don't like right doing what's bad for you right so if you stop doing what's bad for you the second thing is start doing what's good for you right you know focus on those things that are healthy those things that make you feel good and and focus on that things that relieve your stress things that make you feel more positive focus on those things instead of those negative things that's right um you know exercise meditation uh relaxing activities spending more time with people that you care about all those things are what you should be doing and how you should be spending more of your time those are the things that are good for you we know that we know what it we know what healthy mentally healthy activities look like and they look like exercise and meditation and social connectedness yeah good sleep and all those things so the the LA the third thing that's sort of this recurring theme right is is to just get yourself into a good healthy life Rhythm you know you know we we've talked many times before when it comes to sleep and things like that just getting into a good Rhythm so that your life is organized your life is Meaningful your life is put together so that you know what's coming you know what you need to do you know what's happening and so that predictability that um that organization that planning all of that helps relieve stress and it makes you feel more comfortable and less overwhelmed you know the longer I do this the more I think about body rhythms of and and I I think that there's something to that that the our bodies like rhythms um there are day the day night cycle for examp example okay that's a rhythm the sleep cycles are a rhythmic pattern our brain waves are rhythmic very characteristic highly organized um rhythmic activity in your brain and I think that our bodies and our brains like um rhythms that I go to sleep at about the same time that I wake up at about the same time I eat at about the same time um I exercise at about the same time and I think our I think our bodies want that um predictability that structure those rhythms and so many of us are just flying around sleeping when we can getting up when we have to uh rushing here rushing there you're probably overextended but think about building more rhythms into your life um and I and I think that that will I think that's what your brain wants I think it wants a rhythmic predictable um orderly life absolutely absolutely I think that that's what we've talked many times before our brain does what it is used to what it likes doing and and that once you get into an organized Rhythm your brain just wants to stick with that and wants to do that over and over again and so once you get into that um system once you get into that Rhythm then Things become much easier and much uh smoother for you so does I think that's really as I watch people and as I and I work with people uh people who have these people who don't have an organized life seem to struggle more yeah okay and and I think there's some connection so think about building predictability building a structure building a schedule into your life absolutely all right that is it for today uh we'll be back midweek with another uh podcast talking about mental wellness and um but until then stay happy stay healthy and forget to be afraid [Music]

Channel: The Mental Breakdown

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Id: 3eKvGf0Ofxc

Length: 28min 45sec (1725 seconds)

Published: Sun May 19 2024