May is Mental Health Awareness Month!

We have made such great strides in mental health awareness, but we still have a long way to go. Let’s take some time to focus our energy on how we can either start or continue our own mental health journey.

There are really three main foci that guide my path:

Reflect & learn.

While we live in an age of endless resources for learning, it can be very challenging to know where to even begin!

LEARN ABOUT YOURSELF:

The key is to narrow it down to what YOU are experiencing and learn more about that. This is where digging into your own mind is particularly useful. Daily or consistent journaling can bring things to the surface that otherwise would just seem muddled in with everything else running through your brain.

As you journal, ask yourself things like: What common themes keep popping up? What issues are sending me for a loop? What struggles are struggles I just can’t seem to get a grasp on?

This is where you could even ask friends, partners, or trusted coworkers to weigh in. They might have some insights based on what you have been sharing with them too.

FIND A THERAPIST:

My most basic and impactful recommendation would be to find a therapist, but I’m aware of the accessibility issues that can come into play with therapy. Additionally, as I said before, many people still have some block towards going to therapy and need to find other ways to start the journey.

Think about what avenues are accessible to you. Do you like reading? What format do you like best? websites, a physical book, audiobooks…choose what you are most comfortable with.

Do you prefer the more conversational approach to learning? There are SO MANY podcasts out there now. Start searching and listen to an episode or two to figure out if it’s for you. The great thing about podcasts is they often have guests that are experts and authors themselves…therefore you end up getting recommendations for additional resources.

USE SOCIAL MEDIA:

Some podcasts I could recommend are Glennon Doyle’s We Can Do Hard Things, Jay Shetty’s On Purpose, and The Man Enough podcast Jamey Heath, Justin Baldoni, and Liz Plank. These three podcasts talk a lot about mental health and the intersectionalities of it. Additionally, the guests they have on are a great jumping off point for more resources on mental health. Use the episode names and descriptions to find topics that pinpoint the issues YOU care about or experience.

An even easier approach would be to start adding creators who advocate for and provide information about mental health. There are a lot of options on Social Media and once you start following a couple of creators and adding likes to videos about mental health, the algorithm will start sending more things your way.

A NOTE OF CAUTION: You are an individual. While learning about mental health is the direction in which we want to start moving, please keep in mind your own individuality and intersectionality. Instead of going in thinking, this person has all of the answers, go in with an open, but analytical mind. How does this apply to me? What part of this can I use? What part of this doesn’t quite fit?

Explore & Practice

I realize that my “note of caution” leads directly into my next point – how convenient ;). The act of exploration and practice has been pivotal in my own mental health journey.

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EXPERIMENT & CHECK IN WITH YOURSELF:

Keep learning. Keep exploring different creators, authors, resources, and approaches. Lean into your own intuition. Notice what you like. Notice what you don’t like. Find more of the former and less of the latter.

For example, I leaned into the fact that I’m an extremely sensory person. I knew this to be the case with sound already, but I hadn’t realized that I was also sensitive in regard to the feel and texture of things.

Let me be more specific. I know that loud, noisy spaces can really drain my energy and put me on edge. Therefore, making space for quiet or putting gentle, meditative music in my ears can help counter the effect. I never leave my house without a set of earplugs now 😉

When it came to touch, I started to notice that I really like the feel of a super soft, cozy blanket. The level of comfort and safety it brings me is something that I decided to stop ignoring or writing off because, “I’m a grown up now.” Instead, I’ve added one to my bedroom and when I am traveling I always take one with me.

CONNECT WITH YOURSELF:

Identifying ways that I can connect with my senses in order to bring calm or joy has been a simple way to help regulate my nervous system, which is part of taking care of your mental health.

So, pay attention to what makes you comfortable and uncomfortable…but analyze it. Am I uncomfortable because this is simply new? Is my brain sending out warning signals just because it wants to stay “comfortable” with what it knows?

At the risk of sounding like a broken record, consistent journaling can be helpful here too. Writing and reflecting would be a way of keeping track of all of these things and can provide you with a way to get a larger, more comprehensive view of the entire journey.

Go slow & reassess.

This.

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SLOW DOWN:

This has been THE HARDEST part of my mental health journey. It’s probably because “going slow” is at such odds with the pace of our world today, but man, slowing down has been the achilles heel of this process.

I resigned from teaching over 6 months ago, and I STILL fight the urge to DO, DO, DO. “I should do this. I should be doing that. I should have been able to… Maybe I should…”

I call it getting stuck in a “should” tornado. I’ve heard other people say, “Stop shoulding yourself.” Either way, shutting off the noise or reducing the outside pressure to produce, engage, participate, and overextend has been SUPER challenging.

Even seeking information about mental health and the learning process can quickly and sneakily step into that space of DOING. “I must be reading a book, or listening to podcasts, or writing, writing, writing in order to PROVE that I’m working on something.”

Oof.

The only real hack I’ve found to fight this is SCHEDULING in rest. Rest doesn’t have to mean sleeping – either with early bedtimes or naps. Rest can mean doing a puzzle, reading a book (for FUN!), taking a walk, sitting outside in the sunshine, browsing Target (if that’s your jam), or even petting your animals.

BE MINDFUL:

Again, this is where YOU remain the CENTER of this process. Pay attention to what types of activities make you FEEL RESTED. You might be surprised that what you thought was giving you rest was actually not helping you feel more rested afterward.

Scrolling social media is a good example of this for me. I would scroll – especially if I was feeling overwhelmed – as a way to cope…but ultimately I would end up feeling more drained and even more emotionally confused afterward.

SET BOUNDARIES:

Set boundaries FOR YOURSELF! Speaking of social media, I put limits on my own phone so that I would have to work harder to access these apps after 30 minutes. It’s not that I can’t simply override them, but the notifications that pop up are just the reminder that I need to be done.

Think of this part as reparenting. Loving and honoring yourself in ways that build you up and give your body what it needs…what it’s craving. This can take the form of nutrition, movement, play, alone time, or social outings.

The point is that SLOWING DOWN helps you hear your body and identify your needs more clearly. Without slowing down, all of these vital messages are missed and with them the opportunity to give your body what it needs; to build trust with yourself.

You matter.

Through all three of these “simple” approaches, hold tightly to the truth that YOU MATTER. YOU must be the center of all of this. This is not selfishness, this is not self-centeredness.

Improving mental health is about relearning and reconnecting with you. Identifying more closely your needs and how to meet them.

Love yourself through this process.

Talk soon, friend.