Mental Wellness: A Necessary Counterbalance To Physical Well-being

September 29, 2014

Mental health is generally defined the absence of mental sickness. But mental wellness goes further. Mental health can be considered a scale. At bottom, diseases like depression and anxiety don’t just exist, they debilitate the person, perhaps even making them unable to work. At best mental wellness is what we strive for. It’s a state of calm, alertness, a way of engaging very deeply in the present. A way of being self-aware, self-understanding, and self-forgiving, so that a healthy balance can be maintained in all areas of life. At its very essence, mental wellness cannot be separated from physical and spiritual wellness. The three must work together to produce the very concept of wellness. Mental wellness can also be defined as the state of being self-aware, self-understanding, and self-forgiving, so that a healthy balance can be maintained in all areas of life. In this article, we look at the subject of mental wellness in detail: why it is important, its constituents, how to achieve mental wellness, its benefits, and the effects of not having mental wellness.

Mental wellness: An overview
Mental wellness is a way of achieving your true potential. It’s about living a rich and fulfilling life, without getting caught up in the headaches and stresses of twenty-first century living.

There are several reasons why you should make mental wellness a top priority:

Healthy life: Mental wellness is crucial to living a long and healthy life. Good mental health is known to enhance and improve other forms of health. Poor mental health will result in a more stressful life and makes you more susceptible to a weakened immune system, which can make you susceptible to the cold, flu, and mononucleosis (EPV), as well as a range of other chronic diseases and disorders.

Stress management: Research shows that emotional health, and the emotional intelligence needed to handle stressful situations is key for good stress management. A number of psychological studies have found that people who lack emotional expression or who have insufficient outlets to express them resort to antisocial behaviors. These behaviors are a direct reflection of their mental health. Self-destructive acts may take place to suppress emotions. Some of these acts include drug and alcohol abuse, physical fights, or vandalism.

Mental health: Mental wellness will help keep mental health disorders at bay. Poor mental wellness is associated with adverse health behaviors, dissatisfaction with life, and certain disabilities. By constructing your life so that you have many emotional supports, such as friends, family, balance, good diet and exercise, your health can improve and you can prevent mental health disorders. Support systems are a valuable asset and those, who do not have social and emotional support, are more likely to be affected by disorders.

Stability: Mental wellness can lead to an increased personal competence, perceived control, sense of stability, and recognition of self-worth and can have a positive effect on quality of life.

The ingredients of mental well-being
Several identified factors contribute towards mental wellness. Here, we will look at five factors that are involved in the equation of mental wellness. First, we can adopt the following equation for mental wellness: Mental wellness = self-appreciation + resilience + affiliation + negotiation + mental and physical exercise. Let us look at each element of mental wellness:

Self-appreciation: This is the ability to assess both our strengths and weaknesses and to appreciate our unique and individual contributions. Each one of us is unique. Nobody is like the other in all ways. Sometimes we may look at others as being better equipped than we are in particular aspects and we may feel insignificant. This leads to a lack of self-esteem or a low level of self-appreciation.

Resilience: Resilience is the ability of one to deal with, recover from, or overcome hard situations to which we are exposed. Resilience enables us to “bounce forward” from hardship, misfortune, change, or shock.

Affiliation: We embrace affiliation if we can allow ourselves to get close to other people. It is the ability to negotiate give-and-take alliances and friendships and build mutually supportive social networks.

Negotiation: This is the ability to actually accept that we may not have all the answers to a particular situation. The principle of negotiation allows us to learn from others, from experience, and alter our beliefs based on new data.

Mental and physical exercise: This is a primary constituent of mental wellness. We should be able to exercise our brain and our body to achieve mental, as well as physical well-being.

Benefits
Mental wellness relieves anxiety and stress; it brings calm and prevents the chance of developing anxiety and stress. In case you are stressed, you can receive emotional support to boost your mental wellness. Other research has also shown that mental wellness calms the stomach. It also improves immune system. Having a balanced mind that is free from disorders and stress free has several benefits:

Productivity: Unlike those with poor mental wellness, people with mental wellness are able to concentrate on the current tasks and thereby achieve more while studying, researching, etc.

Blood pressure: Research shows that people with mental wellness are less likely to have high blood pressure.

Heart rate: When you are at peace or your mind is calm, the heart rate tends to slow down.

Remedies
Brain exercises are crucial for promoting mental wellness. There are various activities that can help in keeping your brain active all the time. Brain exercises vary a lot. Here we look at five of the best brain exercises you can always use to enhance your mental wellness:

Meditation: This is the art emptying and calming your mind, freeing it of worry. Meditation is about creating enough mental space to be able to see situations calmly, without getting caught up in their emotion. When you meditate, you are invariably exercising your brain for greater efficiency.

Reading: People with good reading habits keep their brain active and alive all the time. When you engage in constant reading, your brain is always busy figuring out the meaning of what you are reading and your level of understanding is normally improved.

Writing: You will always get your brain properly exercised through writing. Creative writing is a great way to figure out how to understand and express yourself and stretch your imagination. Journaling or keeping a diary can also help you turn on your creative side while turning emotion into a story, helping you let go any emotions that you are bottling up inside.

Researching: You can get your brain equally exercised by engaging in research activities. Your brain is always very active and alive when you are researching a particular topic. Whether you do it in the library or over the internet, your brain is always at work when you carry out any form of research.

Brain stimulation: Stimulation is the process of arousing your brain to tackle difficult issues successfully. You can use brain teasers, solve game puzzles, mathematical problems, or crosswords, to achieve the stimulation process. You can also solve game puzzles and mathematical problems in order to stimulate your brain. You can achieve greater results if you make the exercises part of your daily life. As you perform these mental exercises, make sure you exercise your physical body too. You also need to eat well in order to keep your brain alive and active all the time.

Lacking mental wellness: Consequences
If you lack mental wellness, it will spill into other aspects of your life too. Here, we look at some of these effects.

Antisocial behaviors: People who lack emotional health and bottle up their emotions may have antisocial behaviors, such as anger management issues or violence against the self or others.

Self-destructive acts: These may take be a way of coping with pent up emotions or mental trauma that has not been fully resolved. Some of these acts include drug and alcohol abuse, physical fights, or vandalism. Mental instability and depression can also cause people to take tragic actions, including committing suicide.

Dissatisfaction with life: Inadequate social and emotional support is a major barrier to health, and affects treatment of mental illness. If you are dissatisfied with your own life, it can cause you to suffer from anxiety and depression.

Conclusion
Mental wellness is crucial for the well-being of the whole self. It is good for the physical health of the body, and strengthening the immune system. It helps achieve a balanced and positive way of being. It affects our emotions, our relationships and our spiritual health. Be good to yourself, take care of your mental health and well-being.