What is mental health? What is your current mental state?

What is mental health? It’s an important part of everyone's life. Taking care of mental health is more necessary than anything else. Unfortunately, many people ignore or do not recognize their current mental health status.

How is your mental state? Are you in a balanced and stable state? Let's find out with Soumaki in the article below.

What is mental health?

The World Health Organization (WHO) defines mental health as a combination of emotional, psychological, and spiritual well-being. How we make decisions, connect with others, and handle crises are all related to mental health.

In fact, mental health takes us further:

Shaping relationships and the world we live in
Strongly influencing the inner development of a person
Creating happiness or unhappiness for a family/group/community
Being the foundation for building a country's economy and society

Throughout life, many personal and societal factors can impact and protect or weaken our mental health, especially in sensitive developmental stages such as childhood. For example, harsh and punitive parenting can cause psychological damage to a child that lasts until adulthood.

In addition, biological factors such as substance abuse and genetics, as well as social circumstances such as poverty, violence, and inequality, also increase the risk of depression and mental illness.

What is your current mental state?

There are two basic mental states that are easy to recognize:

Stability: a stable and cheerful mental state. Awareness and handling of most situations in life. Able to withstand pressure and adapt to changes…

Instability: easily frustrated and disappointed with life. Overthinking, fear of change, and significantly reduced ability to self-control and handle pressure...

However, not everyone leans completely towards stability or instability. A person with stable mental health still experiences anxiety disorders. And a person who is constantly in a state of panic and lack of stability can still find moments of relaxation and peace.

The mental state from stability to instability and vice versa is a long road. On that road, many different milestones mark the emotional ups and downs between these two extremes. You are a traveler on the road. The milestone you reach in terms of mental state is not related to their order or distance, but directly related to what you are feeling inside.

It is important to recognize what mental state you are in. Because this can be a sign that helps you realize that you are rising and becoming more stable, or that you are falling and gradually losing control of yourself.

The correlation between mental and physical health

The impact of the mind on the body is as follows:

If you have good mental health, your ability to adapt to situations and pressures will be better. It helps reduce the risk of some diseases such as high blood pressure, diabetes, cardiovascular diseases... In addition, it also helps the body produce mood-enhancing hormones and push away negative thoughts...

If you have poor mental health, your physical health will be affected and weakened. This includes symptoms such as loss of appetite, weakened immune system, decreased muscle health, and slower metabolism...

In return, physical activity also has a substantial impact on mental health:

A study extracted from the UK Biobank showed that they surveyed and examined the physical and psychological health of over 150,000 candidates in 2009-2010. Seven years later, they conducted the test with the candidates again. The results showed that for those who are physically inactive, the rate of depression is 98% and the rate of anxiety disorders is over 60%

This study is deeper evidence of the close relationship between the mind and body. Both are closely correlated with each other. Nurturing and balancing both is the way to have a long, happy life.

How to nurture and improve mental health?

Below are some small tips from Soumaki on improving mental health, hoping to be helpful suggestions for you.

1. Practice introspection

The first thing to do to heal and nurture your soul is to turn inward. You need to confront your own negative emotions and acknowledge them. Because not only happiness, every emotion deserves to be respected.

Your anger, anxiety, fear, pain, trauma... also need your care, nurture, and transformation. Perhaps you have ignored these emotions for too long, to the point where they have accumulated into a huge mountain weighing on your soul.

Sit down with yourself, have a dialogue with yourself, and love yourself a little more. If sitting with yourself is too difficult, invite someone you trust to listen, be compassionate, and respect you to sit down with you.

Both of you breathe and talk. The condition of soul pain may not end immediately. But trust me, it is the beginning of the journey towards peace of mind not far away.

2. Accept differences

Sometimes, anxiety and tension often come from comparison. We constantly compare ourselves to others, compare people to people... This makes you gradually lose true awareness of yourself: your strengths, weaknesses, good, bad... of yourself.

Gradually learn to accept differences. Stop judging and comparing. At the same time, know how to respect yourself and others.

You may not completely stop comparing, but you can look at life with more tolerance and an open mind. This makes the spirit heal itself because at least you have stopped criticizing, resenting, and shaming yourself and others.

3. Physical exercise and balanced lifestyle

As mentioned above, physical and mental health always affect each other. Taking care of physical health is taking care of mental health and vice versa. Some physical activities you can do to improve your mental health:

Sit and breathe or meditate for 10-30 minutes
Walk around the house or in the park
Do warm-up exercises for 5-10 minutes in the morning, afternoon, and evening
Participate in fitness classes at centers (yoga, gym, zumba...)

Also, don't forget to prepare healthy meals and get enough sleep... to exercise and maintain a healthy lifestyle. If you need to find a place that provides healthy meals in Saigon, come to our healthy restaurant Soumaki.

Conclusion

The above article has answered in detail your question: What is mental health, and how to step by step nurture and care for your mental health. Turn inward to be more aware of your mental state and love your mental and physical health more.