Mentally Healthy

Mental health is a term that is so frequently connected with an illness label (e.g. bi-polar or depression) that we might have difficulty thinking about how to work on our mental health.  Just because you don't have a diagnosed mental illness does not automatically mean you are mentally healthy.  Like in our other spheres of being (physical, emotional, spiritual, or social) imbalances can interfere in our ability to function at the top of our game.  So, how would we know if we're mentally healthy?

Some signs of having good mental health include:

• Absence of worry
• Positive regard toward yourself and others
• Ability to be truthful in your dealings with others
• Ability to quickly calm yourself after a conflict or disagreement
• Being able to keep a positive attitude when thrown a curve you didn't expect.
• Ability to sort out what problems are yours and what are someone else's.

Often times the learned pathways our thinking takes us down greatly increases our stress.  For example, if we more easily imagine the worst result coming from a situation than we can imagine the best, we are likely increasing our heart rate, blood pressure, respiration rate, and anxiety level simply from that thinking.  Yet our imagination and our thinking alone do not a reality create. How we talk to ourselves has a tremendous effect on how we present ourselves to the public, how comfortable we feel in the presence of others, how confident we can be in any life situation.

Our social up-bringing and the life experiences we have gone through have often unconsciously shaped our mental health.  Because it's what we've always known or lived with, we may think we already have the best mental health we can get.  But, we do not have to be so many of the things people may have called us all our life -- things like shy, ugly, fat, obnoxious, difficult, perfectionist....   You can break out of those unfair and negative molds and rediscover an original you that is so much healthier and vibrant in life.

One aspect of health coaching I do includes assessing and helping you find course corrections/practices to improve how you think about and relate to yourself, other people in your lives, and the situations you face daily. Please call and we can talk about how your mental health is keeping you from being the person you want to be!