The Importance of Mental Health
Mental Health is something that impacts all the aspects of our lives in very significant ways, be it our job, our marriage, our family, or just our well-being in general. Mental health issues can make one’s daily life difficult and even basic work assignments can end up being stressful. Mental health issues can also affect your physical health. Like, for example, chronic anxiety and stress can have an adverse impact on the health of your heart, or lead to high blood pressure.
Mental health issues are nothing to panic about if you’re experiencing a few issues yourself, because everyone goes through their own time of depression or anxiety or stress, which if left unattended, can reach to a point when even day-to-day life seams like a battle or a struggle. Hence, it is extremely important that we take care of our mental health especially through the lockdown and pandemic, when we can’t physically meet our close ones to vent out feelings.
7 Tips to boost your mental health
Here are a few effective tips on how you can take care of and improve your mental health through the lockdown. Let’s get started!
Put a check on Daily News Consumption-
It is definitely important to stay informed but sometimes watching the news continuously can cause too much stress. Keeping your eyes on the 24-hour news cycle can be really depressing, disturbing, and result in serious anxiety. Hence, the best way is to schedule a specific time for watching the news, just to gather all the basic and necessary information and updates that you need to know, and simply turn the news off.
Now focus on watching something fun and less stressful. Watch a Netflix series or a DVD, anything. The main aim here will be to not overload your mind with news, especially news that is negative and trigger anxiety. Give your mind a break and just have fun and relax.
Take care of your Physical Health-
Physical Health and Mental Health go hand-in-hand. They compliment and supplement each other in as many ways as possible. If you want to protect your mental health, you have to take care of your physical health.
No one is in the right state of mind with a fever even if they have all the happiness in life. Hence, stay healthy and develop healthy lifestyle practices like discarding junk food, eating healthy meals, getting sufficient sleep, exercising regularly, avoiding excessive Alcohol intake, and taking prescribed medicines, if any, on time.
Communicate and talk to other People-
Social Distancing has forced us to stay home and barred us from meeting our friends, relatives, cousins, colleagues, classmates, and that is just the way things are now. But that definitely doesn’t mean that you can’t stay in touch with them or have a chat once in a while. Speaking to someone always helps.
If you just need to hear a familiar voice, call your friends. Talk to the people you trust about what you’re feeling. Letting out and expressing feelings and thoughts clearly helps reduce stress and calm the mind. If you feel that you want to see a familiar face, what are WhatsApp, Zoom, Google Meet, Skype, Zoom, and Snapchat for? Reconnecting with friends may act as a healing therapy. You may also end up knowing that even some of your friends are facing the same stress issues as you are, and realising that you’re not alone in this can help you a lot.
Consult a Certified Counsellor-
Professional help is always a good option. You will find several qualified and certified mental health counsellors both online and offline who can help you out and help you manage your stress levels. Even if the physical offices are closed, you will be able to meet and interact with your counsellor virtually, online. Remember that different people respond to stress in different ways.
Hence, it will be best if you can list down all the things you’re experiencing due to stress, before you sit down for your consultation. List down things that worry you, things that trigger you, behavioural patterns that are unlikely of you, physical changes, sleep patterns, and more.
Do what you love, practice your hobbies-
Sometimes, stress makes us allow time to just pass away, while we forget using that time to do things that we love. Make a list of all the things you love to do, and make a plan on how and when, throughout week or month, you can find the time to do all the things you love to do.
Whatever you love to do, just remember to practice social distancing and stay safe at home. If you list down carefully, you will definitely find several things to do even while you stay indoors. Meet your friends virtually, read a book, paint a wall, bake a cake, do anything that you feel happy doing, while staying safe.
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Try Meditation-
Meditation works as a wonder when it comes to relaxing and calming both your mind and body. All you will need to do is to sit comfortably, somewhere quiet, and keep the mind open. You can easily go online and find loads of information and see the different types of meditation practices that help calm the mind and body and you can choose the methods that you think will suit you best.
The you start meditating, you will not get immediate results. It is about practice and consistency, and shows results with time. Meditation will help relive your mind and body from stress, give our mind the active consciousness to find ways to manage your stress effectively, reduce negative emotions, behaviours, thoughts, or even attitude, nourish creative thoughts and imaginations, boost patience, and dedicate unbiased focus on things that are important.
Don’t take social media too seriously-
It is important that you get in touch with people and talk to other people, and to us, the only answer to communication with other people is either Facebook, or WhatsApp, or Instagram. Social media platforms definitely bring a wide range of advantages to the table. But like any other digital platform, social media platforms also come with its own set of cons. Not everything on the social media is true, yet the content we see on social media, somehow creates a serious and long-term impact on our minds.
There are many people online who may spread and circulate information that is misleading or false, and we tend to believe anything and everything we see online without even looking at the real facts or trying to find out whether the information is authentic. Avoid relying on social media to find and get any kind of information related to COVID. Keep social media aside for solely entertainment and promotional purposes, and rely on authentic official sources where they share real-time information and statistics related to COVID.
LASCO Medicare is by your side.
We understand and also highlight the importance of keeping our community safe from COVID-19 and hence, we encourage you to do your part. If you are experiencing any symptoms such as chills, fever or shortness of breath, find a Diagnostic Centre In Howrah, a RT-PCR test lab, or a Covid 19 test lab near you and get yourself tested immediately. In case you test negative, go in to Pathology Labs for Blood Tests, to help diagnose other ailments.
