By: Natalie L. Boehm, MBA, RBLP-T
What is Mental Health?
According to the World Health Organization, mental health is a state of mental well-being that enables people to cope with the stresses of life, realize their abilities, learn well and work well, and contribute to their community.
Practicing good mental health is essential in all parts of our lives. A healthy family structure is important to prevent trauma in children which can lead to mental health complications. Individuals with chronic illnesses or who are caring for a loved one with a chronic illness, need to work on maintaining good mental health to prevent burnout.
What is mental well-being?
Well-being is defined as the experience of health, happiness, and prosperity (Davis, 2024). There are five major types of well-being that as humans we need to focus on. Those five types are:
Emotional Well-Being: The ability to practice stress management and relaxation techniques, be resilient, boost self-love, and generate the emotions that lead to good feelings.
Physical Well-Being: The ability to improve the functioning of your body through healthy living and good exercise habits.
Social Well-Being: The ability to communicate, develop meaningful relationships with others, and maintain a support network that helps you overcome loneliness.
Workplace Well-Being: The ability to pursue your interests, values, and life purpose to gain meaning, happiness, and enrichment professionally.
Societal Well-Being: The ability to actively participate in a thriving community, culture, and environment.
(Davis, 2024)
Emotional Well-Being
According to the National Institute of Health, there are six important strategies to focus on to improve emotional wellness:
Build Resilience
People who are emotionally well can bounce back sooner than someone who is dealing with impaired mental wellness and/or trauma. Learning how to cope better with trauma and negative experiences helps to improve emotional wellness.
Reduce Stress
Learning to deal with stress is essential. We all deal with stress, but when it develops into chronic stress, complications come into place that can affect our overall well-being. Exercising, socializing with friends, journaling, meditation, and yoga are just a few of the many ways you can reduce stress and maintain good well-being.
Get Quality Sleep
Mayo Clinic advises that adults get seven or more hours of sleep per night. If you are experiencing insomnia or interruptions in your sleep cycle, it can lead to sleep deprivation. Poor sleep habits can cause weight gain, having a body mass index greater than 30, diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, stroke, and depression (Olson, 2023).
Strengthen Social Connections
Social connections are important for us as humans. For some, it can be challenging to find new friendships, have a relationship with someone, or be able to spend time with family. According to the Centers for Disease and Control points out the benefits of social connections. Individuals who have good social connections often have less stress, better sleep, and a longer and healthier life (CDC, 2024).
Common barriers that can prevent us from connecting with others can be too much screen time, feeling isolated, high stress due to a situation like divorce, or dealing with a chronic illness. The important thing is to recognize those barriers and take simple steps to remove those barriers.
The CDC recommends the following for making social connections:
- Spend more quality time with family and friends
- Spend time with others in nature
- Express gratitude to others
- Volunteer with a group or organization
- Get involved in your community
- Get to know your neighbors
- Join a community garden
(CDC, 2024)
Finding ways to connect to others and establish healthy relationships. If you find yourself in a toxic situation, it is ok to set boundaries or walk away from the situation. Your well-being comes first.
Cope with Loss
Coping with a loss causes one to grieve. The American Psychological Association defines grief as the anguish experienced after significant loss, usually due to the death of a beloved person. Symptoms of grief can include physiological distress, separation anxiety, confusion, yearning, obsessive dwelling on the past, and apprehension about the future (APA, 2024).
To ensure that we maintain good mental health and well-being, as humans we have to allow ourselves to grieve. Forbes Health recommends the following ways to deal with grief:
Give yourself permission to grieve: Hiding the pain of losing someone can have a negative impact on overall health. Allow yourself to look back on special memories, to cry knowing that they are gone, and don’t feel embarrassed or ashamed for taking the steps to heal.
Find an outlet for your feelings: Whether it is seeing a therapist, keeping a journal, or painting, find a way to alleviate your pain and work towards acceptance.
Prioritize self-care: It is important to focus on your overall well-being when dealing with grief. Eating right, exercising, and sleeping well, are just a few of the basics one must follow when healing from loss.
Practice mindfulness and meditation: meditation is a great way to alleviate stress and focus on inner healing when dealing with loss.
Seek support: having a support system is important when one is grieving. No one should feel alone or isolated. Support groups are a great resource for grieving. Seeing a therapist is beneficial as well. It is important to take these steps and not become overwhelmed due to loss.
Be Mindful
The Greater Good Science Center at the University of California at Berkley states that mindfulness means to maintain a moment-by-moment awareness of thoughts, feelings, bodily sensations, and surrounding environment, through a gentle, nurturing lens.
To be mindful, we need to live in the moment and be aware of others. We need to be able to show empathy, not be judgmental, have compassion, and treat others as we would want to be treated. By working on being kind to ourselves, we can focus on being kind to others.
Here are some of the benefits of practicing mindfulness:
- Strengthening of the immune system
- Increase positive emotions and reduce stress
- Increase the density of gray matter in the brain (linked to learning, memory, emotional regulation, empathy)
- Increases focus, attention skills, decision-making
- Ability to show compassion and practice self-compassion
- Create resilience
By focusing on ourselves and our environments, we can use skills and tools to help us reach our goals. Meditation, cognitive therapy, emotional intelligence, and stress reduction programs are just a few tools that one can use.
Physical Well-Being
Physical well-being has a major impact on our overall health. When our physical well-being is in decline, our emotional and mental health declines. Establishing good habits to ensure physical well-being is essential. Areas to focus on are:
- Maintaining good nutritional habits
- Following a regular exercise schedule
- Getting enough sleep
- Staying hydrated
- Drinking in moderation
(Stevenson, 2021)
When it comes to physical well-being, we need to take responsibility, despite our challenges. Our bodies are all unique despite all being human. For some, achieving physical well-being can be challenging due to chronic illness or socioeconomic status. Despite challenges, we need to practice self-love and set goals for physical well-being. Setting reasonable goals to achieve physical well-being such as losing weight, getting better sleep, and reducing alcohol intake, can have a positive impact. Removing toxicity from our lives also helps. At the end of the day, you have to do what is best for you.
Social Well-Being
Social well-being is the ability to communicate, develop meaningful relationships with others, and maintain a support network that helps you overcome loneliness.
The National Institute of Health recommends focusing on six strategies to improve your social health:
Make connections: make time for family and friends. Join social groups to create social connections and establish relationships. Maintaining healthy relationships can help to improve our health and longevity.
Getting active together: being physically active is important. Having friends and others to support you and help you achieve physical wellness improves not just your physical wellness, but your social and emotional wellness.
Shape your family’s health habits: balancing wellness is challenging enough for us as adults. As parents, it’s even more challenging. It is important to establish healthy habits and teach your children to have the same healthy habits. Establishing healthy habits early leads to better overall health for your children long-term.
Bond with your children: It is important for us to be available for our children. By establishing a healthy bond, we help our children to learn to regulate their emotions, and establish self-confidence and self-esteem. It increases the chances of them succeeding with their life goals and having a good quality of life.
Workplace Well-Being
Michigan State University defines workplace well-being as any combination of holistic workplace characteristics that support healthy behavior in the workplace, improve health outcomes, and strengthen workplace culture.
In many studies, you hear about the importance of the culture of a company. Leaders are showing what their company is striving for. What is not talked about is the climate their employees are working in. Because of that, many employees experience burnout, microaggression, and discrimination in the workplace. The result is a lack of trust between employees and leaders, many believe that their job is nothing more than a paycheck, and high turnover occurs, resulting in many potential employees moving on for better opportunities.
It is important to focus on mental health if you are in this situation. In the article, If You’re Burning Out, Carve a New Path, employees who are chronically bored and not given the chance to grow, are at higher risk for drug addiction, alcoholism, and compulsive gambling. It also puts them at high risk for burnout.
Job crafting is a way to help reduce burnout. Job crafting is defined as a means of describing the way in which employees utilize opportunities to customize their jobs by actively changing their tasks and interactions with others at work (Moss, 2020).
The purpose of job crafting is to continue to do the same work, but have a different outlook towards our position, what is the purpose, and how do we get more meaning out of our career (Moss, 2020). Rather than looking at their career as a position on paper, how does one create impact? What positivity can they create for their team? What can they do to grow and expand their skills?
At the end of the day, you have to do things that create happiness for you in the workforce. Work to establish trust with your supervisor or if you are in a leadership position, with your team. Find ways to alleviate stress in the workforce and create a welcoming environment. If you are in a toxic environment, work towards leaving that toxic environment and focus on your overall well-being. As scary as change can be, sometimes it is in the best interest.
Societal Well-Being
It is important as a society to focus on the overall well-being of citizens. Important factors are social, economic, and environmental conditions that help to produce a thriving economy, quality of life, and sustainability.
The World Health Organization and its participants are focusing on the following five areas to promote societal well-being:
- Designing an equitable economy that serves human development within planetary boundaries
- Create public policy for the common good
- Achieve universal health coverage
- Address the digital transformation to counteract harm and disempowerment and to strengthen the benefits
- Value and preserve the planet
These goals are so important, yet so many are not being pursued by leaders. As a society, we need to advocate for each other despite the challenges we face due to unethical actions. We are seeing in society at a global level the complications we face ahead. One person cannot create change, but as a society, we can create change for the better.
Complications with Mental Health
The biggest complication with mental health is the lack of access to it. For many, insurance companies will not cover mental health care. It comes down to that funding cannot be made off of mental health, unlike pharmaceuticals. Because of that, many end up paying out of pocket for care, resulting in the most vulnerable not having access to the care they need.
In the article, Barriers to healthcare access among U.S. adults with mental health challenges: A population-based study, more than half of the individuals in the study reported affordability-related barriers to accessing healthcare. Due to this, short-term insurance companies feel they are saving money. Long-term, it creates more complications for the person, resulting in additional complications to their health, resulting in higher costs.
Making sure people have access to mental health care results in individuals reducing stress, making better choices, and having a support system, which can help them improve their quality of life.
Negative consequences of lack of mental health care can be self-medication, self-harm, and suicide. Due to this, it is important to find resources for those who are in need of mental health care.
Resources to help improve mental health
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention provides information on resources for mental support. Resources for people in crisis, survivors of abuse, resources for the LGBTQ+ community, the elderly, and veterans are available at the following link:
https://www.cdc.gov/mentalhealth/tools-resources/index.htm
The National Institute of Mental Health also provides the same information along with resources to help in seeking medical attention, federal resources to help those seeking mental health care, and national organizations that advocate for mental health care. Information on insurance companies, resources through state and local agencies, university programs, and employee assistance is also available through this link:
https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/find-help
Conclusion
Mental health is just as important as our physical health. There are many components of mental health that affect us as humans on multiple levels that have an impact on ourselves as well as society. It is essential to understand the different levels of well-being and to seek help when needed.
Resources:
American Psychological Association (2024). Grief. American Psychological Association. Retrieved from: https://www.apa.org/topics/grief/
Centers for Disease and Control and Prevention (2024). Improving Social Connections. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Retrieved from: https://www.cdc.gov/social-connectedness/improving/index.html
Centers for Disease and Control and Prevention (2023). Resources for Help and Support. Centers for Disease and Control and Prevention, Mental Health. Retrieved from: https://www.cdc.gov/mentalhealth/tools-resources/index.htm
Coombs, N. C., Meriwether, W. E., Caringi, J., & Newcomer, S. R. (2021). Barriers to healthcare access among U.S. adults with mental health challenges: A population-based study. SSM – population health, 15, 100847. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssmph.2021.100847
Davis, T. (2024). What is Well-Being? Definition, Types, and Well-Being Skills. Psychology Today. Retrieved from: https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/click-here-for-happiness/201901/what-is-well-being-definition-types-and-well-being-skills
Duszynski-Goodman, L. and Verhulst, O. (2024). How to Death with Grief: What Experts Say. Forbes Health. Retrieved from: https://www.forbes.com/health/mind/dealing-with-grief/
Greater Good Science Center (n.d.) Mindfulness Defined, What is Mindfulness? Greater Good Science Center, University of California at Berkeley. Retrieved from: https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/topic/mindfulness/definition
Greater Good Science Center (n.d.) Mindfulness Defined, Why Practice It? Greater Good Science Center, University of California at Berkeley. Retrieved from: https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/topic/mindfulness/definition#why-practice-mindfulness
Michigan State University (n.d.). What is Workplace Well-Being? Michigan State University. Retrieved from: https://workplace.msu.edu/what-is-workplace-well-being/
Moss, J. (2020). If You’re Burning Out, Carve a New Path. Harvard Business Review. Retrieved from: https://hbr.org/2020/04/if-youre-burning-out-carve-a-new-path
National Institute of Health (n.d.). Your Healthiest Self, Emotional Wellness Toolkit. National Institute of Health, US Department of Health & Human Services. Retrieved from: https://www.nih.gov/health-information/emotional-wellness-toolkit
National Institute of Mental Health (2024). Help for Mental Illnesses. National Institute of Mental Health. Retrieved from: https://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/find-help
Olson, E.J. (2023). How many hours of sleep are enough for good health? Mayo Clinic. Retrieved from: https://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-lifestyle/adult-health/expert-answers/how-many-hours-of-sleep-are-enough/faq-20057898
Stevenson, M. (2021). Physical well-being and health: What it is and how to achieve it. Better Up. Retrieved from: https://www.betterup.com/blog/physical-well-being-and-health-what-it-is-and-how-to-achieve-it
World Health Organization (2022). Mental Health. World Health Organization. Retrieved from: https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/mental-health-strengthening-our-response
World Health Organization (n.d.). Promoting well-being. World Health Organization. Retrieved from: https://www.who.int/activities/promoting-well-being
