Wednesday, March 16, 2016

Mental Health In Other Words

Mental health is often mistaken for mental illness, although the two conditions are worlds apart. However, mental health is not something one has, or was born with, it has to be carefully nurtured. And nurturing is no possible until one understands that mental health, or wellness as some think of it as an overall part of their physical well being, which it is, is not a static condition. In fact, you can be mentally healthy one day and not so mentally healthy the next day. It all has to do with how well you know yourself and your thoughts. You must get in the habit of reading your mind and leaving the file open at all times. When you find errors or ways of thinking in yourself that if found in others you would classify as unhealthy, you must bookmark that page and determine to learn more about the reasoning behind your thinking.

Learn to be truthful about your thoughts. You don't necessarily have to admit this to others, but you must never be false to yourself. How absurd, you may be thinking, how can you be false to yourself? We do it all the time! We like to think we are on top of every situation but are we? We may have only picked up a few basic attitudes and have clung to them for years. What are some of the phony messages you may have claimed as your own?

(My mother never raised me that way) Poor mom, she may or may not have raised you that way, but as an adult and one supposedly knows right from wrong, why should you make her your scapegoat? Can't you think for yourself? It's a shame that too many people grow up in body and leave their mind back in yesterday. At the age of reasoning, you are supposed to take control of your own thoughts and while this is thought to be at the beginning of puberty, it often takes far more time than this. But any age is never too late to begin the process of taking charge of your own thinking. A mentally healthy person will, at some time in their journey onward, stop blaming all their shortcomings on their parents. They will have understood by that time that their parents too were only reacting to the pressures of their time and had they known better, or been taught better, they would have done better. Whether this is true or not, it's at least an honest answer to something unknown. It's simply another wrong belief one can throw out as one lives day by day doing the best they can do with the tools God gave them to work with.

Wellness is another word the professionals like to throw around when describing the opposite of illness. Generally it is used in connection with physical health, but truthfully, it must be accompanied with mental health. The body cannot be separated. A person's mind has a tremendous influence over bodily health. A mind in good shape understands that to go through life pain free is impossible. Pain often is a good thing. It's your seeing eye dog alerting you that something is wrong. Your first response, whether to call an ambulance, or whether to lie down and rest, or try an over-the-counter remedy--depending on the seriousness of the condition--will depend on how well acquainted you are with your innermost being. You will begin to question yourself, has this happened before, if so, what caused it, what did I do this time to bring on this condition, etc.

You see, mental health is an ongoing thing. Some days your are farther along the road to a  good understanding of yourself and the next day, like sunshine and rain, the situation changes. With your mind still in good working condition, although clouds seem to block most of the good feelings of yesterday, you reason that this is normal and although you accomplish less, there will be better times ahead. Although, philosophically you pass off your slight feelings of unease, your are well aware that eating that whole pizza, half for lunch, the other half for dinner, with a tall glass of a sweetened drink is not something that should be repeated. A lesson has been learned. That's what wellness is all about. This kind of thinking becomes a habit but don't expect ever to quit learning. New lessons on how to help heal your self crop up daily.

Others are likewise important and to spend all your time on your frailties is likewise unhealthy. Let God be your doorkeeper and you will learn how much of this or how much of that is healthy or unhealthy. Living is loving and caring for others and forgiving them for their faults and their wrongdoings as well as loving and caring for yourself and yes, forgiving yourself for your faults is likewise healthy.  But don't overdo it.  Going one step forward you at least hope to improve on your unhealthiness by giving Him the credit for all the good you have done this one day. God is not dead
as some smart(?) people often say or think, He is born new everyday, at least where he is allowed to be.



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