Caring for your mental health

It’s important to prioritise your mental health as much as your physical health.

Mental self-care is about creating a healthy state of mind for yourself: it affects how you feel, think, act, socialise and make choices. You have to design your ideal mental self-care routine in order for you to be devoted to it. It could be the little things you find comfort or happiness in to the things you do once in a while as long as you know it improves your mental state of mind. Go for them!

Understanding your mental health is crucial. Recognizing what is unhealthy for your mental health will help you avoid any triggers. Triggers could be things that give you discomfort or unhappiness, things that make you doubt your self-worth, or certain boundaries that are crossed.

Talking about mental health issues should be normalised in conversations. Asking for help or sharing your thoughts and feelings doesn’t mean you are weak, instead, it shows your resilience.

It’s important to prioritise your mental health as much as your physical health.

Mental self-care is about creating a healthy state of mind for yourself: it affects how you feel, think, act, socialise and make choices. You have to design your ideal mental self-care routine in order for you to be devoted to it. It could be the little things you find comfort or happiness in to the things you do once in a while as long as you know it improves your mental state of mind. Go for them!

Understanding your mental health is crucial. Recognizing what is unhealthy for your mental health will help you avoid any triggers. Triggers could be things that give you discomfort or unhappiness, things that make you doubt your self-worth, or certain boundaries that are crossed.

Talking about mental health issues should be normalised in conversations. Asking for help or sharing your thoughts and feelings doesn’t mean you are weak, instead, it shows your resilience.

How to care for your mental health

Here are some ways you can care for your mental health:

• • Treating yourself
  • Meditation
  • Being positive minded
  • Spending quality time with those you feel safe with
  • Journaling what you are grateful for, life events, etc

You can get more ideas about how to look after yourself by reading more about what other young people like you find useful in different situations. As Noam Sphancer said in his book The Good Psychologist, “Mental health is not a destination, but a process. It’s about how you drive, not where you are going”.

Reach out for help

It’s important to care for yourself, but sometimes we need to ask for help. Check Check here for services you can refer yourself to in Greater Manchester, or you can easily search The Mix to find support from local, regional and national organisations.

Supporting others

Supporting others could be as simple as being there when you are needed. There’s lots of different types of support you could provide, for example emotional, financial, informational, educational, tangible, and affirmational help, depending on the situation. Supporting others could go a long way: it could give another person encouragement and assurance or even change their life. But remember that you need to care for yourself to be able to care for others. If you are in a healthy state of mind you will be better able to be there for the people who need you.

It could be a family, partner, friend, colleague, or even a stranger that needs support in any form. Simply being attentive and listening to someone that needs your support can make them feel heard or healed. In a situation where you are unable to help, recommend reliable support for them.

If it seems like an emergency, stay with them, and reach out to local social services by calling 999 or NHS 111. You could encourage them to contact Samaritans on 116 123 to talk to someone 24 hours a day about anything bothering them or any other helpline or listening services.

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