Mental fitness is an important part of every individual’s life as it essentially impacts everything we do and how we do it. As defined by the World Health Organisation (WHO), mental health is a state of well-being in which every individual realizes his or her own potential, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully, and is able to make a contribution to her or his community.
Similarly, to how you physically train and look after your body, making sure you don’t overwork your muscles and cause injury, mental fitness is exercising and training your mind. The more regularly we have negative thoughts and behaviours, the more likely they are to occur. Each time these thoughts repeat, they strengthen, negatively impacting our mental health and lives. There are four pillars of mental fitness: emotional, social, financial and physical.
Emotional
Emotional mental fitness is how you manage your emotions towards yourself and others. For example, self-acceptance and self-esteem.
Social
Social mental fitness is our interactions with our friends, as they provide us with companionship, support and improve our lives.
Financial
Financial mental fitness is about feeling in control of our finances and how we manage being on track to achieve our financial and life goals.
Physical
Physical and mental health go hand in hand. Doing physical exercise, eating healthy and having a good amount of sleep can improve both physical and mental health.
Spending time looking after our mental health can positively impact all aspects of our life emotionally, socially, financially and physically. Everyone has their own way of being mentally fit, below is a list of activities that help us improve:
- Exercise
- Go for a walk
- Meditate
- Read a book
- Take time out to relax
- Relax to music
- Take up a new hobby
- Catch up with friends
- Social media detox
- Get enough sleep
- Spend time with family
