Mental Health Check-In 5/14/20

This morning I have been in a weird mood. I am not happy, but I am not sad. I am more in thought. I am, of course, thankful that at least I awakened to see another day, right? My kids are healthy and here, and my life seems to be okay if I was an outsider looking in. Many do not know that is what depression looks like. I go to therapy, take medication to control these vibes, But none of that works for more it seems. I want to be transparent at a point in my life, and I do not want to make the outside look good as much as I want the inside to feel good. That is the most essential part.

As people, we blame everything around us for not feeling the way we "want" to explore. Social media wants you to look a certain way, society expects you to follow the traditional way, family and friends judge your decisions. I will admit that it has some of what the problem is around mental health stigma, but it is not all of it. As a human these days, we "expect" to be more than what we really need, and we need to be kinder to ourselves mentally.

So, I have lived with reading to uplift my mental health in a different alternative way. The book that has helped me through some of my hard times is "The Misleading Mind by Karuna Cayton." I talk a lot about this book on my podcast and in my journaling. So many tips and lessons that this book has taught me to re-think how I think.

For example, focusing on mind training. Mind training is the nature of changing our thoughts affect. As stated before, we are programmed to what the world, society, social media, and others think of us. We have to unlearn this type of pressure. Train our minds to take in positivity and project those same vibes. Your thoughts are powerful. If you don't have the ideas to block out what you can't do and what people will judge you for the decision you make, you will stay stuck in the space of autopilot.

It is stated that "the quality of the mind is that it is utterly fluid." This means the mind can be changed and taught with discipline, consistency, and determination to change your thoughts. My journey to mind training was found in this book. The way we talk to ourselves can genuinely affect our self-esteem but, most importantly, self-awareness. "We change our thoughts through a process of mental development, [changing] the physical world, the shape of our brain." (Cayton,2012, page 64)

In these moments, my feelings are all over the place; usually, I take the time to work through my feelings. Using this book The Misleading Mind and more to guide me to get back on track with a clear mindset. Mental health is a huge deal, yet it has such a bad stigma against it. I am here to be open and share what helps me. I am not giving medical advice or expecting you to turn to my spiritual beliefs. I just want people to know its okay to not be mentally okay all the time. You aren’t crazy, you’re human. I’ve learned to lean into what makes me uncomfortable, and what makes me hurt to learn from it.

In my opinion, I believe that an emergency routine that can get you back to a space that you can focus on is essential. In my case, with no emergency routine to handle these feelings, I end up panicking about panicking. When you are in these types of moods when you don’t know exactly where your feelings stand, but you are aware that you are not in a good vibe? Let’s end the stigma from expressing that our mental health is suffering. It is okay to do that even in a time like this, most importantly during a time like this. We don’t have to be professionals to be human and let others know their feelings are valid without the stigma. Are you ready to attempt to take control over the way you think? I will continue to tell my journey and hope to inspire someone to join in to help each other normalize it.

REFERENCES:

Cayton, K. (2012). The misleading mind: How we create our own problems and how Buddhist psychology can help us solve them. Novato, CA: New World Library.