My Definition of Mental Health

When I say “mental health” what do you think of? For some, I’m willing to bet they think of things that individuals can struggle with such as depression, anxiety, bipolar, etc. For others, they might think of all we hear about self care (like that you’re supposed to light a candle, crawl into the bathtub, and read a book.) And for others you might think of your visit to see your therapist or of some of our own life struggles in our head and our heart.

I talk a lot about mental health, but I realized this morning that my personal definition (note: not textbook) might be helpful to share. In fact, I see mental health a whole lot broader, including all of the things I mentioned above, and more. To continue on this journey together, I found it helpful to invite you all into this idea about mental health that I have, and give you a picture of where we are going with the work that we are doing on the website, as everything I share will be related back to how you can promote your mental health in this way. And I also truly hope that this definition might be a helpful one for you as you’re figuring out what mental health means to you too.

So what is mental health to me?

I’ll call on school here a bit, because I think it sets the stage nicely. Many people ask what social work is, what you do, and how it is different than psychology. If you’re in the profession, you hear “person in environment” and “strengths-based” a lot. This means it’s not just looking at someone’s symptoms or the existing depression for example. We look at the individual person, and the environment they live in. This gives an entire view of the person, and how those things all fit together to create their reality, which may include anything from a predicament to one of the mental health related topics mentioned above.

Holy smokes think of all of the systems and environments that you exist in! We are part of our homes and families. You might be a spouse, a mama or a dog mama or dada (we’ve taken this whole dog parenting thing quite far…) You may have a job, or be in school, each with their ups downs stressors and joys. You live in a community, with a neighborhood, access to things you need or difficulties getting those things, you may attend a religious organization that has significant influence in your life, or you may be a part of other groups like workout studios or friend groups. You live in a state and in a country, which makes laws and policies that impact you and the people you care about around you in so many ways. And it’s all of these things, from our individual selves, to the people in our immediate homes and families, to the place we live that all interact with each other to not only make our current reality, but you better believe they’ve got a big impact on our heads and our hearts, no matter if we are recognizing it or not.

(To draw on class, this is technically an explanation of Systems Theory from Policy Class and I just love it!!)

I see our mental health the same way. You are applying to a new job or school and you’re waiting to hear back? Hello Mental Health. You got the chance to share a sweet conversation with someone you love? Oh nice to see ya mental health. You have food on the table and maybe even the opportunity to make a beautiful meal? Oh mental health. Your voice is heard when you speak up? Mental. Health. (I could get a bit passionate about this one…ooh triggered.) To me, mental health is all of these things that seep into our heads and hearts and impact us both in positive and negative ways, and its happening all of the time.

On my site, I’ll be talking about all of these little things that impact mental health everyday. If there’s anything I’ve learned with being on this mental health journey myself, and also having my view expanded through school, is that it can be a bit tricky to recognize all of these things, sometimes even things that don’t interest us much, or things we take for granted that give us the sincere privilege of not needing to worry about it, that is mental health. And my hope, no matter how perhaps off topic it may seem, is to share all of those different little ideas with you in bite sized ways, and I won’t leave you hanging. I’ll also do my best to not just share ideas, but also some tools and resources for what you can do to promote that positive mental health in your life. Because we all have life happening all the time, and those tools are so very important to walk through them with your head and heart in mind.