“Mental health” as a term gets tossed around all the time, but what does it really mean? How do we know if our mental health is good? Is there some kind of scale that can show us if we have good, fair, or bad mental health?
Mental health refers to how we think and feel, and how we perceive and interact with reality. Our mental health informs our behaviors, our relationships with others, our ability to work, and our success in making a satisfying life for ourselves.
Mental health refers to our:
- Thinking
- Feeling
- Mood stability
- Behavior
Our physical health, genetics, life experiences, and interactions with other people, affect mental health.
Good mental health allows a person to:
- Feel, express, and experience a full range of positive and negative emotions
- Form pleasing relationships with other people
- Cope with stress and anxiety
- Cope with trauma and grief
- Manage changes both positive and negative
- Learn and acquire new skills
- Manage one’s behavior and alter it as necessary
- Work productively
- Enjoy a satisfying life
Good mental health allows a person to be adaptive; that is, a person with good mental health can adapt to positive and negative changes in their lives or environments.
A period of high stress or periods of poor coping doesn’t mean a person is mentally ill. Everyone becomes overwhelmed from time to time. It’s when a person experiences a lengthy downturn in their mood or has significant problems coping with day to day life that mental illness might be diagnosed.
Mental illness is considered serious and lasting. It has a significant impact on a person’s life and isn’t a passing period of stress. Consider depression, the most common mood disorder. For a diagnosis of depression to be made, a person must suffer from symptoms every day for at least two weeks.[1]
You can benefit from visiting a mental healthcare professional even if you don’t have a diagnosis of a psychological disorder. Mental healthcare providers help people learn to manage stress and anxiety better, improve their relationships, and deal with common life problems more adaptively.
If you’re looking for help with issues in your life, Damaris Aragon, ARNP, BC provides a full spectrum of mental health care to people in Spokane, Washington, and surrounding areas. She focuses on providing personalized, compassionate care that adheres to current evidence-based standards. Reach out to Damaris through her contact page or calling 509-342-6592.
[1] https://www.nami.org/About-Mental-Illness/Mental-Health-Conditions/Depression
