Habits to Improve Mental Health for Women
Good mental health doesn’t necessarily mean being happy all the time. Women with good mental health can experience happiness and sadness, anger, and excitement, all in healthy ways. When you have good habits to improve mental health, it means your mind can perform all its functions appropriately. You can do things such as:
Learn new information
Build strong, healthy relationships with other people
Experience a range of emotions in a healthy way
Contribute productively and work
Adapt quickly to change
However, women often face different mental health challenges than men. Women have higher rates of anxiety and depression, which can be related to physical health factors. Changes in hormones can lead to postpartum depression, depression during menopause, or premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD).
Plus, how women experience mental health conditions can also be different. While some men may act out in anger due to depression, women are more likely to experience fatigue, sadness, and lack of motivation.
Each year, around 29 million American women experience mental health conditions. It’s important to remember that you are not alone. You can find support through friends, family, your community, a doctor, and a professional therapy provider
How to achieve better mental health
A variety of factors can affect your mental function and health. These factors can be as simple as being sleep-deprived or hungry or as complex as eating disorders and major depression. Depending on your state of mental health, you can increase your well-being with healthy habits.
Good habits to improve mental health will look different for every woman. For instance, some women relax by taking a quiet bath while others release stress through physical activity.
However, if you face a condition such as mild to severe depression, or an anxiety disorder, these healthy habits alone may not be enough to improve your mental health.
To help maintain good mental health, you can:
Get seven to eight hours of sleep each night
Make new friends and maintain meaningful connections
Exercise regularly
Practice living in the moment
Express gratitude for things and people in your life
Say positive things about yourself
Participate in activities you enjoy
…AND IF IT WERE THAT EASY
Here’s more detail to improve your mental health
1. Sleep Status: Critical
Good restorative sleep so is vital for your mental well-being and impacts your diet and weight management, too. Sleep’s impact on your health is so important, that we’re adding Good Sleep Hygiene to the 10 Food Rules at Fit Chicks
2. Connect with other people that are on a healing journey
Good relationships are important for your mental well-being. They can:
help you to build a sense of belonging and self-worth
give you an opportunity to share positive experiences
provide emotional support and allow you to support others
There are lots of things you could try to help build stronger and closer relationships:
Do
if possible, take time each day to be with your family, for example, try arranging a fixed time to eat dinner together
arrange a day out with friends you have not seen for a while
try switching off the TV to talk or play a game with your children, friends or family
have lunch with a colleague
visit a community group, friend or family member who needs support or company
make the most of technology to stay in touch with friends and family. Video-chat apps like Marco Polo and FaceTime are useful, especially if you live far apart
Don’t
do not rely on technology or social media alone to build relationships. It's easy to get into the habit of only ever texting, messaging, or emailing people
3. Be physically active regularly
Being active is not only great for your physical health and fitness. Evidence also shows it can also improve your mental wellbeing by:
raising your self-esteem
helping you to set goals or challenges and achieve them
causing chemical changes in your brain which can help to positively change your mood
Do – practice strength, aerobic, and flexibility exercises consistently and at a constant level
4. Learn new skills
Research shows that learning new skills can also improve your mental well-being by:
boosting self-confidence and raising your self-esteem
helping you to build a sense of purpose
helping you to connect with others
Even if you feel like you do not have enough time, or you may not need to learn new things, there are lots of different ways to bring learning into your life.
Do
try learning to cook something new.
try taking on a new responsibility at work, such as mentoring a junior staff member or improving your presentation skills
work on a DIY project, such as fixing a broken bike, garden gate or something bigger.
consider signing up for a course at a local college.
try new hobbies that challenge you
Don’t
do not feel you have to learn new qualifications or sit exams if this does not interest you. It's best to find activities you enjoy and make them a part of your life!
4. Give to others in small ways - Research suggests that acts of giving and kindness can help improve your mental well-being by:
creating positive feelings and a sense of reward
giving you a feeling of purpose and self-worth
helping you connect with other people
It could be small acts of kindness towards other people or larger ones like volunteering in your local community. Some examples of the things you could try include:
saying thank you to someone for something they have done for you
asking friends, family, or colleagues how they are and really listening to their answer
offering to help someone you know with DIY or a work project or volunteering in the community for a day
5. Pay attention to the present moment - Paying more attention to the present moment can improve your mental well-being. This includes your thoughts and feelings, your body, your images, and the world around you.
6. Practice AWE
Awe is considered by many to be a basic state of mind, yet it is surprisingly hard to define. It is as the great philosopher William James said, “ineffable.” It’s hard to put into words, but science reveals an awe checklist of sorts.
It’s hard to find something that is better for your body and mind than experiencing a bit of awe. Studies where people look up into the trees or take in vast views or think about somebody who is morally inspiring find that brief experiences of awe calm the stress response and make a person feel more connected and less lonely. Awe has been seen to reduce depression, reduce PTSD symptoms in veterans, and is also good for cardiovascular health and the immune system.
“Awe is identifiable through a checklist of body symptoms,” says Dacher Keltner, professor of psychology at the University of California Berkley) -- More to come!
WHY SELF-HELP DOESN’T HELP
Self-help “help” reinforces perceptions of shame and inferiority. Plus, much of it perpetuates avoidance and therefore doesn’t address the underlining situation.
Why Am I Not Okay Right Now?
What causes mental health problems?
Mental health problems can have a wide range of causes. It's likely that for many people there is a complicated combination of factors – although different people may be more deeply affected by certain things than others. For example, the following factors could potentially result in a period of poor mental health:
social isolation or loneliness
severe or long-term stress
being a long-term caregiver for someone
having a long-term physical health condition
social disadvantage, poverty, or debt
unemployment or losing your job
homelessness or poor housing
experiencing discrimination and stigma, including racism
childhood abuse, trauma, or neglect
bereavement (losing someone close to you)
drug and alcohol misuse
domestic violence, bullying or other abuse as an adult
significant trauma as an adult, such as military combat, being involved in a serious incident in which you feared for your life, or being the victim of a violent crime
physical causes – for example, a head injury or a neurological condition such as epilepsy can have an impact on your behavior and mood. (It's important to rule out potential physical causes before seeking further treatment for a mental health problem).
Although lifestyle factors including work, diet, drugs and lack of sleep can all affect your mental health, if you experience a mental health problem there are usually other factors behind what’s happening to you as well
31 Tips to Boost Your Mental Health
1. Track gratitude with a journal: include 3 things you were grateful for each day
2. Track achievement with a journal: Mark 3 things you were able to accomplish each day
3. Set up a getaway: It could be a staycation with friends or a trip to the tropics. The act of planning a vacation and having something to look forward to can boost your overall happiness for up to 8 weeks!
4. Work on your strengths: Do something you're good at to build self-confidence, then tackle a tougher task.
5. Just the first step: Think of something in your life you want to improve and figure out what you can do to take a step in the right direction.
6. Experiment: Creative expression and overall well-being are linked.
7. Show some love to someone in your life. Close, quality, healthy relationships are key to a happy, healthy life.
8. “There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside of you.” -Maya Angelou. If you have personal experience with mental illness or recovery, share it
9. Sometimes, we don't need to add new activities to get more pleasure. We just need to soak up the joy in the ones we've already got. Trying to be optimistic doesn't mean ignoring the uglier sides of life. It just means focusing on the positive as much as possible.
10. Color: For about 20 minutes to help you clear your mind, color something. Pick a design that's geometric and a little complicated for the best effect. Check out hundreds of free printable coloring pages (click here)
11. Take time to laugh: Laughter helps reduce anxiety.
12. Go off the grid: Leave your smartphone at home for a day and disconnect from constant emails, alerts, notifications and other interruptions.
13. Eyeball to Eyeball: Spend time doing something fun with someone face-to-face.
14. Dance: Dancing reduces levels of cortisol (the stress hormone), and increases endorphins (the body's "feel-good" chemicals). You can do it when no one is watching!
15. Go ahead and yawn. Studies suggest that yawning helps cool the brain and improves alertness and mental efficiency.
16. Relax in a warm bath once a week. Try adding Epsom salts to soothe aches and pains and help boost magnesium levels, which can be depleted by stress
17. Has something been bothering you? Let it all out…on paper. Writing about upsetting experiences can reduce symptoms of depression.
18. Spend some time with a furry friend. Time with animals lowers the stress hormone - cortisol and boosts oxytocin - which stimulates feelings of happiness. If you don’t have a pet, hang out with a friend who does or volunteer at a shelter.
19. Practice forgiveness - even if it's just forgiving that person who cut you off during your commute. People who forgive have better mental health and report being more satisfied with their lives.
20. Smile: It may not be the easiest thing to do when you’re stressed, but smiling can help to lower your heart rate and calm you down.
21. Send a thank you note - not for a material item, but to let someone know why you appreciate them. Written expressions of gratitude are linked to increased happiness.
22. "Anyone who has never made a mistake has never tried anything new." -Albert Einstein. Try something outside of your comfort zone to make room for adventure and excitement in your life.
Get the rest of the tips (click here)
Resources LINKS below
Main Page (click here)
Get Support (click here)
Screening Tools (click here)
Treatment for women’s mental health conditions
If you think you or someone you love is facing mental health challenges, you should seek help and support. Your healthcare providers can connect you with the resources that can help you learn new habits to improve your mental health. You can also talk to a number of trusted health providers, including:
A psychiatrist
Licensed counselor/therapist
Your primary care physician or your OB/GYN
If you have thoughts about harming yourself, please call the National Suicide Prevention Hotline at 1-800-273-8255 any time of day or night. These trained professionals provide the support you need at no cost
Why repost this article?
“For women, in general, we cannot improve our mental health without filling our emotional-health tanks up first” - Roz Harris
7 Things to Do When Your Tank Is Empty by Karen Nimmo
You’re running on empty.
You’re fatigued.
You’re lethargic.
You have things you’d like to do — or you should do — but you can’t get fired up about them. Or anything.
You’ve had low patches before and you’ve always been able to find your way back. But now it feels like you have no resilience left. It’s like the plug’s still in the wall but someone flipped the power switch off.
No surprises here. Every therapist hears stories like this. Many people are saying they’re depleted, they don’t have the resilience to cope with the stress, the anxiety, and the roller-coaster uncertainties. “Resilience burnout” is real. We need to acknowledge the impact on people when there’s nothing left in the tank.
Resilience Burnout: a hybrid term for a real phenomenon
Resilience is the capacity to recover from difficulty; burnout is physical, mental and emotional exhaustion caused by chronic (persistent or recurring) stress. When you put them together you get a reduced capacity to cope with life’s difficulties.
Don’t try to force yourself to be AMAZING — and get self-critical when you fall short.
1. Know when to quit the day
I love this line from the young woman who was feeling she’d lost a chunk of her twenties. If you get to 3pm and absolutely nothing’s going right, take your foot off and quit the day. Curl up and have a cry if you need to. Know you’re not going to make your mark on anything today. Dump it in the way-too-hard-basket. And know that all feelings are temporary. Just because one day goes wrong doesn’t mean the next one will. Often, it’s quite the opposite. You can try again tomorrow.
2. Live in “day-tight compartments”
One of the early founders of the self-help movement, Dale Carnegie had a strategy for reducing worry: “live inside day-tight compartments.” It’s a tidy way of saying take things one day at a time — to stay in the present, which is especially helpful during times of turmoil. Just live each day until bedtime.
3. Throw your heart over the bar
One of the traps of feeling low is to do everything half-heartedly, which means you don’t enjoy anything much, you persistently feel like you’re going through the motions. So do fewer things. Or, better still, do one thing at a time. But whatever you do, bring all your focus to it. Do it with your whole heart. Your distracted mind will follow — at least for a little while.
4. Phone a friend (who’s on a healing journey, too)
Because it’s helpful for you to stay connected. But also just because someone, somewhere, may need a friendly ear. They may welcome a chat with you, and they may benefit from it — and that confirms you as a good person. Bonus benefit: It takes you out of your own life (and head) into someone else’s.
5. Keep the routines but kill the to-do list
Basic routines are helpful for framing your day. But 25 things on your to-do list? Seriously? Don’t do that, you’ll just end up transferring most of it to the next day and that’ll just make you feel bad. Be objective and real about your to-do list. Or throw the list out altogether and just do what you can.
6. Tiny, novelty projects
Routines help ground and steady us. But the downside is the sheer repetition of them. Humans are wired for novelty and stimulation. So we have to keep finding ways to spark our interest. Pick tiny, novelty projects that you can complete on the same day, or at least quickly. Cook a new dish, walk a new route, paint a picture, write a poem, put up a shelf, and plant some seedlings. The rule is active — not passive, though. So finding a new TV show to stream doesn’t count. Aim for something that engages the body as well as the mind.
7. Remember to laugh.
There’s some really sad stuff going on in the world right now. And some shocking stuff, and some stuff to make you angry, all of which make it easy to lose your sense of humor — and feel guilty when you hang onto it. Even during suffering, there are moments of weirdness, of fun, of joy. It’s a sign of emotional health that you can keep leaning into them.
However, if you face a condition such as mild to severe depression, or an anxiety disorder, these healthy habits alone may not be enough to improve your mental health.
