5 Life Hacks for your Mental Health well-being
Today is a great day to accept yourself, embrace your life, and make yourself mentally healthy.
We’ll leave you with once final mental health hack: These hacks can be applied in any order, anytime, anywhere, and in any way that works for you. Today, tomorrow, and forever are great days to accept yourself, embrace your life, and make yourself mentally healthy.
And there are countless other ways in which our mental health influences our physical well-being, making it a non-negotiable part of our daily priorities. But does it have to be a rocket science?
Let’s explore 5 life hacks and daily practices that will help you improve your mental health instantly and long-term.
Good quality sleep
Good quality sleep is one of the most essential practices and life hacks for better mental and physical health and well-being. There is not one cell in our entire body and mind that does not benefit from good-quality sleep. However, we are the only species on the Earth that purposefully deprioritize sleep without an actual need. In fact, approximately 2/3 of the population in industrialized countries sleep too little. Lack of sleep negatively impacts our ability to focus, learn and process information. Furthermore, inadequate sleep negatively influences our memory, hormonal balance (or rather imbalance), stress levels, mood, energy levels and, in fact, also our immune system.
When we do get an adequate amount of good quality sleep, the benefits are endless, and here are some of them:
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Increased energy and better mood
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Reduced stress and anxiety
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Positive mindset
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Improved cognitive function
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Improved productivity
Mindful living
Our minds hold an enormous power. In fact, everything in our lives starts in our minds. Our thoughts, our self-talk, our beliefs (be they positive or limiting beliefs)all create this lens that we see and perceive ourselves and the world around us through, shaping not only our internal, but also external environment, affecting the way we feel inside and out and also the way we show up in the world every day.
We cannot always control what thoughts pop into our head. In fact, our mind automatically generates more than 70.000 thoughts every day. But we can always bring more mindfulness and awareness to our thoughts by:
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Noticing a negative thought or belief
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Noticing how it makes us feel
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Getting curious about it: is there evidence of it, is it even true? (Spoiler alert: most times it is not)
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Challenging the thought rationally
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Rephasing it into a more positive thought or belief
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Thinking about something else
Self-care
Self-care is activity that nurtures and refuels you at a deep level. If we search in dictionary it has the following definition of self-care which means “practice of taking an active role in protecting one’s own wellbeing and happiness in a healthy and self-compassionate manner, in particular during periods of stress”. Self-care is loving yourself, resting, getting enough sleep, cultivating grounding practices like meditation and gratitude, eating healthy and nourishing foods, staying hydrated, moving your body, doing things you love and that bring you joy, surrounding yourself with things and people that make you feel good.
Taking time for self-care rituals every month, week and day can for instance help to:
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Manage stress
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Increase energy
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Elevate mood
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Lower the risk of illness
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Build stronger relationships with yourself and others
Movement
Very few lifestyle choices are as impactful for our mental health and physical wellbeing as regular movement and it does not even require significant time commitment or intensity. Any time and space you can create for this habit – even if it is just 5 or 10 minutes a day – will benefit your body and mind in multiple ways.
Making movement a daily habit will also help you unlock your mental strength, as it is proven to:
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Reduce anxiety
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Aid in coping with stress
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Increase the release of our happiness hormones
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Boost confidence and elevate our mood
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Strengthen memory and improve our cognitive functioning
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Aid in preventing development of dementia and other cognitive diseases
Mindful breathing
When our brain senses something stressful, it is like a switch is clicked. The nerves send the whole system into overdrive, triggering a flood of stress hormones into the blood streams. Our breathing speeds up, our heart starts racing, the whole body feels wired. But if you can breathe slowly and deeply, nerve fibers in the chest will detect the change in breath movement and tell the brain to relax, which will soothe the body’s stress response. Throughout the body everything is dialed down: heart rate, stress hormones, and anxiety.
When done right, is a tool that builds a safety bridge between our body and mind, and helps to:
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Improve our sleep
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Reduce the amount of stress hormones in the body
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Improve our ability to focus
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Support our digestion
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Reduce pain
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