Today is World Mental Health Day, but for me, every day is kind to your mind mental health day
I paid no attention to my mental health until I started the journey of changing my mindset. I realised this would take work after years of just thinking things would change on their own.
- My vision board is full of slogans such as
- Changing my mindset to change my life
- New mindset new results
- It is possible for me to change my mindset
- Good things are coming
- My daily a.m. and p.m. routine is who I want to be
- My feelings cannot control what I do
- Be kind to your mind with the words you repeat to yourself
- And my favourite, I am rich with vision, loaded purpose and destined to soar.
Changing My Mind
I started the journey of intentionally changing my mindset 3-years ago after being tired of old habits and thinking patterns dominating certain areas of my life after years of allowing all kinds of thoughts to develop mental and emotional roots.
My life had changed in many ways since taking that step to kick depression to the curb in 2011, but 3 years ago and made changing my mindset a priority in order to fast-track my progress.
It wasn’t enough to be a Christian and believe I could, would and had overcome depression, I had to do something with the thought patterns and habits that had developed over the years due to prolonged depressive and negative thinking.
Each week I focused on a different area of changing my mindset and did this by focusing on the intentional focal point when I recognised my old thinking patterns and habits creeping back in.
Let me be honest, it has been tough at times. It doesn’t matter how much you encourage yourself, it doesn’t stop you from feeling what you feel unless you change the way you think.
Mental Mindset Goal
While others set goals of achieving certain things in business, ministry and life, my number one goal has been to completely change my mindset so there were no traces of my depressive thinking dominating any area of my life.
Today as we focus on World Mental Health Day, my encouragement to anybody would be to ensure you work on your mindset.
Our mindset is our mental well-being.
Our mindset is the foundation that kickstarts anything we do, so it needs to be healthy.
Changing my mindset was detrimental to the way in which I viewed things especially as I pursued a journey of becoming an entrepreneur and setting up businesses, a ministry and a charity.
If I didn’t change my mindset, elements of the old me would affect everything I wanted to do and achieve in life, something I was previously oblivious to and struggled to understand why I failed to be successful and consistent in certain areas of life.
I was so determined I created a vision board around it.
In my opinion, I think what affects our mental health the most is procrastination and procrastination can be fuelled by so many things.
- Poor self-image
- Lack of confidence
- Not having a clear vision
- Not protecting one’s vision
- Feeding your vision the wrong mental food.
- Starving your vision
- Being stuck in the past
- Fear of the future
But to name a few.
I’ve had to work through all of the above and more, which has made taking care of my mental health a daily routine that is just as important as washing and brushing my teeth.
Daily Routines Create LifeTime Habits
Our mind is what shows up daily in everything we do. We are who we are and become because of the dominating thoughts we allow to occupy our minds.
In this journey of changing my mindset, I have developed strategic tools on how to overcome depression. Tools to manage and control my emotions. And tools to develop a daily habit that supports my mental health. I do this by establishing routines to support the areas I want to change.
Your routine can be as short or as long as you want it to be but must be done daily.
I start my day early with prayer and quiet reflection and praise. It is something I do, not something I do depending on how I feel.
I do a bit of exercise to get my endorphins going and raise my vibrations and mental energy.
I say affirmations in line with my business goals, ministry goals and mindset goals.
I have a sign in my bedroom that tells me if I do not say my affirmations I won’t be consistent in changing my mind because there are days when I don’t feel like doing it.
I also journal and most recently have started deep meditation which has been so powerful in controlling my thoughts and my emotions and staying intimately connected to God.
I socialise more to create balance in my life.
And the best one is when I don’t feel like doing something I play, beat the timer with Alexa.
Beat the timer is where I tell Alexa to give me a certain amount of time I’m on the device and then I start doing the thing that I don’t want to do.
By trying to do the job before Alexa tells me my time is up. Doing this, my focus changes to what has to be done and removes it from focusing on why I don’t want to do it, which in return affects my emotions, raises my mood and not only do I get the task completed the next time when I have to do the job I know that I can do it and it does not have to drag.
I get lots done with beat the timer!
Mental Rewards
As a result of all of these and other things I’ve done along the way, which included counselling, I am now on the right path to becoming a successful entrepreneur with multiple businesses.
I host Away Days and Retreats helping others develop and maintain intimacy with God which has a huge impact on our mental health by helping them to be still, and quiet and listen to their heart, mind and what God is saying to them, in order to live a more balanced lifestyle mentally, emotionally, physically and spiritually.
These steps are allowing me to enjoy life, even on the rough and tough days, which for a very long time was something I was unable to do. I always wanted to give up because I did;t know how to fight or that I could fight.
So as the world focuses on World Mental Health Day my encouragement to you would be to guard and protect your mental health and well-being because without it we have no stability.
Remember we are and become the dominating thought in our minds
