Finding an Approach to Mental Health Problems that is Right For You

Here is a very comprehensive and simply presented list of some great ways you can take control over your mental health and sense of well-being:

Some of the suggestions are very specific, like 'staying hydrated' or 'not overbooking yourself'. Others refer to life-style changes such as 'making time for hobbies', 'trying new things' or 'getting enough sleep'. There's quite a lot here as well to do with personal relationships: for example 'setting boundaries with yourself and others' and 'communicating your needs'.

This is just the kind of guidance we might offer to clients who are dealing with problems of anxiety, low mood and poor self-esteem. They add up to a great check list of strategies for anyone looking to reduce the stress in their lives and feel better about themselves.

They won't all be to everyone's taste or suited to everyones particular issues . But taking on board just one, two or three of these would be a good way forward. You can always integrate more as you go along.

Choose Options that are Right for You

It's always important in deciding upon self-help strategies to choose the options that feel right for you. It's good to set yourself a challenge, but if going for a run or meditating everyday sounds like a real chore, then the likelihood is that you won't keep it up, however beneficial it might be to your physical health and mental wellbeing.

What works for one person won't necessarily work for another. So while positive self-talk may help someone with an overbearing inner critical voice, journaling may be more suited to someone who needs to offload. Don't feel guilty because you're not doing all of them.

A Flexible Approach to Therapy

In our own practice as counsellors we try not to be prescriptive about the techniques and strategies we introduce to clients. We do not offer a programme of approaches, but where strategies would be helpful we seek to tailor our suggestions to the clients particular needs and preferences. Working out ways forward is always a collaborative process between counsellor and client.

Some therapies offer more of a programme of learning and for some people this can work very well. But often we find ourselves working with clients who have previously had therapy where they felt they just weren't listened to. The theory and techniques were rolled out regardless of what the client was thinking and feeling.

So trust in yourself to know what are the right choices for you.

Practical Support and Guidance on Mental Health and Wellbeing

Follow our Facebook page for lots of excellent practical support and guidance on mental health and well-being issues.

There are some great resources out there on the web which are often very visual and can be taken in at a glance (see the examples above). We try to post information which we feel will be particularly helpful to our clients.

This information is not, of course, a substitute for the deeper understanding, self-exploration and reflective thinking that goes on in a counselling session, or which may come from reading a good book.

But it can serve as a useful reminder of the things which know we should be doing to help ourselves, presenting information in a simple, accessible and engaging way.

Recent posts have covered: the importance of emotions, ways of dealing with upsetting world events, tips on self-care and what you should be expecting from your relationships.

Our Facebook page also includes news about us: our book recommendations, our ways of working with clients and the resources we are developing to use in counselling sessions.

The Importance of Self-Compassion

The ability to be kind to ourselves is fundamentally important to our sense of self-esteem and well-being. In therapy this sort of kindness is now commonly referred to as self-compassion, a concept drawn from Buddhism.

As RuPaul says in every one of his shows: ‘If you can't love yourself, how in the hell you gonna love somebody else?’.

To have a low opinion of yourself not only means you will be conflicted within yourself, but that you won’t feel deserving of the love of others. So it will affect your ability to have satisfactory relationships. It will make you feel over-anxious about what others think of you and may mean you allow them to treat you without respect.

Feeling bad about yourself may also make you feel awkward in social situations and therefore make others feel awkward as well. Hence you will establish a vicous circle where the fact that others disrespect you or feel uncomfortable in your company justifies and reinforces you dislike of yourself.

Offering yourself compassion is a way of breaking this cycle and The Self-Compassion Wheel above provides some ways in which you can start to do this.

Learning to develop a self-compassionate attitude takes time. It’s easier to say ‘I’m not meant to be perfect, I’m human’ than it is to really believe it. But learning to talk to yourself in a more compassionate way and to forgive yourself for what you regard as faults will begin to break the habit of negative thinking.

Tell yourself ‘if I were to take a compassionate point of view, what would I be saying to myself’. You’re not committing to that view-point yet, because that would be too far outside your comfort zone, but you are at least acknowledging the possibility of that alternative view-point.

As we’ve said elsewhere on this site, consider what you would say to a good friend who was experiencing similar thoughts and feelings. It would probably be much kinder than the sorts of things you are saying to yourself now.