What is Mental Health Awareness?

What is mental health Awareness? It is one thing to acknowledge that mental health exists and is something we need to look after, but it is a completely different thing knowing when and how it needs taking care of.

For me, mental health awareness is not a week or a month, it is a daily ritual. To be truly aware of your mental health is to know where you’re at behaviourally, emotionally and cognitively on any given day. It is a constant check in, whenever you feel off kilter, tired, frustrated, triggered, stressed, sad, or angry. It is the ability to look inside and ask, ‘why is this happening and what do I need’.

In order to achieve this, we need a vocabulary and a framework to identify and understand these emotions and concepts. We can ask questions like ‘What is it inside me that triggers this feeling of childish helplessness’, ‘What have I experienced that means this scares me?’, ‘How am I different now to how I was then’, ‘do I have the power, in the here and now, to ask for my needs to be met?’, ‘Who’s voice is this critical internal monologue?’.

These are big questions to ask, and that is exactly where therapy can help. It can be an invaluable opportunity to ask these questions in a safe, non-judgemental, supportive and reflective environment.

We are all products of our past; outcomes of decisions we made without a clear and accurate view of the options. Unless we become aware of these decisions and somehow change them, the patterns will keep repeating, the outcome remaining the same.

Through attuned, empathic enquiry, as a therapist, I can guide you to understand how you became who you are and why you react the way you do to things. I will help you identify historical decisions and re-evaluate them in the here and now, with an unbiased view of your options and your abilities. I will equip you with the vocabulary and tools to identify feelings, isolate their causes, and react from a rational and autonomous position of power.

For me, mental health awareness is understanding when you’re acting to your detriment; not thinking, feeling or being in the here and now, and knowing what to do to change that.

If you’re interested in learning more about Transactional Analysis therapy, what it is and how it can help, please get in touch to arrange a free consultation.