Stress affects all of us in various ways, however dealing with stress and becoming mentally strong is not complicated. With practice, exercise and healthy habits in your life can help you develop mental resilience. Questions arise as to why it is necessary to become mentally stable, what are the benefits of being mentally tough and what is being “mentally stable.”
Shannon Kolakowski, PsyD, author of When Depression Hurts Your Relationship writes,
We all experience terrible loss and hurdles at some point in our lives; the death of a loved one, a divorce or painful breakup, being fired from a job, suffering from an illness, or any number of life events that can be overwhelming and terrifying to confront. However, some people are better able to bounce back, whereas others struggle longer, with higher incidences of depression, anxiety, and long-term effects of stress that take a toll on their lives.”
Mental toughness is the quality that lets people face failures with serenity and strength rather than letting failures drown them into stress and anxiety. Resilient people possess a positive attitude, optimism, and the ability to control their emotions. Mentally tough people can face challenges and deal with stress, anxiety, and feelings better than normal people. Resilience is the quality, usually found in winners, athletes, leaders and entrepreneurs.
One of the stereotypes about being mentally strong is that people think to be resilient means being cold-blooded or not reacting to emotions. However, the actual meaning of resilience is dealing with emotions in such a way that is beneficial for you, learning to keep yourself relaxed and calm.
We have compiled a list of ways to become mentally strong to help you live a happy and successful life. If you have any comments please share them with us.
Ways to Become Mentally Strong
1. Failures are not final
Failures are not final, and they’re certainly not the end of the world. Think of each failure as a lesson, learn from it and use your experience in your next project until you find success. Failures can be highly stressful, but once you learn how to incorporate positivity in your life, you won’t find anything more fruitful regarding learning experience than a failure – except success, of course.
2. Stay Away From Bad Habits
Let’s face it, dealing with stress and anxiety is difficult and not many of us deal with failures strongly. Most of us turn to drug abuse and alcohol. Although these habits can give you temporary relief, these are the very reasons behind weak emotional and mental capabilities as well.
Staying away from vices help you maintain your emotional level along with keeping you physically healthy.
3. Differentiate Between Positive and Negative
Humans are prone to have positive as well as negative thoughts; however, dealing with either of them varies person to person. Some people tend to be dreadful of everything while others are overoptimistic. One of the qualities of strong minds is they can maintain a balance between positive and negative thoughts. Training your mind to see positive things will keeping you relaxed and calm will enhance your ability to deal with situations with confidence.
Heidi Reeder, author of Commit To Win: How To Harness the Four Elements of Commitment To Reach Your Goals, writes,
Research shows that on average, adverse events impact people five times as much as positive events do.”
Resilient people usually are positive and optimistic about situations; however, they also have some negative thinking as well, allowing them to prepare for the worst outcomes.
4. Re-evaluate Your Social Circle
The statement “Human is a social animal” isn’t just coincidental. It’s in our nature to socialize, however, the type of social circle that we have around us reflects our personality and affects our overall emotional state. The first thing that you can do to develop a vigorous and supportive social circle is to re-evaluate it and distance yourself from dishonest and toxic people—those who pressure and judge you.
Having a supportive social circle, one of the ways to become mentally strong, helps you in the development of your mental strength as you can share your worries and fears with them confidently.
Craig Malkin, in his book “Rethinking Narcissism” writes,
Open up and depend on others more emotionally, sharing vulnerable feelings, like sadness or fear or loneliness, and trust that the people we care about will be there for us. Individuals who share in this way come to see themselves, and the world, in a better light—and it makes them stronger.”
5. Commitment
Stephen Covey in his famous book, “The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People” writes,
If you are an effective manager of yourself, your disciple comes from within.”
Committing to something and keeping up with your commitment needs a strong mind. Start with committing to small tasks such as eating healthy food or reducing alcohol consumption and stick to your commitment. The process needs dedication and practice but helps you strengthen your mental muscles and develop discipline in your life.
6. Live a Healthy Life
According to the World Health Organization,
Mental health is an integral part of health; indeed, there is no health without mental health.”
Ways to become mentally strong depend on your physical health. Follow these 11 ways to live a healthy lifestyle to improve your health.
7. Never Stop Learning
A human never stops learning, from birth until death. You just need to build up a perspective that is both positive as well as beneficial. Next time you face a failure, instead of wasting your time on self-pity and curses, try to evaluate the situation.
Take a pen and paper and write down everything that might have been the cause of failure. Learn about your weaknesses and strengths. Failure doesn’t mean you’re of no worth, or you don’t have any strength, it just means something went sideways.
With each failure and experience, you will learn something and will grow your mental capabilities to face challenges strongly next time.
8. Set Goals and Achieve Them
Setting up goals is a part of human nature. However, we sometimes set up unrealistic goals because of either our excitement or overconfidence. When we fail to achieve these goals, we blame ourselves and acquire stress and anxiety because of this self-pity.
Instead of setting big goals, start with smaller ones. Having little achievements can boost your self-esteem and strengthen your mental ability.
9. Get a Different Perspective on Life
One of the ways to become mentally strong that I usually do when I am feeling down is to go out with someone I trust, discuss my problems with them and ask them for their opinion about the situation. It may not sound like something useful but believe me, getting a different perspective on a situation enriches your point of view.
You will find it much easier to handle a situation if you can see it through different perspectives.
10. Count on Your Experiences
Our mind naturally depends on our past experiences while dealing with various situations. However, you cannot let your previous experiences affect your mental health. Whenever you face such as situation, evaluate it, think about it and then take a position on whether you should deal with this situation based on your past experiences or you should handle it differently this time.
Let go of bad experiences of the past and try to exchange them with good experiences of the present.
11. Stay Happy
One of the ways to become mentally strong is to live your life with happiness. Life is too short to live with sadness, worries, stress and anxiety. Think of all the positive things in your life, go out with a friend, and search for happiness in everything. Plan a spontaneous vacation somewhere quiet and spend some time by yourself.
12. See a Therapist
You should never be afraid or embarrassed to go to a therapist. Therapists are professionals who know a lot more about how the human mind works and are trying to help you deal with your stress. We always have this fear that “people will judge me.” Come on, your life is yours—own it. Stop letting others interfere with your likes and dislikes. Stop trying to get the approval of others. Those who care will always support you.
Change Your Life Starting Today
Having a strong mind requires patience, dedication, and strong willpower to change yourself. Dealing with emotions, the loss of your loved ones, a troubled relationship or a divorce can be difficult. However, you must understand that these are merely hurdles in your way, not the end of the world. Regaining resilience and becoming mentally strong can be challenging, but you must try some of these strategies as resilience is a critical and highly contributing attribute towards your success in life.
Please share with us in the comments section below any habits you have developed over the years to become mentally strong or if you are ready to change your life. Thank you!
Resources
http://www.forbes.com/sites/alicegwalton/2015/03/02/growing-resilience-7-strateg
http://www.talentworksgroup.com/blog/archives/07-2013
http://yourhealth.uncc.edu/mental-wellness
http://www.forbesmagazine.com/forbesdaily/FD_2015_03_03.pdf
http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs220/en/
http://www.drcraigmalkin.com/the-book/
http://www.heidireeder.com/commit-to-win
http://www.drshannonk.com/books/
[…] who are mentally and emotionally stable are naturally better problem solvers. That is why you must become mentally tough to improve your problem solving skills. One of the very first attitudes that you need to become […]