As I was whiling away my time – lazing around, my friend sends me a message reminding me of May being a mental health awareness month. She was also responsible of turning me into an author of a book. We co-authored a book called “9 Wellness Hacks” – on mental health. It was book of our learnings and experiences laid out in general laymen terms around mental health and mental space. It is over a year that we have published the book. The book writing journey was spiritual to me, and I would be ever grateful to her for pushing me to do that. Wondering why I am writing about the book and my friend. It’s the mental awareness month and I felt that I had to write my thoughts and share it. Two key things as I mention about the book journey. One I wrote my learnings – which soothed my soul and other I had a great friend who was a constant support and continuously pushed me to do what I thought I could never do in my life.
In this busy world, where there is always a constant pressure of living to the expectations of the people around us and our own selves, we have forgotten to take a stop, breathe and live in the present. We are either waiting for a weekend to come so we can laze around or take a quick vacation break. There are only a bunch of us who despite of all the materialistic pressure, have taken a step back to honor not only the physical wellbeing but also the mental space. These few have not only taken care of oneself but others too. Love or relationships (any types) makes total sense when it is not only about me but also about us.
Just as a reminder to myself, I jotted few quick notes as below:
1. Empathy – A very strong word. Be empathetic to yourself and to others. Each of us probably are fighting our own battles without the other knowing it.
2. Supportive – Lets be supportive of each other. I know all of us are running a hectic schedule. But let’s try and make some time for the people we love. We all come with an expiry date, ain’t it?
3. Reach out – Don’t shy away to reach out when in trouble or need to have a conversation. It has helped me. I have constantly cribbed to my bestie about grief and pain. She has been an amazing listener, every time available with her keen ears. It has helped me to find a new perspective to my issues and deal with it in a right way.
4. And final pointer – love yourself enough. Love your body in any shape and size and love your mental space. Its as precious as the physical body. It’s the centre place for all your thoughts and actions, so it definitely deserves the attention and love.
I do struggle on a daily basis to work on the above pointers and others, but I have started. We all need to start somewhere to make it better for ourselves. Like my favorite Meryl Streep quotes – “Start by starting” .
Smile Always 