ļ»æHey, my friend! What's up? And welcome back to Do Life Big. I am so excited to have you here. I hope that you are doing awesome. All right, we are gonna dive right in here and get started on today's episode; it's going to be a quick one, but a really good one. And we're going to be talking all about improving your mental health: Five Keys to Improve Your Mental Health.
Listen, this is so important that we all concentrate on creating better mental health because everything rises and falls on that. And it's our responsibility to create better mental health. I mean, I feel like some days it's hard for me, especially while I am going through this new potty training here with a three-and-a-half-year-old who still has fits of throwing things and screaming and hitting all that fun stuff that comes with that āthreenagerā age. So I'm always trying to work on my mental health. And I just think it's something that we all need to do; it's so important. So I'm going to just dive right in and share with you five keys that you can do to improve your mental health.
So number one, if it still bothers you 24 to 48 hours after it's already happened, then you should talk to somebody about it or let it out or tell someone about it. So, for example, think about if you get into an argument, or you're about to get into an argument with your spouse, and maybe you're going down this path, and it's not going well. And you could just feel yourself boiling inside. And there's all these things that you want to say, but you just don't want to go down that path. Because you know that if you start saying this thing, it's going to lead to the next thing. And then the whole entire argument is just going to blow up into this big deal issue. And you just can see which way it's gonna go. So you don't want it to go that way. So you just don't say anything at all, right?
So you go to bed, but then maybe you wake up the next day, or maybe a couple of days have gone by, and there's still something there that you just are like, I really should say this because it's still on my mind. It's still on my heart. I don't want to get into like a fight about it. But I really should say what I need to say versus just avoiding it, right? Pushing it down and ignoring it, and then never acknowledging it isn't going to make it go away. That's definitely not the answer. Right? And if you keep on sweeping crap underneath the rug, you just one thing happens, sweep it under the rug, another thing happens, oh, just sweep it under the rug, sweep, sweep, sweep, sweep, sweep. Next thing you know, you're gonna have this big bump under your rug, and you're eventually going to trip and fall over it. Right? Maybe you need to say or express something. And I don't know what that something is. Only you're going to know. But if it's been 24 to 48 hours, and it's still bothering you, definitely speak up about it, and let it out and talk about what happened.
Alright, number two, we need to get better at expressing our emotions. We all need to get better at expressing our feelings, myself included. And I've been working on this for so long now because I am a recovering people pleaser; I truly am. And if you're feeling angry inside, then you got to find a way to let it out. You got to find a way to let it out in a safe way in a safe place. Or if you're feeling any kind of sadness or frustration, whatever it is that you're feeling inside, you have to find a way to let it out. Stop holding it all in.
I lived a life like this because of my people-pleaser tendencies, where I never ever ever wanted to speak up about certain things. And I can think and remember one particular friend that I had from the past where I would want to say certain things to this person like this person was constantly doing things to bother me and to try to bring me down and to just try to belittle me. And I never wanted to speak up to this person because I just never wanted to ruffle any feathers. And I never wanted to cause a big deal about it. So I just pushed it down and never said anything about it because I didn't want to upset anybody.
And what ends up happening is if you keep pushing it down, you just eventually one-day freakin' blow up! Like, one day, that person does something. Or maybe it's not even that person that does something, but something happens, and you're just at your wit's end, and then you lose it. We don't want to do that, right? We don't want to completely lose it and look ridiculous and irrational, right? So we just need to really get better at focusing on seeing what's going on deep down inside and feeling it and then expressing it. We're just so good at holding so much in. And then, if you do that, it backfires. Just like I just explained to you like, it totally will backfire like it did to me. I'm sure you can relate.
So if you're feeling really pissed off, instead of just pushing it down and pretending that it's not there, or acting out in a fit of rage, which is only going to lead to regret, once you calm down, just try doing something different. Like maybe try going out to a kickboxing workout or doing some kind of a workout, I don't know, something along those lines, that's going to get you to relieve that frustration and anger that you have inside versus bottling it all up.
Because holding all the emotions in just puts an extreme amount of stress on your body, and it can lead to you becoming sick and just not feeling well. A lot of times, like your emotions that you suppress can actually turn into sicknesses and diseases over time. So we don't want that to happen. So just let it out. And when you do let it out, and you express your emotions too, one thing that we need to remember, we don't ever need to apologize for expressing how we feel, right? You don't ever need to say or feel bad or say you're sorry for how you feel because it's how you feel. And no one can belittle you or take that away from you. Everyone has their own feelings; everyone has their own emotions. And we are all entitled to feel the way that we feel when we do for a reason.
So the most important thing that you can do is to just who cares if somebody else tries to make you feel ridiculous for feeling the way that you do; the most important thing is that you at least get it out and you express the emotion versus just bottling it up inside. And of course, there are right ways and wrong ways to express your emotions. We want to make sure we're doing it right. We want to make sure we're doing it safely. But get it out and never apologize for feeling that way.
Alright, number three, get better at asking for help. So I just want you to imagine for a second here, you have this backpack on your back, and you're walking through your life. And with everything that you decide to take on and everything that you say yes to and everything that you try to do yourself, it weighs a certain amount of weight. Let's just pretend it weighs like one pound, and you put it in the backpack. And every time you say yes, it's more weight in the backpack, more weight on your backpack, more weight, more weight, more weight, more weight. And then two to five years down the road, it's like you're walking around carrying like 300 pounds of weight of all these things that you chose to take on by yourself because we didn't ask for help. Because we didn't want to ask for help because we wanted to say that we did it all on our own.
But there are people in our life right now who are more than willing to help us and to take some of that weight off. But we've got to be willing to ask for the help first. And that's why it feels so heavy sometimes in life. Like you ever feel like that where you're just like, gosh, it just feels so heavy right now, like I just feel so stressed and bogged down. It's most likely because you're trying to do it all on your own. And you can't do it all on your own. You've got to ask for help. At some point, you've got to drop the weight and ask for help. Otherwise, it's all going to just come crashing down. So who is that person who you really trust, who you can vent to or ask for help? You can't do everything alone. You cannot possibly be an island. Everyone needs help. So don't be afraid to go out there and ask for it.
Alright, number four, start treating yourself like someone you're responsible for taking care of. Let me repeat that one again. Start treating yourself like someone you're responsible for taking care of. What I mean is stop taking care of everybody else and putting yourself on the back burner. You're spending all of your time taking care of this person, and that person and your kids and your spouse and your parents and your friends, and you're doing your job, and you're doing all these things. And then you're saying that you don't have time to take care of you. So you don't take care of yourself, and you go on the back burner. This can't happen. We need to get better at this; make the time if something is important or a priority to you'll find the time for it. You can't pour from an empty cup. It doesn't matter how busy you are. It doesn't matter how many kids you have, how many businesses you're running, what you have going on. You can't possibly show up and be the best CEO, the best wife, the best mom, the best friend, whatever it is, without taking care of yourself. You've got to make yourself a priority. You can't help people the best that you can, if you're not taking care of you, plain and simple, so you have to be your top priority.
So here's where self-care comes into play. Now listen, when I'm saying self-care, I'm talking about real self-care; I'm not talking about, āHey, make sure you go get a massage once a month, and let's go get our nails done, and our hair did, and all that fun stuff.ā Listen, I'm not saying not to do those things. Of course, if it makes you feel good, definitely do them. But when I'm talking about self-care, I'm talking about like true self-care, the things that are going to really help you as a person. Things like getting the right amount of sleep, or exercising, which by the way, exercise is one of the key ways to push aside depression, or I'm talking about eating well, or maybe practicing relaxation techniques, or just spending time alone. How about meditating or even journaling? Or journaling your emotions, things like that real self-care, that's going to help you. So start treating yourself like someone you're responsible for taking care of.
All right, and the last one, number five, practicing more silence in your days. Ha! Silence? Holy Lord! This one is something that I definitely, - I know I need to work on! But I'm trying to figure out here where I can actually get silence because I don't have silence during the day because I'm home with a three-and-a-half-year-old all day long. And then the older two kids come home after school, and I go to lay down at night, and most of the time, my three-and-a-half-year-old wakes up and comes in our bed. So it's kind of hard to find that silence time. But what I found is that the only time that I can get that little bit of silence in is pretty much when I'm in the shower. That's the only time I can get it in.
So we're just we're so busy. All of us were so busy all the time, just moving, moving, moving, going, going, going. One thing after the next, right? We have to really think about how can we build more silence into our lives. And it doesn't need to be a lot of time, like a couple of minutes, three to five minutes, just something, and I know, trust me, if you're an overachiever like I am, then more silence can seem impossible. Especially if you're a busy mom and also running a business, it can seem impossible. And when somebody tells you that you need to get a little bit more silence in your day-to-day life, you might think that, okay, that's gonna hold me back, I don't want more silence, I need to go Go, go, go go. But it's so important that we really force ourselves to get this in a little bit. I know I need to work on this. Or maybe if you get into the car, instead of immediately putting on the radio spending, like the first three to five minutes just in silence, just letting yourself think, allowing your brain to calm down.
So that's all I had for you today. Just to recap real quick, the five keys to better mental health.
1. If it still bothers you, 24 to 48 hours after, say something and speak up about it.
2. Get better at expressing your emotions.
3. Get better at asking for help.
4. Treat yourself like someone you're responsible for taking care of.
5. Get more silence in your life.
I hope that you enjoyed today's episode, really. Improving your mental health. We know it's a journey, just like everything else. And it's okay if you need to ask for help along the way. Just give it time, practice these keys, practice getting these things into your day-to-day life so that you can develop healthy habits and coping strategies that are going to promote positive mental health; it makes all the difference.
And before I let you go, in case you missed it, I do have a free guide that is going to help you flip around your limiting beliefs or those negative thoughts that have been holding you back I created a completely free guide. You can go to kathireuter.com/thinkthisnotthat; it will be in the show notes. So you can go, and you can check it out. But it has a list of all of the common limiting beliefs and negative thoughts that people think that keep them stuck and keep them where they are and what you should think instead of that negative limiting thought or that negative limiting belief. So go check it out.
Thanks for being here. You know, I love you. I think you're awesome. And I will see you the next time. Alright, see ya!
