In Mental Health Awareness Month, We Must Ask: What Even IS It?

At last, the taboo subject of mental health is coming out of the closet. We’re allowed to talk about how we’re doing. We’re even encouraged to center the pursuit of it before all else. All of this sounds good. There’s just one problem: What the hell IS good mental health?

That’s the big idea I’m exploring this month in Julie’s Pod. Please join me by dropping a note in the comments with an example of what good mental health looks like or feels like for YOU.

this is what i think it looks like, but that doesn’t mean i know how to achieve it all the time

My friend Donnovan Somera Yisrael is one of the wisest people I know. He gets how humans work. We were college classmates, and for decades he’s served Stanford students as a Health Educator and Well-Being Coach. He’s also passionate about the skill of grieving. So when I’m really struggling, I’m likely to turn to Donnovan.

When I wrote my book on Adulting (Your Turn: How to Be an Adult) I knew I needed Donnovan’s advice in the self-help chapter, so I interviewed him about what mental health even IS. Like, how do you even know if you’re in a good place, or not?

He shared the theory of “stuckness.”

“A body that stops moving gets stiff or constipated. Water that stops moving is going to stagnate. Money that stops moving causes a recession or depression. When emotions stop moving, there’s a depression also. So one good indicator of healthiness is movement. Whereas if you’re stuck, that stuckness is a good sign to go get help. You’ve got to get your car moving.” – Donnovan Somera Yisrael

Can you relate to this movement/stuckness dichotomy? Have you experienced that stuckness? Comment below.

Donnovan went further. He taught me that this “stuckness” leads to languishing – an unequivocaly poor state of mental health – and “the opposite of languishing is actually flourishing.” So, what does it feel like to flourish, then, I asked him?

He said, to know if we are flourishing – if we have good mental health – we should ask ourselves:

“Do I have an enriching life? Do I have a life that has growth? Do I feel curiosity? Do I have juicy issues to wrestle with? Do I experience occasional states of flow (a sign of experiencing engaging work/activities)? Do I engage in work that gives me a sense of purpose? Do I know my “why”? Do I feel a sense of connection with others? Do I feel that I am part of a community?” – Donnovan Somera Yisrael

There’s a ton of stuff on social media about mental health and I want to amplify it this month in support of Mental Health Awareness Month. Some of the stuff out there I find trite, though, (like the suggestion to have a hot bath - cuz I hate baths). And some of it I find too clinical. But recently I found some good stuff I could really relate to.

From @happinessproject

From @happinessproject

From @happinessproject

Feel free to click on these images and grab them to share on your socials this month, so that the people who follow you will have the chance to see them and learn from them, too. This set of ideas is from “Happiness Project.” Be sure to credit them if you decide to share. (I have no connection to them. They’re not paying me or anything like that. I’m just sharing their work because I really appreciate the specificity of their examples.)

Don’t forget to leave YOUR example of what good mental health is below. And here’s to all of us having a mentally well May… and maybe even June.

xo

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