When we listen to the word ‘CORONA’ a fearful darkness passes through our mind. All that we think is only about isolation and lockdown. A lot of changes took place in the year 2020. Some of the people think that 2020 is the worst year, it has caused many mental health issues. Some people compare the year 2020 with 2012. A mega scale destruction which was going to take place on 2012 feels like trembling our minds now. Yes. We all have that fear, but is it right to disturb ourselves or other people around us?
Coronavirus has become our mental fear instead of saying about the physical destruction. There are lot of rumors and false information spreading through the social media and the television sets. Most of the time we think about how and when this pandemic will end. There is no tolerance or patience because this routine has become so hectic.
You cannot meet your friends, party late night, join clubs, discos or at least eat peacefully inside a fine dining restaurant. Even if the lockdown gets lifted, people won’t step out of their homes. Everyone wants to remain alive and the cause of fear is that virus which we call it as ‘COVID-19’. But there is nothing more to worry than worrying about your own mental health.
‘MENTAL HEALTH’ is becoming so popular nowadays that even small kids are suffering through mental health problems. It’s not a joke but let me tell you that we mostly focus on mental health just after a breakup or a divorce. Our human culture is developed in such a way that we will follow what others are following.
There was a time when the word mental health was never heard or you can also say it remained unheard but as the development started, competitions rose and at last the human race has become more intense now. Let me tell you a common interesting heart-wrenching story, which you might have heard.
There was this boy called John who was studying in a well-reputed university. He opted for a professional course. He was allotted a batch which consisted of only male students. The female class was allotted a different batch. Basically the idea of university was to restrict males to interact with the females.
Even their break times were different. There was this girl called Monica, who was studying in other batch. But this didn’t restricted John to fall in love with Monica because she was one of the gorgeous woman in the entire university. One day John bunked his lectures and waited outside the university premises for Monica.
When he saw her, he was just impressed by the beauty. She was slowly approaching towards John until her boyfriend popped up in the middle with a sports car. She was in a relationship. John instantly regretted his feelings for her. He tried to control his feelings as much as possible.
There was no escape from that tragedy of so called ‘LONELINESS’. As days passed he felt something in his heart, it was aching. And then what, the story of mental health started. He started searching on Google about “How to control feelings”, “How to secure mental health”, “How to forget love” and he almost read around sixty long posts a week on Google.
After a year, he was at that stage of losing himself in that flow of emotions. But let me tell you that this has become so common nowadays that there is no way to escape at all. The only way to escape is to understand yourself better. Why he started searching so much about mental health awareness and fixing it just after a breakup.
Why he started searching about mental health at that stage when he knew that it was degrading his productivity and future. Basically we are so busy with the world that we forget to take time for ourselves. There is no kind of awareness or education about those thoughts. No one will educate you or award you a degree for loving someone.
No one will teach you how to love someone or what do you mean by mental health. Because these are the questions out of your syllabus. People generally search this on Google just after concrete situations kill their survival. So now if you have found this blog post from any kind of medium then this will be your day to celebrate a moment free from mental health problems.
SO WHAT DO YOU MEAN BY MENTAL HEALTH?
Mental health is the state of your psychological well-being or absence of any mental-illness. It shows all the functioning of your routine related with emotions and mind is satisfactory with the end results. Basically in simple words, it means the end report of the state of your mind related with emotions.
A lot of people get confuse between mental health and physical illness. A common cold, cough or fever doesn’t mean your mental health is degraded. Physical illness can be temporary but mental health is permanent. Physical health has a lot to say with what you have been affected in physical terms.
For e.g. If you touch a surface which has a common cold virus and if the virus enters your body through a source, then it might take time for the virus to affect you physically. Even though it makes you ill but after taking the right medication from the doctor you will surely feel good.
But problems related with mental health are not the same. If you want to improve your mental health, then you need to take time for yourself. Just like you take time to recover from your physical illness, it too requires time. The most important part is your contribution.
I know that you might not have sufficient amount of time to perform extra additional tasks. I know that you are so busy in 9-5 jobs or in your daily lectures. But actually these are not any kind of extra additional tasks, you can say it is a part of daily routine which you need to do in this quarantine.
Remember that in order to improve your mental health, you need to make changes in your daily routine. Your routine completely contributes towards your mental health. The way you create your routine is what will be the most important part of not only your mental health but also your lifestyle. So I will explain you five necessary steps that will help you to do this.
STEP 1. EXERCISE AND MEDITATE DAILY
A lot of people will ask, “Are you serious? Such a deadly pandemic is going on and you are advising us to exercise? We can’t stroll or go to the gyms, sorry.” Hey, I am not advising you to step out from your homes but let me tell you that you can exercise and meditate without any kind of equipment. You don’t have to step out from your home at all.
There is no need of dumbbell or any equipment. Your arms, legs, waist, neck and back require movement. If your any body part doesn’t get exercise properly, it will lead to a frequent ache. Just like some people lift dumbbells, there is a certain part of body which is working. Yes, most of the people only perform certain exercises but forget to look over others. If you don’t create workout for your back then it might lead to back pain.
SO WHAT DO YOU MEAN BY EXERCISE?
According to the gym instructors, exercise for them means building abs or muscles but for me exercise is the overall physical effort carried out to improve physical fitness. Even if you don’t join a regular gym and just perform simple exercises, you can actually remain more fit and healthy than a person joining a gym.
Gym instructors will only show you exercises that can lose or gain weight and building muscles. Actually gym is not a healthy way to remain fit. You need a workout that will help you to improve your overall performance. And that’s why in this quarantine you have to maintain your overall physical health.
SO WHY EXERCISE IS IMPORTANT?
All of you might have this obvious question. Instead you can also ask, what is the connection of exercise with mental health? We all have listened from our childhood that exercise is necessary to maintain physical fitness. But apart from physical fitness one of the main part that is also improving is your mental fitness.
Mental fitness is interlinked with your physical fitness. Just take an example, the most common frequent ache is of spine which is related to your back. Can you focus on your work or on your studies when you are suffering through a back pain? Will your efficiency be the same? Absolutely no, because it irritates your mind.
Your brain constantly signals you about it through those nerves. A human brain cannot concentrate on multiple things or situation at the same time. So a poor physical fitness will lead to poor mental fitness. You can directly improve your mental fitness by a proper exercise. But it is not same with the mental fitness because the only route is through yourself.
“Remember, improving physical fitness is in your hands but the same does not lie with the mental fitness.”
And that’s why it is necessary to act more sensibly towards this section of our routine because physical health is as important as mental health. Apart from physical exercise there is also something more important called ‘MEDITATION’. If you have heard about it then today is your lucky day. For the people who haven’t then search it on Google.
Meditation connects to a great extent when it comes to mental health. Physical exercise is important but if you want to sense peace then meditation is the key to unlock happiness of your mind. Most of the people think that meditation is a kind of myth that only uneducated people practice it, but no it is not.
Meditation is a cherry on the cake like thing that if you insert that habit in your daily routine, you will automatically sense its long term benefits. In India, most of the people call it as yoga. So if time permits, then please don’t forget to practice meditation.
STEP 2. AVOIDING SOCIAL MEDIA
Any idea, what social media means? Who doesn’t know social media? According to the recent reports, during COVID-19 Pandemic when the world is still under the lockdown, mobile data consumption is said to be at its peak. Quarantine has played a very important role for the billionaires to nearly double their income. Leave this topic about profit and let us jump back to mental health.
SO HOW IS SOCIAL MEDIA IMPACTING OUR MENTAL HEALTH?
If you have been under quarantine during the coronavirus pandemic, then what is that thing which you loved the most? If I prepare reports about this, then the most common answer will be scrolling through social media feed. Isn’t it? Even if you are in dead sleep, you can locate that app on your phone.
Trust me, you can do that too because it has become a habit of every individual from couples to singles. Social media is one of the deadly venom to degrade our mental health. It’s just like, even if you exercise daily but your mind won’t feel good at all. Social media has become an excessively one of the hot discussed topics on the internet, which is closely related to the mental health because it truly harms you.
Most of the affected ones are the celebrities and famous people. Trust me almost everyone around the world depend on social media for any updates. Social media is actively becoming popular because it’s an addiction. In simple terms, social media is used for every purpose.
When it comes to entertainment, we use social media. When it comes to chatting with someone, social media is the only relying option. If we want to create content or creating ideas, social media is the only way to do it.
This is what we think and because of this thinking, we have been triggered. If you love to sleep late at night and wake up late in the morning, then this is because of social media. Social media is the main target for each one us to get rid of it because slowly and gradually it is killing our mind.
Do you know why celebrities and famous people are trolled on the internet? It’s because of our unstable mind. Trolls has become one of the major disaster for the young famous people because each of them has gone through that phase.
There was a time when we had a mutual respect for every human being, no matter what kind of job they were doing. But now it has vanished because we are more interested to hurt others.
I know that social media is great for content building and for entertainment purpose, but a lot of people don’t know that there are also some negative effects. Have you ever felt a certain kind of anxiety during the home quarantine in the pandemic? Did you feel that disturbance through the quarantine routine? If it’s ‘YES’ then dear you need to delete your social accounts immediately.
Just take this step during this quarantine and it will automatically form into habit. That screen can cause a lot of stress to your eyes which can even affect your eyesight. So don’t fulfill your desires with small options. We need a creative world and not an imaginary world.
We need to live for our own happiness and not for others. Remember most of the people realize mental health awareness when a negative situation kicks in but instead of thinking it at that time take these two easy steps in advance and make your routine more productive.
You Can Also Read:
1.Why Financial Problems Are Arising In COVID-19 Pandemic
2.How News Channels Are Toxic To Your Mental Health
3.Why You Shouldn’t Promote Black Lives Matter Movement