Considering how extremely fast-paced life is, it’s nearly impossible to keep up with everything without making necessary sacrifices. Unfortunately, one’s mental health tends to get the short end of the stick. Most of society will reason that all you need to get by is your physical body—no one has the time to accommodate your mental well-being. Therefore, it’s not unheard of for people to overlook their mental health.
What they don’t know is how much influence your mental state has. Naturally, your physical body will produce results. But since your mental health is affected, the process of creating these wanted results will be hindered, regardless of whether it’s within personal or professional circles. So, instead of only having one area affected, a troubled mental state can easily snowball through other aspects of your life, too.
How Does Your Mental Health Affect Your Relationship?
People are social creatures. Therefore, making connections is never out of the question. Even introverts are found interacting with living beings besides people, particularly animals. So, it’s safe to say that relationships almost take up most of your life. And your mental health can easily influence the state of these relationships.
Normally, relationships are built through communication. Regardless of whether it’s verbal or by other means, relaying one’s thoughts to another serves as the groundwork for a connection to take place. After all, is there any other way for society to build from the ground up other than through communication?
Although, as helpful as it is to communicate, that doesn’t mean every chance to do so will be perfect. Because as mentioned earlier, mental health issues could easily influence your day-to-day life. Once that happens, any form of communication you do is compromised. As a result, it’s affecting your relationships as well.
What Is Mental Health Counseling?
As troublesome as it is, there’s no way of ‘fixing’ one’s mental state with a snap of your finger. Doctors everywhere can simply prescribe you treatment for physical ailments after a quick check-up. They might even recommend some routine exercises to help your body fight back any infection. But that’s not the case for your mental health.
With physical ailments it’s easy to run a diagnosis to pinpoint the damage before offering treatment options. After all, everyone has roughly the same biology despite having different appearances. Therefore, it’s easy to identify any anomalies within the patient’s body with multiple references in hand.
On the other hand, your mental health didn’t worsen due to the change of weather, or being infected by a virus or bacteria. Your mental state has likely been rooted from a long time ago, even during childhood. That said, mental health counseling may help in unraveling that complicated pathway to smooth it out for better understanding.
Although if you dive deeper into it, mental health counseling (also called psychotherapy) is an approach that most people may consider to be confusing. Even though it’s similar in nature to the general medical field, this approach focuses on fortifying the partnership between patient and professional for any progress to occur.
With mental health institutions such as Insight Northwest Counseling growing in number by the day, more and more people are starting to participate in such counseling services. Here, patients explore different problems with their counselor.
Since some of these problems delve into heavier and more sensitive topics, there’s no one but their counselor who can help their patient in their path. Once these sessions are successful, patients are guaranteed to have their mindset honed into approaching similar problems head-on instead of succumbing to their mental issues.
How Can It Improve Your Relationship?
No one can dispute the fact that the mind is a complicated thing. It can either be your biggest motivator or your worst critic. But regardless, you’re expected to live with it. However, that doesn’t mean you should suffer the entire time because the longer you experience that level of trauma, the more likely you’ll compromise any relationship you have in your life. After all, juggling your issues while maintaining connections is hard work. And that’s why mental health counseling strives to remove some of the weight from your shoulders.
- Acts As A Safe Space
As mentioned earlier, it’s difficult to keep your mental health issues at bay, especially if you want to prevent them from affecting your relationships. Since one way or another, relationships are created out of necessity. You’re expected to build relationships with your fellow employees in professional circles. Although there are no expectations, connecting to people at a personal level is meant to act as your support when you need it most.
But even though you’ve connected with these people successfully, it’s not always sunshine and rainbows the entire time you’re together. After all, everyone has different outlooks and personalities. While they’re refreshing for some time, having differences creates friction in any relationship.
People will develop various reasons behind their reluctance to clear up the tension. However, most of them boil down to risk. You’ve invested time and effort in keeping this relationship. But relationships are built from communication in the first place. For everyone involved to have a chance to say their piece meant they’re all at equal standing in the relationship. Removing that from the equation is akin to getting the dirt swept under the rug.
This is what mental health counseling is for, to serve as a space where you can breathe out your worries. Besides, without the tension of ruining any relationships, you have the freedom to express what’s on your mind. Once you’ve divulged everything you wanted to say, you’re left with a clear mind and a better opportunity to discuss your concerns with your counselor. This way they can develop ways for you to better handle those difficulties in the future.
- Sets Down Boundaries
There’s always a risk when getting into a relationship, be it professional, romantic, platonic, or whatever your intention might be. Since it is empowering to build connections wherever you go, you’re still terrified of ruining them. After all, you’ve invested yourself in this person. So, to ruin your relationship with them means ruining a part of yourself, too.
This line of thinking often leads to boundary problems. Fear has always been an effective catalyst, after all. With that strong emotion, it’s bound to lead people down paths where they never expected to go before. With that said, you might be inclined to consider breaking out of your comfort zone.
In any other context, that would’ve sounded ideal. However, there’s a line that needs to be drawn once you’re going outside your own limits for the sake of another. But the worst part is knowing that all your efforts may be one-sided.
As you can see, there’s nothing ‘noble’ about sacrificing your comfort. If anything, this only casts your relationship adrift because of false expectations. Since you’ve approached a counselor, they’ll emphasize your wants and needs. As a result, you’ll be taught how to set boundaries until you eventually learn to do it on your own. Once that happens, you’ll have stable ground in your future relationships.
- Encourages Exploration
Nowadays, it’s almost impossible to find time for yourself. There’s practically no room for your thoughts to wander between work, social circles, and responsibilities. But having an appointment with a mental health counseling session grants you a space where your thoughts are encouraged to flow.
Admittedly, this is bound to be a challenge, especially if it’s rare for you to open up. However, with the encouragement from a professional, you’ll find your foothold eventually. When that happens, you’re free to express yourself as much as you want and you’ll have the opportunity to improve your interpersonal skills. Hence, boosting your chances of creating more relationships and deepening the ones you have now.
- Multiple Approaches For Different Problems
As mentioned earlier, it’s so easy to lose your balance when it comes to relationships. For them to work, everyone should do their part. Otherwise, self-destructive traits could grow inside you, such as:
- Disregarding your boundaries
- Co-dependency
- Explosive temperament
Those are only some of the most well-known toxic traits, yet these traits may occur at varying levels of severity. Fortunately, mental health institutions typically have professionals equipped to handle patients depending on the gravity of their condition. So, with their counselor’s expertise they can help their patients to get rid of toxic traits by using facts and providing them with healthier alternatives to tackle them instead.
Takeaway
Mental health is just as important as one’s physical body. Because while it’s nearly impossible to function properly with a compromised body, the same applies if you’re plagued with mental health issues. Keep in mind that these issues could easily influence other aspects of your life, especially your relationships.
However, handling these issues isn’t as simple as having a check-up with any typical doctor. Considering how complex the mind works, only those who specialize in it could help you. Therefore, scheduling an appointment with a mental health counselor can improve your mental state. By extension, your relationships as well.
