a story in progress

This is my first ever #Blog4MH post! I'm so excited (and to be honest kinda nervous) to share my story and thoughts with you all. 💖

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I developed a love of psychology during high school. Neuroscience and the brain fascinated me and I would spend extra time focusing on memorizing the structure and functions. This lead me to the topic of mental health and illness. I started to think:

What is mental health?

The definition from the World Health Organization website is

• a state of well-being in which every individual realizes his or her own potential, can cope with the normal stresses of life, can work productively and fruitfully, and is able to make a contribution to her or his community

This definition really got me to reflect on how I was doing and how I was feeling.

It used to be increasingly difficult for me to focus on, well, anything. I was always worried about failure and had developed this bad habit of comparing my accomplishments to others. I was always putting myself down. It wasn't until my senior year of high school and first semester of college that I started to see that I have potential to do great things. It is hard sometimes, but I'm trying to stop those bad habits. And this effort, although small, is one of my greatest accomplishments.

I have realized that mental health and psychology aren't just terms and concepts. It's personal. Everyone has mental health. It's important that we are aware of it and take care of ourselves when we need it. 💜