Building better mental health in the Fashion Industry

Strategies to Boost Mood, Build Resilience and Increase Happiness

Your mental health influences how you think, feel and behave in daily life. It also affects your ability to cope with stress, overcome challenges, build relationships, and recover from life’s setbacks and hardships. Whether you are looking to deal with a particular mental health problem, handle your emotions better, or only to feel more confident and energetic, there are plenty of things you can do to take control of your mental health—starting today.

What does it mean to be mentally healthy?

Mental health refers to your overall psychological well-being. It includes the way you feel about yourself, the quality of your relationships, and your ability to manage your feelings and deal with difficulties.

Good mental health is not just the absence of mental disorders. Being mentally or emotionally healthy is much more than being free of depression, anxiety, or other psychological issues. Rather than the absence of mental illness, mental health refers to the presence of positive characteristics.

People who are mentally healthy have:

• A sense of contentment
• A zest for living and the ability to laugh and have fun.
• The ability to deal with stress and bounce back from adversity.
• A sense of meaning and purpose, in both their activities and their relationships.
• The flexibility to learn new things and adapt to change.
• A balance between work and play, rest and activity, etc.
• The ability to build and maintain fulfilling relationships.
• Self-confidence and high self-esteem.

These positive characteristics of mental and emotional health allow you to participate in life to the fullest extent possible in productive, meaningful activities and strong relationships. These positive characteristics also help you cope when faced with life's challenges and stresses.

The relationship between resilience and mental health

Being mentally healthy doesn't mean going through bad times or experiencing emotional problems. We all go through disappointments, loss, and change. Moreover, while these are healthy parts of life, they can still cause sadness, anxiety, and stress. However, just as physically healthy people are better able to bounce back from illness or injury, individuals with stable mental health are better able to bounce back from adversity, trauma, and stress. This ability is called resilience.

People who are emotionally and mentally resilient have the tools for coping with difficult situations and maintaining a positive outlook. They remain focused, flexible, and productive in bad times as well as good. Their resilience also makes them less afraid of new things or an uncertain future. Even when they do not immediately know how a problem will get resolved, they feel hope that a solution will eventually be found.

Authors: Melinda Smith, M.A., Robert Segal, M.A., Lawrence Robinson and Jeanne Segal, PhD.