Why You Need Mental Fitness Always

Even if you practice healthy lifestyle through adequate exercise and healthy food to keep yourself in good shape, but if you are ignoring your mental fitness, you are taking care of your overall health only partially. Mental fitness is imperative for your overall fitness, without which you will be left feeling less motivated. You are also going to feel drained out and won’t be at your best to take care of yourself. As a result you are more likely to be sidelined or tempted to make unhealthy choices leaving yourself deprived of all the best experiences life has to offer.

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Living an optimum health means living life each day to its fullness, which is outright impossible without your mental health. You are also greatly limiting your potential to live other areas of fitness. Each area of fitness work together in harmony to create a synergy level of fitness that is greater than the sum of its part.

 The importance of mental fitness

Mental fitness means you are taking care of your mental and emotional needs. It could be anything from effectively managing your stress, depression, anxiety to having enough quota of sleep at night, challenging your brain and connecting with others. If you are already taking care of your physical fitness needs and taking enough nutritious food, you must have already observed much improvement in your mental fitness.

However there are still much scope of improvement in this direction which will inadvertently also help you improve your physical fitness. Taking care of your mental aspect will connect you with your body which is so important for an effective physical fitness and overall health. Find below few tips and techniques that will help you improve your mental fitness.

 Visualization

Visualization is a kind of mental technique that is beneficial in improving all areas of your life. In this technique, in your mind you visualize things with great detail that you want in your life. Visualization is a technique to speak to your subconscious mind. It is pivotal in bridging the gap between your present reality and the reality you desire to live by eliminating the “I can’t” factor from the big picture. When you visualize yourself achieving the unachievable, you are actually defeating your greatest obstacle which is your own fear.

 Thoughts that you can use to think yourself thin

It only takes few minutes a day to practice visualization. Find a peaceful and calm place in your house where you can practice visualization without disturbance. Ideally the best time to practice visualization is morning since your mind will be calm and you will be able to connect with your subconscious mind better.  Sit down comfortably and close your eyes. Picture yourself achieving your goals. Picture every detail that goes into achieving your goals. Feel it with emotions and rise as you visualize yourself successfully achieving your goals in your mind.

Like for example if your goal is to run 5K, picture yourself at the race in your imagination, with closed eyes. Imagine details like cloths and athlete gears that you are wearing. Feel the weather and the sound of other runners around you. Visualize yourself hearing the starting bell and feel yourself begin to run. Feel the excitement and adrenaline flowing through your veins and at last imagine the thrill of hitting the finish line with scores of people cheering you on. Feel the sense of excitement and accomplishment.

 Relaxation

With so much to juggle each day from work life, family life, kids and personal commitment, it is natural for anyone to be stressed out. The kind of demanding life we are living, it is rather easy for stress to creep up on us quickly. It is around this time when stress takes a toll on our overall health and it has to be addressed effectively and efficiently. Relaxation plays an important role in stress management. By practicing relaxation technique daily you can effectively rescue yourself from stressful situation before it adversely impacts your health.

Practicing relaxation daily means religiously taking out time each day to unplug yourself from the chaos of daily life and find some solitude. You can take this a step further by using this time to practice deep breathing while keeping your eyes closed. Take a deep long breath and blow it out slowly. When you practice deep breathing, your mind is forced to move its attention from the chaos of daily life and concentrate its attention on breathing.

Meditation is also an effective tool to visualize. Close your eyes and make effort to empty your mind from all kinds of thoughts and just connect with present moment. Listen and feel every sound, feel the energy of your body, feel every breath of it and practice to release all your thoughts as they crop in your mind.

 Connection

Connecting with others is important for your overall health and fitness. Socializing and spending time with others helps in releasing stress and releasing endorphins. When you connect with others and talk, you process your emotions. Friendship and family connection is important to feel safe and loved.

You can also volunteer to take the connection a step further by reaching out to others in need and performing acts of kindness or just being there with them at their time of crisis. The intrinsic gratification that you receive by performing acts of kindness will leave you feeling good about yourself at the deepest level.

 Gratitude

The art of daily gratitude is the simplest, yet most important thing you can do every day for your mental fitness. It has been proven through several studies that shifting your focus to positive things in your life can dramatically improve your happiness. It helps in keeping you focused on how far you have come and how much you have achieved, instead of dragging yourself in the destructive spiral of lamenting your failures.

Practicing gratitude is simple. All that you have to do is write 3 to 5 things daily that you are thankful for.  Let go of negative thoughts by just acknowledging them. By doing so you provide yourself an opportunity to move ahead is life and be thankful for everything good that you receive in life.