Simple Practices for Better Mental Health

October is Mental Health Month, and we’ve come a long way in having open conversations about mental health over the last decade. These conversations are a great starting point, they help people recognise when something isn’t right and guide them toward getting help and taking action.

It must also be acknowledged that our minds are extremely powerful. A significant part of everyday anxiety and stress comes from repetitive patterns in the mind. The mind can easily keep you replaying dangers, risks, and anxieties, because it’s wired to protect your survival, that’s its job. If you want to change this tendency, you need to learn how to guide your mind out of these patterns, rather than being carried along by them.

Here are 3 short, effective practices that can help shift these patterns, bolster your mental health, and give you more mastery over your own mind.

Breath Control – The breath changes to support your psychological state and because the nervous system works on feedback loops we can change the breath to shift our psychological state. 

Take a 3 second inhale and a 5 second exhale, do this for 3 minutes, the longer exhale slows down your heart rate and is a safety signal for your nervous system. You can use this to slow down a racing mind during the day.

Mindfulness – most of our suffering happens because our minds are stuck in the past or future. You can learn to spend more time in the present moment through your senses.

Move through 5 things you can see, 4 things you can hear, 3 things you can feel, 2 things you can taste, 1 thing you can smell. Our senses are only absorbing what is happening in the present moment so if you are aware of them you too are in the present. When feeling overwhelmed bring in this practice to redirect your mind.

Meditation – our minds often get stuck in automatic negative thoughts (ANTs). By practicing meditation we get to see the dominant thought patterns and can start to ask if they are true, fair or serving us. We then have the awareness to move away or interrupt those thought patterns.

A simple meditation is Zen Breath Counting – notice each inhale and exhale, count them up until 12 breaths, each time your mind wanders start again at 1, each time you get to 12 start again at 1. Try it for 3 minutes. Through this you are developing the circuitry in the brain to direct your awareness where you want it.

None of these practices require special equipment, an app, or an hour out of your day, just a few minutes and a willingness to try. Pick one, practice it this week, and notice what shifts.

Or sign up for the fortnightly WiBF Meditation series to be guided through these techniques and many more.

And if you’re dealing with something heavier than everyday stress, these practices work best alongside professional support.