Emotional wellness is the ability to deal with life’s ups and downs, and adapt to the many changes and uncertainties that we face at each stage in our lives. It involves a state of balance and harmony — with yourself and the world — wherein you have the capacity to process all your emotions, both positive and negative, in a constructive manner without being overwhelmed by them.
Many people think that emotional well-being is only about being in a positive mindset no matter what life throws at you and trying to find the silver lining in everything. While optimism is a valued personality trait to have and does give you the power to positively deal with every situation you are in, the core value of emotional well-being lies in focusing on both the good and the bad. When you focus only on the “happy” emotions and repress all negative feelings, you may eventually end up feeling emotionally exhausted and drained as you bottle things up instead of dealing with them in the right way. Negative emotions are undoubtedly difficult to deal with, but they act as checks that alert you to things that may not be OK in your life.
For example, constantly fearing going into work might indicate that you’re not feeling professionally fulfilled; but ignoring this feeling can lead to burnout or depression. To really build yourself up emotionally, you must be able and willing to manage all your feelings, express yourself effectively and authentically, and maintain healthy relationships with others and yourself.
Naturally, your emotional well-being is deeply intertwined with the state of your mental health. Mental health conditions like depression and anxiety make it harder for us to cope with our emotions properly. At the same time, how we deal with our emotions impacts not just our mental health but also our physical well-being. Repressed emotions can drain us of our mental energies, lead to chronic stress, and also cause a slew of health issues, such as hypertension, cardiovascular disease, and digestive disorders. This, in turn, affects our overall quality of life and may hamper our intellectual growth, disrupt our ability to work, grow our personalities and maintain relationships.
How to maintain and improve your emotional wellness
- Practice mindfulness and be self-aware: Self-reflection and mindfulness help us better understand our own emotional patterns and how we respond to them. Although it requires a certain amount of discipline and commitment, mindfulness is a simple yet effective practice. It’s about being completely aware of what’s happening in the present — what’s happening in the world around you and how you’re reacting to all of that in the present moment. Mindfulness helps us understand how we’re feeling and creates a path for us to delve deeper into that emotion. It means not living life on “autopilot” and being conscious of your present emotions and thoughts. Mindfulness includes simple, everyday activities that help you connect with your inner self, such as walks in nature, practicing the body scan technique or other relaxation exercises, as well as actively observing your feelings and thoughts through meditation practices. Such activities can help you to pause for a moment and take stock of the present you’re inhabiting, enable developing healthy coping strategies and ultimately build a deeper understanding of yourself.
- Develop healthy coping mechanisms: We all experience stress and negative emotions in our lives. A bad day at work, a difficult conversation with a loved one, things not working according to plan — there’s no way out of these difficult situations but going through them. While it’s natural to be upset, we have to avoid letting these situations get the best of us and ensure to not devleop unhealthy coping mechanisms to deal with them. You can identify these habits by observing the activities or feelings you turn to when you’re stressed. Feelings of hopelessness, self-deprecation, self-pity, staying isolated, or even things like excessive consumption of alcohol, overeating, and oversleeping are signs you are relying on unhealthy ways that come at a personal cost and don’t work for you either in the short or long term. Motivate yourself to step away from these by recognizing that they won’t fill in the void you feel inside, and instead redirect your attention to healthy habits that improve overall wellness, such as yoga and working out, journaling and eating well.
- Strengthen your social connections: We need to surround ourselves with people who care about us in order to live a meaningful and satisfying life. Strong social connections help us build emotional wellness because they make us more empathetic and also increase our self-esteem. People who feel more connected to others also tend to have lower levels of anxiety and depression, whereas a lack of social connections can make us feel more isolated. In a world that increasingly focuses on the individual only, building a community of care is beneficial for all of us. This doesn’t require much, even something as low-effort as chatting up your neighbours, calling your loved ones, joining online or offline groups that share your interests, or volunteering to help out with community efforts — all of these give us an opportunity to connect with more people. Having a support system and being surrounded by loved ones makes us more emotionally resilient as well, giving us the confidence to deal with our emotions more fruitfully.
- Learn to deal with loss: Grief and loss are difficult emotions that are very hard to overcome, and they are also inevitable in everyone’s lives. The Kübler-Ross grief cycle — a framework on grief proposed by Swiss-American psychiatrist Elisabeth Kübler-Ross in her 1969 book titled "On Death and Dying" — notes, rising above grief follows five stages — denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance. As we process these emotions, we create a framework that helps us deal with the loss and move on. Shift your focus on rebuilding your life around the loss, instead of trying to fill up the vacuum through denial. Remind yourself to be grateful for what you have and don’t be afraid to fall back on your support systems when you can’t bring yourself to focus on the light at the end of the tunnel. When we use a positive approach to deal with our feelings of grief and loss, we create space for greater emotional well-being.
- Set healthy boundaries: Sometimes the lack of any boundaries in our relationships can also be the cause of emotional distress. Setting boundaries early on in any relationship ensures that your own well-being is not hampered by issues caused in the relationship. This doesn't mean that you don't care for the other person or won't prioritize any of their needs over yours. Rather, it means that you see both yourself and the other person as equal individuals worthy of respect and affection. In order to set boundaries, you must have an honest, open conversation and be direct about your feelings.
