Mental Health for Meaningful Engagements with Self and Others - A Panel Talk with psychologists and mentors
As the month of mental-health and well-being. We at Garden of Life Introduce to you this panel talk titled "Mental Health for Meaningful Engagements with Self and Others", tackling different aspects of the current and recent "mental hygiene" issues combined with some tips on raising self-awareness of such issues.
Spending hours on social media can have positive yet negative effects too. discussing in details how can our usage of such platforms be utilized to the one's benefit and to maintain a sound level of mental health.
Also, expecting the unexpected becomes sometimes challenging and thus building some skills in facing those challenges is a-must.
All of these topics and more are raised and discussed through this panel talk.
Duaa's part translated from Arabic to English:
Q1: To Duaa, in times like these where we are almost always just reacting due to the noise, instead of actively participating in one's own life - how does one realize and identify that they are in this situation?
At the beginning, I just want to mention a point that with the increasingly rapid life pace right now, it’s hard for the person to expect what’s coming or what’s the next steps to what’s happening. So, the most important thing in this point is - as humans- to accept our limited capabilities to anticipate the unknown events and plan for them, and accept the planning has limitations upon what I only have control over; like for example setting the plan for my work, my study for the next month or the things that I’m responsible about. But, anticipating things like the pandemic we’re living in for example is hard to be anticipated. Therefore, the things we need to work on are: accepting our limited capabilities as humans and secondly working on building more resilience in order to be more flexible in encountering the sudden and unexpected events that happen and will happen.
Q2: could limiting access to social media and setting a personal boundary be solutions? What else could be utilized as tool to battle such demands; on posting a perfect life when deep inside things are unravelling?
Using social media is like any other behaviour or activity we do like eating or shopping, so it’s unfair to look at using social media as a right or wrong behaviour but what can be helpful in such matter is imagining that social media has 2 spectrums which are 1- the benefits we get out of these social media platforms 2- the risks we’re getting exposed to by using these social media channels.
All of us swing between these 2 polars of the spectrum from time to time. That’s why it’s so important to where am I from using these channels. Hence, limiting or stopping using these channels isn’t a solution. The solution is to be aware while using social media. Who am I following? Why am I following these people and this content?
For example, some people scroll when they’re stressed. So awareness is the most important point here. My response to the second part of the question here is that we need to perceive that, for example if I’m following a makeup artist, all I’ll expect from her is a makeup content. Therefore, I mustn’t allow this content to affect my judgement on myself and my life, or getting trapped in comparing myself to these content creators because at the end of the day, he/she won’t change the content they’re aiming to publish.
Q3: I certainly would like to hear and ask this to Duaa, in the context Family, of you as a devoted mother how do we do show and embody support to other women?
Through my experience as a mother at the first place, and as a psychologist, especially during the last year when I started focusing on women and their self-care aspect in particular. Usually because of the education and nurture within the family that girls and women have to sacrifice and put others priority on them, one of the things that as women of all positions overlook is their self-care especially with the cultural background of some societies that are selfish in that aspect; which makes it harder for women to take care of themselves as a priority.
For example, when we ask some women what activity that when you do during your day, you’ll feel relaxed or chilled, some women just dream of having a hot cup of tea but don’t have the time for such small activities or even if they have, they feel embarrassed to do so fearing to be seen as selfish or irresponsible.
Imagine yourself as a mug under the running water of the sink with no break, at some point the water will spill out of the cup, same to us, if we’re exposed to stress (water) all the time, we won’t be able to continue. That’s why it’s so important for women to take break and take care of themselves in order to be able to do their roles efficiently.
Our role as individuals and entities is to raise awareness of women of the importance of their existence and role in life and how important it is to take care of themselves to be able to do their jobs well.
Enjoy your listening!
You can reach out to our panelists through the following links:
Chau:
Website: https://www.myglowjournals.com/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/accounts/login/?next=/myglowjournals/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/myGLOWjournals
Nawal Parkar:
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/nawal-parkar-8a8b887a
Duaa Gafar:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/doaa-mhanna-2657691a3
Interact with us through -
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/GOL_DXB/
Twitter - https://twitter.com/gol_DXB
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/GOL.DXB
LinkedIn - https://linkedin.com/company/garden-of-life-dubai
Italia