What is mental health?
Mental health means striking a balance in all aspects of ones life: social, physical, spiritual, economic and mental. At times, the balance may be tipped too much in one direction and ones footing has to found again. Everyones personal balance is unique and the challenge is to stay mentally healthy by keeping the right balance. Mental health is as important as physical health. The World Health Organization (WHO) has always considered mental well-being as an integral part of the general definition of health. WHO defines health as a state of complete physical, mental and social well-being and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity. CMHA believes that everyone must have good mental health, including people living with mental illness on a daily basis.
Mental Health is about how you feel about yourself and others and how you deal with the demands of day to day life. It is not the absence of problems, but how you cope with the problems you have. Some of the ways of maintaining your mental health include getting the right amount of sleep, eating a proper diet, and receiving good medical care.
The website section “Mental Health in Alberta” gives some commonly used definitions for mental health. The common thread among them is that positive mental health means striking a balance in all aspect of one’s life: social, physical, spiritual, emotional, economic and mental. Maintaining a healthy balance in these areas means staying mentally healthy or having good mental health. When this balance is disrupted or distorted it can often be a challenge to regain a healthy balance again.
