5 Practices to Support Our Mental Health at Work

During stressful times on the job or if you’re an entrepreneur and feeling the heat it is critically important to take care of your mental health. Neglecting our mental state leads to fatigue, emotional outbursts, bad decision-making, and more.

But don’t wait until something is wrong before you think about your mental health. By then the damage to your job or career can be done, and in some situations, irreparable.

Implement the following practices to maintain your mental health and to enable you to effectively manage the stresses that will inevitably come.

Develop connections. It is vital to our mental health to engage with others. We are social beings and gain support and energy from our friendships and relationships with colleagues. Schedule regular time to meet with friends, develop new relationships with co-workers, attend networking events, and seek out meet-ups with others who have similar interests. 

Manage expectations. It’s easy to compare our work performance with others and get down on ourselves for failing to measure up but it is important for our mental health to be realistic and focus on our own strengths and weaknesses.

Take vacation time. In addition to ensuring that we get adequate sleep each night, we need to take advantage of our vacation time to allow ourselves to reset and focus anew on the big picture. Stepping away and getting a change of scenery can do wonders for the soul and help a frustrating or cloudy situation become clearer.

Work with a coach or therapist. Sometimes it is necessary to work with a coach to maintain our mental health. A coach or therapist can provide a different perspective and can help us be more effective in our work. Talk to friends or colleagues to get a referral or recommendation.

Find other sources of joy, fun, and satisfaction. Our lives should not just be about the office. We need hobbies and other interests to better enjoy life and to help us maintain our appreciation for the work we do. Often, by engaging with our curiosity for the world outside the office we can gain new insights that we can apply to our working lives and bring new enthusiasm and purpose to our career.

Paying attention to our mental health and applying practices that support us will reduce the stresses in our job, help us manage the inevitable surprises that accompany change, and help us bring consistent energy and intention to our working lives.