Five tips on looking after your  mental well-being in challenging times

The last 12 months have been something I could have only imagined to be a semi-decent backdrop for a 3-star action movie, but here we are almost a year on having made it through one of the most challenging years in modern history.

Working in the PR industry, where everything is fast-paced, high pressured and heavily driven by face-to-face communications, 2020 turned everyday PR life upside down. Gone were the days where I could meet with a client for a strategy meeting or meeting new people at a buzzing networking event. Instead, it was exchanged for zoom calls that tested the strongest of broadband connections.

With the drastic change last year, I have felt stressed, sad, angry plus a multitude of other emotions. One of the emotions that stood out the most was guilt, guilt for having any emotions at all because the whole world is going through the same thing and there were people out there that were worse off than me.

However, that mentality didn’t stop me from being in pyjamas non-stop or fighting the urge to sleep all day. It is important to acknowledge and take steps to improve our mental well-being.

I found myself remembering a great PRCA course focusing on stress management and mental health, they gave me some great tips that I have incorporated in my everyday life to help me with taking better care of my mental health.

They introduced me to the five pillars of wellbeing:

• Connect – speak to someone instead of sending a text, build your relationships.
• Be active – physical activity increases the heart rate and lowers depression and anxiety rates.
• Take notice – taking the time to be aware of what is happening in the present.
• Learn – continued learning increases self-esteem and encourages social interaction and more active life.
• Give – it has been reported that an individual who has a great interest in helping others are more likely to rate themselves as happy

I took on board as many of the pillars as I could, I joined the masses and started running like I was going to compete in the next Olympics, I started volunteering at a local charity that focused on giving food to those worst hit by the pandemic and I made sure to speak with my team via video chat at least once a day.

As we navigate this new year with all the lessons from the last year and a promising solution for the pandemic, I hope we all take time to ensure that we consider incorporating the pillars and taking care of our mental well-being.