Because It Can Worsen Mental Health, Reduce These 9 Habits

Illustration of reducing bad habits (Unsplash / Anthony Tran)

JAKARTA - Mental health is important because it affects all aspects of life. Starting from how to think, make decisions, solve problems to act. If the mental state is imbalanced, it can possibly interfere with physical health.

Therefore, mental health needs to be worked on at least for oneself while sharing knowledge with those closest to you. So, for this reason, the habits below need to be reduced because they can worsen mental health.

Always want to be superior

Perfectionists or always want to be superior is indeed one way to achieve success. However, the need to be perfect can undermine any accomplished effort. Launching Careers In Psychology, Wednesday, April 21, psychologists describe two sides of perfectionism.

There are negative and vice versa, positive. Positive perfectionism can help a person do their best. Positive effects of perfectionism habits include setting realistic goals, accepting failure, and seeing mistakes as opportunities to do better.

With this perspective, anxiety and stress can be overcome and the process can be more enjoyable. Meanwhile, negative perfectionism is an ambition beyond one's own abilities. Whatever is done is considered imperfect, clinging to failure, and always contradicting the proposed solution.

Bad posture

According to research published in the Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry, simply sitting up straight can reduce depression. A number of other studies have shown good posture can improve self-esteem and mood.

Plus, good posture promotes a positive attitude, reduces fatigue. This means, pay attention to your sitting position while working or reading. Also improve the standing that only rests on one side of the sole of the foot.

Guilty feeling

Frequent feelings of guilt are often cultivated from childhood. When you behave the way you are, for fear that your family will not be proud, you feel guilty. The grip of guilt gets tighter as you get older.

If guilt is allowed to grow steadily, it can prevent a person from paying full attention to a task.

Lack of exercise

Lack of movement has a negative impact on waist circumference, heart and mental health. Regular exercise can release endorphins and chemicals that contribute to feeling good. Other positive effects include boosting the immune system and being more calming.

Misjudged failure

Negative thoughts will never last, neither now nor in the future. Even with feelings of failure that can enlarge and interfere with your ability to achieve success. Being surrounded by feelings of failure makes life feel gloomy, miserable, and hopeless.

Illustration of failure (Unsplash / Markus Spiske)

Don't let the habit of condemning failure damage your mental health. Start over from scratch and set goals.

Excessive access to social media

The survey reported in The Telegraph found 62 percent of the 1,500 adult Twitter and Facebook users felt inadequate and 60 percent reported jealousy because they compared themselves with other social media users.

Thirty percent of them said they they were lonely. So, be aware of usage limits to minimize negative effects on mental health.

Using a device is not limited by time

Anything that is excessive will not have a good effect, including using the device indefinitely. According to research from the Journal of Effective Disorders, compulsive use of devices can exacerbate symptoms of depression, anxiety, chronic stress, and low self-esteem.

Dependency

Dependence on other people and family can interfere with one's abilities. In fact, healthy, mutually satisfying relationships can suffer when dependent on others.

Psychology uses the term co-dependency to describe the chemical bonds of the two partners. But now it is widely used to describe a one-sided relationship.

Dependency illustration (Unsplash / Viktor Mogilat)

Dependent habits include sacrificing yourself to look after others. It can even happen when you place the wants of others before your own needs. Addiction can take away individuality as well as be harmful to mental health and well-being.

Regret 💦

In a small way, regret is a healthy emotional state as long as it doesn't become a habit. Regret, from a research report cited by Psychology Today, is more often experienced by someone in certain cultures. A culture that has more control over one's life choices.

On the other hand, from the amount of control to make life choices, habits of regret can cause depression, anxiety, difficulty concentrating and even destroy sleep patterns. Well, bad sleep habits also have an effect on mental health.

From the nine list of bad habits above, one by one can be minimized in order to get mental health.