Walking your way to a healthier mind

There is a strong focus in the media, the news, in business and education at the moment on mental health and healthy mind. This is due in part to staggering statistic that one in every four people will experience an issue with their mental health each year. This can range anything from a period of high stress or anxiety right through to a diagnosable condition such as bipolar disorder or post traumatic stress disorder.

Some conditions will need to be closely monitored and may require the need for medication and perhaps therapy of one form or another. But there are things that someone with mental health problems can do to help themselves. Mindfulness is one such technique and this can take a number of different forms.

It could be sitting quietly listening to your own breath for five to ten minutes each day and just noticing how your body feels and where you hold any tension. You can then start to work on trying to the release these areas of tension. When we become anxious and stress it can eb easy for us to metaphorically leave our bodies and start to disassociate from them. This is where mindfulness comes into play as it makes you notice your body and notice the things around you. This can help you to feel ground and that in itself can help to regulate some of the stressful and anxious feelings.

Once you start to feel stronger you may want to look for people like motivational speakers such as adventureman who may inspire you with their talks and their passion. It is important to make sure that you are feel more secure and grounded in yourself before listening to anyone else talk about their journeys and first time around pick someone who’s story is not going to make you feel triggered in your own emotions.

Walking is an amazing exercise that is also incredible for your mind, especially if you combine it with some mindfulness practices. On a warm Spring day take a walk out into the countryside and rather than let you brain worry about the work deadline that you have to meet or how you are going to pay for your broken boiler try to encourage your mind to focus on your surroundings. You could focus on a particular and note how that makes you feel or whether you can feel the warm sun on our back and what sounds you can hear around you. By the time you have returned from your walk you will be feeling much less stressed and the good news is that the positive effects of a walk on your mental health can last for around seven hours after you have returned.