When life becomes hectic, it's easy to place your mental health on the backburner. But in doing so, you also leave a cloud of anxiety and stress in your mind that stops you from living fully and meaningfully.
Supporting your mental health is just as important as caring for your physical or financial health. Your mental health affects every aspect of your life from the food you eat to the sleep schedules you practice.
We're here to tell you that prioritizing your mental health is so important. That’s why for Mental Health Awareness Month, we’re highlighting the benefits of living simply!
Living simply is an easy way to practice self-care. The World Health Organization defines self-care as “the ability of individuals, families, and communities to promote health, prevent disease, maintain health and to cope with illness and disability with or without the support of a healthcare provider.”
At Clarity, we like to think of self-care as a simple act of compassion for ourselves. While you can practice simplicity and self-care in nearly any aspect of life, we’ve identified four core areas of focus: space, finances, time, and health.
Take a look at these simply smarter ways you can support your mental health by incorporating simplicity.
- Space: There are truly 4 easy steps to simplifying your space: Start Small, Declutter, Organize and Maintain. Practice these steps at home, work, the garage or anywhere that feels right to you. When you have less clutter to worry about, your mind is free to practice the care you need to keep you in tip-top shape! Read more about simplifying your space here.
- Finance: For many of us, our finances can add an incredible amount of stress and complexity to our lives. But did you know there are simple ways you can ease that stress? Try placing 1 monthly bill on autopay or creating a simple budget for the month. By planning the money that’s coming in versus the money coming out, you can better budget your finances and alleviate the stress of the unexpected.
- Time: How many times have you found yourself saying “there just aren’t enough hours in the day”? It’s an all too familiar saying that is so relatable. But what if we told you that you could make more time in your day? No it’s not magic. It’s time management! Some simple steps you can take to add more time to your day could be planning out your weekly errands ahead of time so you can group the tasks and knock them all out in a trip or two. Often, spreading tasks out over different days can eat up more of your oh-so-precious time. And giving yourself time is crucial for mental health.
- Health: We know what you’re thinking… How can you easily simplify your health? The truth is, there are dozens of ways you can incorporate simplicity into your health! Establish (and stick to) a morning routine. Prep a healthy lunch the night before work. Chop all your veggies for the week on one day so they’re easily ready for dinner all week long. By creating healthy habits in your physical health, your mental health will thank you!
It’s never too late to start implementing simplicity into your life! By creating a culture of simplicity around these four core areas, you can develop the mental clarity you need to practice positive self-care.
While it may not always seem that important to prioritize, putting your mental health first will positively impact so many areas of your life. One of the best things you can do for your mental health is to practice simplicity in your spaces, finances, time and health.
At Clarity Benefit Solutions, we believe life is a journey; one that should be lived well. Our goal is to bring clarity into the challenging world of benefits and utilize technology to simplify benefit administration, reduce costs and empower our customers.
With a full suite of consumer benefits, we offer reliable solutions that ease pain points, provide clear direction, and lack unnecessary complexity. After all, simplicity is the key to living well. Simplicity is at the heart of our company and in the details of everything we do from championing National Simplicity Day to our Simply Smarter Approach to employee benefits. This mindset has led to thoughtful new ways for all of us to get the most out of our benefits and to ensure that people are ready for whatever comes their way.
Sources:
https://www.verywellhealth.com/self-care-definition-and-examples-5212781#citation-1
