> One of the things that is most protective to mental health is not to spend too much of our lives consciously obsessing about it.
That last statement is rather asinine and seems at odds with the rest of the article. I think it's fair to say negative emotions aren't the same as mental illness, but ignoring those negative emotions and keeping a "stiff upper lip" can lead to much bigger emotional problems down the road. There's a middle ground that involves accepting & experiencing the lows along with the highs as a part of life.
Well the author is certainly privileged to not have to think about his own mental health very much, considering who he is and what he does for a living.
The real thing that's happening with mental health in the US and probably the UK is that people aren't so much deciding that their personal problems are diagnosable psychiatric conditions as they are deciding that they would like to become mentally healthier and are seeking help. And the medical profession, being ill-equipped to actually provide a means to change, is turning to psychiatric medicines to control what are essentially patterns of thinking and being. At the gym it would be like people seeking to become better and instead of receiving personal training they would be given steroids.
I was one of those people who wanted to change how I thought about things and how I acted. And so I sought therapy not necessarily because I had a clinical disorder, but because there were a lot of probably sub-clinical issues I was having with my thinking, and having someone rational and well-trained helped me change my thinking and my behavior so it was no longer causing problems for me. Frankly I was nearing a meltdown of some sort.
It's not the same as needing psychiatric care for a personality disorder or for Schizophrenia or for any number of treatable, identifiable psychiatric disorders. But he's standing up this straw man that people like me are just wimps and they just need to suck it up and have a cup of tea or something. It's pretty patronizing.
> ignoring those negative emotions and keeping a "stiff upper lip" can lead to much bigger emotional problems down the road
To me, keeping a "stiff upper lip" isn't so much about ignoring negative emotions, but more about behaving in the right way even when emotions pull you the wrong way. In my experience, exercising that skill doesn't create emotional problems, but solves them.
Be like a rocky promontory against which the restless surf continuously pounds; it stands fast while the churning sea is lulled to sleep at its feet. I hear you say, "How unlucky that this should happen to me!" Not at all! Say instead, "How lucky I am that I am not broken by what has happened and am not afraid of what is about to happen. The same blow might have struck any one, but not many would have absorbed it without capitulation and complaint."
I think I know the kind of people the author is thinking of when he says this. Mental illness is core to their identity, and they think of everything in terms of what will "protect their mental health". It's good to be aware of how you're feeling, but at some point you also have to set your attention to just living your life.
We need to be reflective enough to know when we have a mental health problem and need to do something about it. But it's also true that one of the most common causes of mental health problems are patterns of thought that can be changed by conscious self-discipline. Indeed, that's the basic premise of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy.
I also think there's a social point: we often feel bad because we fear that other people will think less of us for various reasons (money, status, lifestyle). A lot of the time, it's important to resist that natural social impulse and to live on your own terms.
That last statement is rather asinine and seems at odds with the rest of the article. I think it's fair to say negative emotions aren't the same as mental illness, but ignoring those negative emotions and keeping a "stiff upper lip" can lead to much bigger emotional problems down the road. There's a middle ground that involves accepting & experiencing the lows along with the highs as a part of life.