Understanding Mental Health and Happiness: Amudim

okay I'll introduce myself just for a minute my name is AI Landa I've been working in various forms of psychology for over 20 years now and I do do counseling and I do work in a school but here I'm here in my capacity as Director of Education for amudim amudim amudim dorg it's an amazing resource it's an amazing Organization for the Jewish Community when it comes to mental health both in terms of helping people in crisis helping people deal with ious mental health challenges but also helping people educate understand prevent have better knowledge and awareness of things so that we can stay healthy and remain healthy and that's what I'm here to talk to you about today I'm going to try to leave some time at the end for some questions so if you have any questions throughout you could feel free to raise your hand if I can stop I will otherwise keep in mind your questions we'll have some time at the end to answer them I want to begin today with a question of my own to you what does it mean to be happy how would you define happiness there are all sorts of things you could think of in terms of State of Mind in terms of what you might do how would you define happiness yeah so joyfulness is like a synonym yeah being able to do things that you like to do being fortunate to be able to do that feeling good about yourself so feeling good about yourself self-esteem that definitely an important one having friends that's a big one we're going to elaborate on that yeah in the back okay so recognizing from a very chemical perspective the neurotransmitter dopamine which has a tremendous effect on our brain in terms of our mood that that's well in balance and that's in good proportion and there are various things we do or don't do that help to sustain that so really we're talking kind of the step before that what we do to help promote that yeah anybody else okay so I'm here to propose that it has nothing to do with how much money we have and what we buy and it has everything to do with three specific criteria now to be extra clear I am not saying that somebody who's very affluent and Rich cannot be happy that's crazy we know that's not true you can have many very affluent people who are very happy but you can also have many people who are at average wealth and can be very happy in fact if you have a low level if you're in the poverty level it can be very difficult to be happy and in fact psychologists have found that there is a correlation between happiness and money up until you're around the average of your community but once you're at that average beyond that having more stuff more money does not correlate with happiness you could have a lot more and be happy or sad you could have a lot less and be average and be happy or sad so what are the components that determine our happiness anybody think they know one was mentioned already I'll call that out friends or relationships in general having a good relationship with our family members and with our friends is one of the three critical components to having happiness because when we speak about happiness we don't mean thrill riding a roller coaster we mean contentment what we say in Hebrew feeling satisfied feeling content that's the most Good Feeling a person can have in this world that everything's running everything's flowing so good relationships is going to be a key component of that what do you think are the other two anybody have an idea yeah okay so self-esteem I would include that in relationships with like kind of your relationship with yourself although it could connect to one of the other ones yeah so we said finances can have an impact up to let's say being average but it won't necessarily impact that Beyond yeah self-confidence self-esteem similar to what was said before one big one is having meaning in life meaning in life can come from your job your job is to help people you find tremendous meaning in that it can come from religion we're blessed to be Jewish people part of the Jewish Nation we can find tremendous meaning in that we can connect to that so there's various ways a person can find meaning in life that's a huge one what's the third one what do you think it's connected to what you were saying and the answer is something that the richest man in the world would give up all his money for in a second Health if he had something that he wasn't able to cure with the best doctors and there was something he could give up all his money for to cure he would in a second so that means these three components healthy relationships a social network being able to feel like I have health in my life and meaning in my life those three are the critical components for real true deep inner happiness inner peace and content m in life I'll share with you one idea when it comes to relationships and when it comes to meaning in life especially religion and then we'll move on to health and specifically mental health I have a question say you have a guy who's dating a girl thinking about marrying her and it's the fourth or fifth date and he's thinking you know what I want to get a gift for this girl now the boys and girls might have some different ideas about what that should be but I'll give you two choices choice number one a bouquet of a dozen red roses anybody here know how much that can cost at a real fancy flower shop it could cost a lot of money way more than even a hundred couple hundred dollars sometimes okay or or I can get her an ice cold kiwi strawberry Snapple sna some people love that flavor some people hate that flavor okay so those are your two options now on the surface you'd say of course the Roses right that's so much more of a meaningful but let me give you more Contex to the story you see on the first date they were having some light conversation and they were talking about like what's your favorite food what's your favorite drink and the girl mentioned in a second it was a three- second part of the conversation mine's kiwi strawberry Snapple oh interesting okay but then three dates later four dates later she opens up or he opens up for her the front door to the car and she's about to sit down and on that seat she sees either the bouquet of roses wow that's so nice that's so sweet or the ice cold kiwi strawberry Snapple which one do you think is going to make more of an impression on her now okay that's what you're gonna say for sure this Snapple because what it reflects is that you were paying attention to this person even the minute details of what they like what they don't like you committed it to memory it's a good tip for when you get older and you're dating pay attention to the details it makes a huge difference in developing relationships even just with a friend are you really listening when they talk or are you just thinking of the next thing you want to say while they're talking paying attention to those details and listening is what connects people it's the same thing when it comes to meaningfulness with religion sometimes people ask why do we have tens of thousands of laws in Judaism it's overwhelming it's overburdening like you could ask it as like does God really care about every tiny one of these little details and the answer is it's actually an opportunity that Hashem God is sharing with us even the little minute details of what he wants what he doesn't want it gives us even more and more opportunity to commit those details to memory and to act in accordance with them it allows us to have an even more special relationship with him it's an amazing idea so that's one idea just when it comes to relationships healthy relationships and when it comes to meaningfulness in our life pay attent attention to the details remember those details but now I want to transition to health and mental health now when it comes to our mental health and our self-care being able to take care of oursel when it comes to Mental Health there are different things we can do to maintain healthy mental health there are psychology techniques that I'm going to share with you in a few minutes but before we even get there it has to be said that basic diet sleep and exercise is absolutely critical to healthy mental health because without any one of those three you could have a psychologist actually see symptoms to diagnose you with a mental health disorder even though it's really just lacking one of those three if you're not getting enough sleep consistently at night you're going to present with mental health disorder symptoms it's important make sure you get that sleep if you're not eating enough or not eating nutritious enough your body starts to react and your mind is affected as well so to exercise exercise has a huge impact in how we are able to feel and to think through things our mental health state it is huge even 15 20 minutes of exercise a day can be a GameChanger for a person's mental health so we got to remember sleep diet and exercise once we get past that we can talk about some basic mental health strategies from a psychological perspective so let's talk about some of those one of those is a breathing technique a breathing exercise now what we want to understand is that we were all made up of two things nature and nurture anybody know what the definition of those two are how you define those yeah nature versus nurture yeah I'll come back to you go ahead okay what were you gonna say okay so nature how you were born and nurture how you're raised or your environment another other words nature my genetics what was given to me at Birth and stays with me my genetics and nurture what's happening around me now we can't control our genetics maybe not completely we'll see in a second but nurture our environment and the decisions we make the friends we choose to hang out with recognizing maybe there's a group of friends I should stop hanging out with maybe I often feel bad about myself after hanging out with them or maybe I often make bad decisions when I hang out with them impulsive decisions maybe I should try to limit it and hang out with other friends a little bit more maybe I should be careful with the decisions I make unhealthy decisions because those influence me on the flip side if I can hang out with positive people if I can hang out with positive influences if I can make positive decisions with my sleep diet and exercise and all the habits of my life then it's going to have a tremendous positive influence on us what's amazing is there's a brand new field of study called epigenetics anybody ever hear of that term before epigenetics is where when we repeat our habits over and over again it could be positive it could be negative they actually end up having an influence on our genetics which is an incredible idea that means we could literally pass some of that new habit down to our children it's a fascinating idea so we're all made up of Nature and nurture the part that we can really control is nurture that means we want to try to help keep ourselves in a good mental health mentally healthy State one of those examples is how do we deal with anxiety can we keep ourselves calm when we have a worry there are relaxation techniques that people use they're very effective one is a breathing exercise what's the sound we make when we're frightened and all of a sudden we're scared or shocked or worried about something inhale but yes if it's very frightening we might scream yes that's fine what's the sound we make when all of a sudden we're relieved and everything's okay exhale because there are two totally different nervous systems that are engaged when we we inhale versus when we exhale when we inhale versus when we exhale when we inhale it's actually the nervous system in charge of more focus and lack of calm and when we exhale it's actually much more the nervous system of relaxing which is why we can hack the system with a breathing technique you want to calm yourself down inhale for four seconds but then exhale for eight so it's and then we can definitely try it together we can definitely try it together one of the you don't have to one of the things that you want to do is kind of hold it for seven seconds in between so it's called four 478 478 so it's inhale for 4 seconds you can do it with me hold it for seven and then exhale for eight if you do that three or four times in a row it's the simplest technique that actually brings some level of calm onto you it's literally Understanding Psychology and applying it to hack your emotional mood State it's a very worthwhile thing 478 breathe in for 4 seconds so it's a quick breathe in then you hold it for seven and then it's a slow exhale and you're actually engaging that nervous system of Cal even just me doing it with you right now it brought a little bit of calm to me it really works it's an amazing idea there are other relaxation techniques as well but what I want to transition into for you now is a technique called mindfulness and I want to introduce this technique with a concept every anxiety almost every single anxiety and worry we have in life is rooted in the past or the future not in the present think about it I'm either worried about I made a mistake in the past I did the wrong thing or I'm worried about oh no what's gonna happen in the future I'm gonna get in trouble that person's gonna get upset I'm gonna fail I'm not going to do well something's gonna go wrong I'm gonna get sick it's all future in the present there's no worry there's no anxiety it actually is a concept that we could once again use to hack our mood system to make ourselves calm using psychology it's an amazing idea somehow to live in the present that's what we're going to discuss let's put it this way imagine if a person lost all their memories they had no memory of the past and therefore no thoughts about the future they're just literally like okay I'm here right now there's nothing to be worried about nothing now they could be in physical pain right now that affects you right here right now in the present but mental pain anxiety worry it doesn't affect a person when you're only focused on the present and that's why if we could root ourselves in the present even just for a minute it can bring calmness to us I'll give you a little bit of a really deep idea God himself is above time there's no past future that means for God everything is present it's all present which means it's all perfectly peaceful there's no worries it's an idea okay so we want to try to root ourselves in the present and I'm going to give you a technique as to how to do that question yeah about don't know it you're really worried let me ask you question if you end up finding out later that you got the right answer and you passed the test you have anything to worry about now no if you know that that's what's going to happen do you have anything to worry about now but but if you would get it right so the point is it's a future worry it's when it gets graded and I get my mark back I'm gonna fail now what if I told you it's just a practice no one's going to look at the grade you wouldn't be worried about it but if if it's going to count and your parents are going to see and your teachers going to see and they're going to come to you and what's going on is going to reflect on your report card it's all future stuff you understand what I'm saying because of what will happen because of this now in the future think about it okay yeah when you're in the future that's your present and you're worrying about the past that's what I said it's all about the past and the future not the present but it's a good question so here's here's a way to practice this how do we ground ourselves in the present we notice things in our surroundings that we've never noticed before that purposely gets us to mentally focus and be grounded in the present so let me start okay let me give you an example I want you all to look around this room you've been here many more times than I obviously look around the room and notice something you've never noticed before I'll go first I'll tell you what I said earlier but this is not going to be true for me because I noticed that last time there's a little dirt spot on the ledge leading up to the windows over there I'll notice something else there's a little I'm sorry to point out all the little little things but there's a little piece of uh of paint or whatever hanging down over there okay so I'm noticing things I never noticed before yeah what the wood mold on top of the pillar somebody mentioned that last time you never noticed that until this moment then you got to speak to me afterwards yeah right but it's got to be something you never noticed until this second yeah okay what else yeah okay that little chip yeah anything else yeah the outline of the brown trim around it okay that's a the exit sign okay you there's a tissue box up there yeah okay a gap [Music] okay okay yeah okay what time it is that's a smart one that's a smart one yeah okay okay so there's many many things there are many little tiny details around us all the time and by Design we don't notice these things because if while I was talking to you I was noticing all these things I wouldn't be able to talk to you I would just be looking all around all the time but by Design we're not distracted by all these things but we can choose once or twice a day when we're not in the middle of a conversation when we're not in the middle of a class and we need to pay attention to start focusing on the little details all around us even insignificant details it actually can calm us down because we're focusing on things in our present environment and we stop thinking about the past and stop thinking about the future even just for a minute even just for a few seconds it once again can have a calming effect on a person which is a important thing for when we get stressed like was mentioned before everyone has hard points in their day in their week you have to be able to have tools in your toolbox to take care of yourself or self-care to calm yourself down yeah oh we're going back I'll take more questions about that that that idea afterwards but but but yes yeah there can be by the way we can find exceptions for the most part that's how it is it exists in the past and the future okay so now think about this this works even better when we're Outdoors Outdoors you can notice distant tree lines you can notice the grass now noticing the grass just this big green area but have you ever noticed each individual blade of grass probably not you do okay good right you notice one blade is a little shorter than the one next to it or has little ridges in it all of these things that you're purposely noticing in nature around ourselves can ground you in the present as a mindfulness technique to help relax and calm ourselves somewhat to be able to think more clearly and be more healthy when it comes to mental health so I want to leave what time are we okay so I want to leave a little bit of time for questions but I wanted to share with you these ideas these techniques because when we think about ourselves in terms of Nature and nurture in terms of what makes us who we are both in terms of what we are born with our genetics but also what decisions we make in terms of our mental state are we generally calm or stressed and by the way if you try some of these things and it's still really difficult for you to calm down you got to talk to someone you have a guidance Department you have a principal you have teachers you have rabbis you have parents talk to someone so that you can speak it out one of the core elements of therapy is that you are talking out what's bothering you to another person who's really listening just speaking it out can be very helpful so you got to make sure that you do that if some of these other techniques are not working well enough for you with any particular struggle that you're going through any particular worry or feeling that you have that's really important so when we take care of of course diet sleep and exercise and we take care of the nurture who we're hanging out with and what we do and what emotional states we allow ourselves to stay in it's normal to be a little worried a little sad when we first hear difficult news but if it stays for hours and days we need to use these tools or speak to people and speak to people to calm ourselves down and to become more in a mentally healthy State when we do that it has a tremendous effect not only on our current state but it can even have an effect on our genetics on our nature on who we are as people which is a very powerful idea so that's what I wanted to share with you today I wanted to leave a few minutes for questions okay any anybody have any questions on that or even anything relating to mental health in general I'm happy to answer yeah talk about I do I do find myself happy it's a great question but I also I also find myself at times needing to use some of these tools to calm myself down to be able to make sure that I stay in a good mentally healthy state if I find that let's say I haven't exercise for a while I'll realize I gotta I got to do it today not just for my physical health for my mental health right and me I'm hearing a lot of other people's besides for the stresses of my own life I'm hearing a lot of other people's stresses so I have to make sure that I have that strength to hear it and not get bogged down by it does that make sense so yeah it's a good question and I appreciate the question what about you yeah all the time yeah all the time okay so you want to use these tools in these techniques as a way to expand that does that make sense yeah so that's a really really important question the question was how does someone help themselves get out of depression let's talk about depression for a second depression when we use it in a psychological way means a person who like cannot function they're so sad like they're in bed all day they can't come to school that's real clinical depression diagnosable depression and in that case almost always you need another person or group of people to help that person it's going to be almost impossible not impossible but almost impossible for that person to just help themselves in that state because part of being in that clinical diagnosable level of depression is that it's hard for you to do anything positive it's hard for you to go out and exercise and to eat healthy and to get a good night's sleep it's hard for you to do mindfulness it's hard for you to do anything so it's really important to make sure that if you or someone you're friendly with that you know that you see is really suffering at a high level like that you immediately tell someone so that we can get them the help that they need but we also use the term depressed to mean like someone who's sad they're just down but they're coming to school they're going to class they're generally paying attention but they clearly have a sadness so first of all again if it's a friend of ours just saying hey I noticed you're a little bit sad if you want to talk about anything I'm here to listen you don't need to say anything just listening has a tremendous impact on the person who's sad because they have someone to speak it out with like we said before but if you want to help yourself you finding yourself a little bit sad so some of the techniques that we use today what's making you sad is it because there's something you're really worried about and it's just getting you down and out well then again we can use a breathing exercise to calm ourselves down we can use mindfulness pay attention to the little details around us for 30 seconds a minute two minutes and it calms us down a little bit otherwise we have to think about well what are the other reasons why somebody might be sad and so how can they help themselves we have to think about are we we mentioned this already but who are we hanging out with sometimes there's a certain group of friends that they tend we tend to hang out with them and end up afterwards just feeling sad not feeling great about ourselves I should think about that there's some common denominator there that's causing that maybe I should find a little bit of a different group of friends to hang out with more often so does that answer your question does that answer your question yeah yeah there are medications that can be given usually to those diagnosable level type of mental health conditions it would be with the advice of a psychologist and then potentially also a psychiatrist if medicine is going to be the way to go and medicines can be very helpful very often in conjunction with therapy but it can be a GameChanger it can be very helpful absolutely absolutely and then there are like we said all the people to your support group around you and then there are organizations like I said at the beginning like amudim and like other organizations who can really help you connect you with the right people give you the advice that you need and the guidance that you need so keep that in mind okay so we're going to end on that point it's a real privilege to speak with you thank you so much for your time have a great day