Holding your Mental Strength in a Crisis.

Byline: Dr Aamir Hanif

This year, we have seen thousands of lives perished from earth due to COVID-19, many thousands of people still struggling to come to terms with. There are many thousands of families suffering of poverty, hunger, unemployment, social injustice, poor health, corruption, loss of businesses due to cities going into lockdown and people disconnecting socially. This has created an immense pressure on human minds to think rationally and to make right decisions. There are few things that we can discuss today to keep our minds strong when we see our physical and mental health is in danger, due to fear, anxiety, and sense of impending doom. In our society, strength is the word used to show muscles rippling, absolute fearlessness, never crying, never feeling sad or angry, never asking for help.

These all are misconception and often attached to men in our cultural ideas of strength. Due to these cultural pressures we might overdo, get on with the business or impatient with ourselves and switch to hyper-productive mode instead of taking the time as opportunity to slow down, reflect, nurture ourselves during a very hard time and be present with our loved ones. We might think wrong of ourselves when we feel sad or show our grief or feeling weak as compared to our counter parts. We might then suppress these uncomfortable feelings. The trouble with suppression of these true feelings is that anxious feelings will convert into bizarre behavior patterns such as short temperament, blame others such as selfish or fearful behavior such as stockpiling safety equipment and toilet papers. This could also lead to depression or unfortunately can increase in domestic violence as the aftermath of these severe stressful times.

This is completely opposite to what an...