The Importance of Therapy for High-Achieving Individuals Part 1
What is Mental Health?
Mental health is a critical component of overall health and well-being. It affects how we think, feels, and act in our daily lives. In order to reach for the stars, we have to start from ground zero by setting ourselves up for success. That means, taking care of our health. Mental Health can be a vague term. So one thing that can help is to think about it from the 8 dimensions of wellness. This includes: social, emotional, physical, environmental, financial, spiritual, mental, and vocational wellness.
Wellness itself is a neutral term. There is achieving a higher level of wellness on one end of the continuum and a lower level on the other side. We fluctuate with our wellness from season to season. For example, one season we may feel that we are saving money, in good health, satisfied with our job, and socially connected. Then during a season of tension, we find ourselves getting sick, dealing with higher levels of stress, not feeling connected in our relationships, and struggling to pay the bills.
Is it possible to always have every dimension filled?
I want to encourage you to not see this and try to achieve perfection in every area. While we want to strive for a higher level or even a neutral level of wellness, trying to make sure every single area is at the same level of functioning all the time will burn you out and leave you feeling like you are not enough. This is merely a guide. When we are feeling exhausted, stressed, and burned out, sometimes, we fail to see how other areas could be impacting us. This is meant to be a guide to support you in better understanding how your mental health and wellness are connected.
Why Does It Apply to Me?
As high-achieving men and women, we often put a lot of pressure on ourselves to accomplish many great things. Whether we are working in the corporate world, running a business, or striving for career success, we can have high expectations and put ourselves at risk of burnout if we don’t take care of our mental health. Therapy has become an important part of self-care and wellness for many people, and i want to include you in that as you may be wondering if it really can be helpful for you in particular.
Benefits of Therapy for the High Achiever
Increased Self-Awareness
Self-awareness matters. To some extent, you have this down pat when it comes to success, high performance, and achieving your goals. You know to some extent what needs to be done. However, when it comes to your stress levels, high anxiety, and overwhelm, this area can be a little blurry. It's not that you don't understand what could be causing it, it's just that when you try to fix it, it feels like nothing helps. That’s when therapy can be extremely beneficial. Therapy can help you to become more aware of the patterns in your life, what is serving you, and what is not.
Therapy can help to increase your self-awareness by helping you to understand the root of certain thoughts and beliefs that are holding you back from reaching your goals.
Improved Communication Skills
A core part of therapy that I love is teaching communication skills, assertiveness training, and setting boundaries. This is something many of us struggle with. Either we overcorrect with these skills or we become people pleasers. When it comes to " how do I manage my mental health", many of us cringe at the thought of saying what's on our mind because " what if it comes our mean", or " I've tried before and nothing seems to help". Look, I get it, I've been there. But when it comes to therapy, you are in control of the conversation and your therapist is there to work with you. You get to decide what works and what you are comfortable with. I will just encourage you to try some things outside of your circle of comfort because growth doesn't happen in the spaces that we deem safe enough. If the goal is to move forward, we need to step out of our circle of safety and be willing to assert our needs and wants.
Better Stress Management
How many of you are always trying to manage your stress levels? Can I get a show of hands? This is an ongoing struggle as a high achiever. You are under constant pressure to succeed. Whether that is because of a message you were given in your childhood, or one you have created for yourself, stress levels are inevitably going to be high sometimes. So how can therapy help you better manage it?
Therapy can help you to become more aware of the triggers for your stress levels, develop coping strategies and skills that work for you, and provide you with an alternative perspective to help you manage them more effectively. This is the power of having a therapist that understands your struggles and can offer insight and support. With their help, you can begin to make changes that will lead to better stress management and emotional well-being.
Healthier Relationships
Having healthy relationships is paramount for achieving success in all areas of life. Our relationships have a profound impact on our overall wellness. If we surround ourselves with toxic and harmful relationships that will show up in our mental health and wellness. However, we have the power to restructure and walk away from harmful relationships. It's not easy, there may be tears, but we need healthy and impactful relationships to help us reach our goals, and maintain the level of sanity we deserve. Not only can you process your relationships in therapy, but you therapeutic alliance you create with your therapist will help to mimic a healthy relationship that you can model in your other relationships outside of therapy. So, don't underestimate the power of healthy relationships to help you.
Life Satisfaction
The final area I would like to touch on is life satisfaction. It's important to find joy and fulfillment in the things that we do every day. Therapy can help you with this by helping you to identify your core values and what motivates you to be successful. You can also explore the things that bring you joy and satisfaction in order to create a life that you are proud of. This could mean anything from exploring hobbies to having meaningful conversations with friends and loved ones.
The best part about talking with a therapist is reminding you that life isn't always about achievement and productivity, you are allowed to enjoy life. You have the work down pat, know to get the play aspect up to par to create a well-balanced life for yourself.
What's next?
If you are considering taking that next step to begin therapy, Aspire Counseling may be right for you. So what is next? Contact us and schedule your free 30-minute consultation. If we end up being a good fit, then great! Let's begin setting goals and start achieving them together.
About the Jasmine:
Jasmine is a counselor in training at Aspire counseling with a master's in clinical mental health counseling. She is passionate about working with trauma, body image, athletes, disordered eating, high achievers, anxiety, values, identity, and more. Reach out for support!
