The Importance of Mental Health

Factors outside of your control, such events and people, might impact your mental health in either positive or negative ways. Sometimes, your disability can cause you even more stress, making it difficult to take care of your mental health. Also, people in some societies view mental health issues as less important than physical health, but this is untrue. Both are very important, and addressing your mental health issues is a sign of strength. There are many things you can and should do to improve your mental health. This will require you to actively work on improving your mental health, but a healthy mind will ultimately help you to deal with stresses in your life. 

Sangu Delle is an entrepreneur and clean water activist from Ghana. In this video, he talks about the ways his stress negatively impacted his mental health, and how he initially refused to seek help. He struggled with expectations from his society on what it means to be masculine, and thought that asking for help could make him seem weak. He says there is a stigma within his society and many others which prevents people from seeking help or taking action. 

“All of us -- but we Africans especially -- need to realize that our mental struggles do not detract from our virility, nor does our trauma taint our strength. We need to see mental health as important as physical health. We need to stop suffering in silence. We must stop stigmatizing disease and traumatizing the afflicted.” 

Watch this video to hear Sangu’s entire speech on mental health, called “There is no shame in taking care of your mental health.” He explains how taking action helped him, and how it can help many others. 

https://www.ted.com/talks/sangu_delle_there_s_no_shame_in_taking_care_of_your_mental_health/transcript?utm_campaign=tedspread&utm_medium=referral&utm_source=tedcomshare

More information on mental health:

 World Health Organisation