Wellspring Magazine (FINAL.NOVEMBER)) - Flipbook - Page 3
Letter from
the President
I have good news.
There are some positive trends in the realm of mental
health. Because of Covid, the stigmas of mental illness
have lessened, as we all realized that with enough stress,
even “normal people” can tip into anxiety or depression.
People have become more comfortable with the idea of
seeking help, thanks to a number of celebrities becoming
publicly honest about their struggles with mental illness
and pursuit to health.
Mental health awareness has increased in the public eye,
which hopefully may be reflected in more funding for
services. And Telehealth has made therapy much more
accessible. At Wellspring, our number of sessions grew
27% during Covid. These positive trends mean more
people are seeking help to improve their mental health,
whether it be managing or curing mental illness, healing
a broken heart, or simply enhancing patterns of thinking,
feeling, or behaving.
Mental health improvement means life
improvement.
“Better is better!” is the phrase that I have coined for
myself regarding this. When I recently gave up eating
meat (other than seafood) in order to boost my health,
this phrase freed me from getting stuck in an all-ornothing mentality, counting days of “eating right” only to
beat myself up after “failing”, or giving up all together. I
have given myself “permission” to eat meat if appropriate
for an occasion (such as if a friend wants me to taste his
award-winning barbeque). I don’t even call it “cheating”
because that feels unnecessarily bad.
Tova Kreps, LCSW
President & Co-Founder
Wellspring Counseling
to seek to be a little better in some area of mental health,
because “Better is better!” For example, fighting less often in
front of your kids reduces their stress, drinking less alcohol
is better for your body, feeling less anxious by utilizing some
calming techniques makes life more tolerable, lessening
depression enough to show up for work keeps the bills
paid, and learning communication skills makes family life
more positive. Obviously, some bad thoughts or behaviors
need to be stopped all together, but most of the time, even
a little progress makes life better than no progress.
Small steps are the start to completing a long
journey.
I hope that as you look through this magazine, addressing
how lives have been transformed by moving up the mental
health spectrum, that you ask yourself this question, “What
aspect of my mental health could I work on that would
make my life better than it is today?”
I just say to myself, “I am generally eating
better, and that is better for me”. Or, as others
would say, “progress over perfection.”
As I write and speak about mental health being on a
spectrum (see page 10), I want to encourage all of us
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