A better headspace for 2021

2020 marked itself as the year we all lost our minds in some fashion. Mental health tanked. We encountered a wide variety of issues on a regular basis. Emotional fortitude was tested at every level. The world struggled. Our country struggled. Our friends and family struggled. We struggled.

I don’t know about you, but by the end of 2020, I found myself ushering in a new year with trepidation and a lower bar of what to expect out of 2021.

How could 2021 be any better?

Despite circumstances, hitting the refresh button on your mind may be the key to making 2021 the year you need it to be.

We can talk about New Year’s resolutions all day long. There are plenty of resources out there to help you make those happen. What I want to talk about is getting your headspace in a better place to make the most out of this new year.

Clean up on aisle one

Your brain is the epicenter for everything. Your decisions are made there. Your ideas reside there. How you process the world and everything in it is grounded in your headspace. Your memories replay there. Your fake arguments happen there. Everything conscious and subconscious happens within your headspace.

This means your headspace needs to be constantly taken care of. For your brain to be at its best, it needs to be refreshed. Re-centered. Wipe the slate clean, if you will.

Nerd time! Your brain is made up of neurological pathways. These are the roads in your brain that connect to one another that carry everything from how to breathe to the joke you just learned and need to share with someone. The more a particular neurological pathway is used, the stronger it becomes. The stronger a pathway becomes, the easier it is for your mind to wander down that road, like a default mental place-holder.

So what do I mean when I say hit the refresh button on your mind? I mean you can physically change your neurological pathways. When you learn something new, a new pathway is created. The more you commit that new something to memory, the stronger the pathway comes. Thus, changing your brain as you learn and grow.

I believe taking care of your headspace is one of the keys to making 2021 a better year. If you make the care of your headspace a priority, I believe everything else will follow that transformation.

I will add here, I am not specifically addressing mental illnesses, which greatly impacts how one takes care of their mind. I would just encourage you to take the needed steps to make sure you are at your healthiest. I don’t mean coping, but genuine ways to help your brain function at its best. I hope you can draw inspiration from my words to help you get to where you want to be.

So how does one create new neurological pathways that are life-altering? I’m so glad you asked.

Don’t be a bully

One of the best ways to create new and healthy neurological pathways is to speak kindly to yourself. Your self-talk will reveal a lot about your headspace and the place that it is in. Do you yell at yourself? Call yourself degrading names? Criticize yourself to the point of doing nothing at all?

What do you say to the person looking back at you in the mirror? Are you kind?

How you speak to yourself is fundamental. If you are constantly speaking negativity over yourself, you are building negative neurological pathways in your mind. So when you think of yourself, you travel down those now well-worn pathways, defaulting to the negativity you have built.

To be fair, how other people speak to you will also affect these pathways. What you will have to decide, then, is how much weight you will give them. You don’t have to accept their degradation. If they are not helping you become your best, you should not let them help you create those negative neurological pathways.

Instead, you will need to build new neurological pathways that are kind and supporting to your headspace. Listen to and believe the people who love and care for you. They will support you and add to the positive reinforcement.

Building those new pathways will take some work. It will take a true reset of your mind, possibly daily. When you look in the mirror, remember to speak kindly to the human being you see there.

Repetition will also be key; repeat the truths you want to seal into your headspace. Make those truths the new, well-worn highways of your mind. And remember you are not alone; lean on those who love you and they will help you rebuild and solidify those pathways.

So one day when you look in the mirror, you won’t verbally abuse yourself, but rather speak truth and kindness.

I am all too familiar with this. My self-talk was awful. I was my worst critic and my constant bully. I got very skilled at berating myself. Letting it be my excuse that I should have done better to begin with.

There was a point I hit where I told myself enough was enough. And like all people who want to be healthier, I had to cut ties to that portion of myself. I had to learn how to speak to myself with respect and kindness. I had to remember the verbiage of those who loved me and how they spoke to me, so that I could start speaking to myself that way.

One of the practical ways I made that mental shift was that I was not allowed to refer to myself by my name. (“Really, Christine, that’s the best you could do?” “Wow, Christine, way to go.”)

I chose to move forward with speaking to myself by my family’s nickname for me. (And no, I am not divulging that here on the internet.)

As you can imagine, it was very hard to verbally abuse myself when I used a name that has only been spoken to me with love. You try trash-talking yourself with “Pumpkin,” “Darling,” “Love-bug,” and other cute names.

You are what you consume

Another way we build neurological pathways is by what we consume. I mean digitally and physically. I’m referring to the books we read, the music we listen to, the types of movies we watch, our reliance on social media, and our actual food diet.

Consume what you want to become.

Want to bring your mind to a healthier place? Maybe change the kind of content you are reading or watching. It contributes to your worldview. Want to bring your mind at ease? Music also has a huge impact on our pathways and stress levels.

I, personally, have been listening to more soundtrack music than songs with lyrics. If I listen to music with lyrics, I am pretty diligent to make sure that it is music that doesn’t affect me negatively. I want what I listen to to add positivity to my life.

Maybe your diet has impacted how your headspace has been as well. Sometimes comfort food really isn’t all that comforting later. Too much sugar will slow your brain down and make you sluggish. Not enough minerals will wear your body down since it doesn’t have what it needs to function at its best.

Social media will also add to the health-quality of your headspace. If you are constantly comparing yourself to others, you may want to reconsider your social media boundaries so that you can get to a better headspace. You want social media to add to your life, not make you more miserable.

Find your happy place

I truly believe 2021 can be the year you want and need it to be. The world may not change or change for the better, but you can start with you. You can change parts of your worldview to be more constructive and healthier for yourself.

Do what you need to do to get to a mentally healthy place. I am a huge fan of counseling. If needed, don’t be afraid to see a doctor for additional medical help. There are many aspects one can include in their life regularly that will help take their headspace to healthier levels.

Once you begin to build those positivity-building neurological pathways, your headspace will change for the better. Refreshing your mind will help you conquer 2021 and be what you want and need it to be.