Self Awareness: The First Step Toward Psychological Health

In modern psychology, one of the first things that you will benefit from knowing is the CBT triangle. This is what we call self-awareness. When you understand your self you classify the major mental aspects of your life into three categories:

• Feelings
• Behaviors
• Thoughts

 If you want to improve your mental health, learn how to recognize and differentiate these aspects of your self. Understand that each influences each other. How you think influences how you feel. How you feel influences how you think and act.

Many of the problems of this world and your own suffering come not from feeling, but from what you do with those feelings. When we experience intense emotions, we are often compelled to act. We can be wise by realizing that feelings won't kill us. Learning to recognize and sit with your feelings is an important part of your emotional development.

The same can be said if you are raising children. If you have children you can help them learn  to differentiate these aspects of their self. Keep in mind that children below the age of 3 have virtually no ability to regulate their feelings, but you can at least help them be more aware by communicating to them what they seem to be feeling and teaching them not to be afraid of negative feelings.