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With a little help from Entrepreneur, Psychology Today, and a good bit of research by yours truly, here are 10 expert ways to be a mentally stronger person.
1. Deal With Your Emotions
Do you bury yourself in your bed and sleep for hours when you’re sad? Binge eat when you’re stressed? We’re all guilty of doing at least one of those things, none of them are good for actually dealing with our emotions and working through them in a healthy way. To be a mentally stronger person, you need to learn better coping skills.
2. Delay Gratification
Instant gratification is something we all love. However, science tells us that delaying it is so, so important for success, and only those who have the willpower to keep from indulging in a moment’s enjoyment reap the successes later on.
3. Learn To Say “No”
For many of us, saying no is hard. Research revealed that the harder it is for you to say no to people, the more likely you are to be stressed, get burnt out, and even depressed. And that’s not good.
4. Give Up Bad Habits
In order to be a mentally strong person, you need to ditch your bad habits because you can’t move forward with them weighing you down. Some of the worst habits to kick include: Comparing yourself to others, surrounding yourself with negative people you, ruminating on the past, worrying about things you can’t control or change.
5. Don’t Blame Others
Even though it’s often easiest to throw blame on others, it’s never a good thing. Taking responsibility for your problems is incredibly empowering and so, so important to building mental strength, because only then will you be able to learn from your mistakes and avoid them in the future, solve problems, and be more successful.
6. Overcome Your Inner Critic
Thanks to a little something called the self-fulfilling prophecy, being your own worst critic is one of the worst things you can do to yourself. Those negative thoughts only set you up for failure, so instead of judging and criticizing yourself and expecting the worst outcome of a situation, try to force yourself to believe that you’re going to succeed in anything you do.
7. Be Grateful
Here’s the difference between people who possess great mental strength versus those who don’t: Mentally strong people deal with their sorrows and problems gracefully and focus on what they’re grateful for, whereas those who aren’t wallow in self-pity…which is never, ever productive.
8. Be Optimistic
“People who are optimistic are more committed to their goals, are more successful in achieving their goals, are more satisfied with their lives, and have better mental and physical health when compared to more pessimistic people,” says Dr. Suzanne Segerstrom,, a professor of psychology at the University of Kentucky.
9. Don’t Worry About Pleasing Others
Mentally strong individuals have the guts to express how they truly feel and act how they want to, even if it isn’t popular with everyone else. It won’t happen overnight, but try doing and saying things you actually want.
10. Don’t Be Afraid Of Pain
As we all know, the things we want in life don’t magically appear in front of us, and sometimes, we need to really work for those things. That’s why only the mentally strong achieve what they want – they’re willing to endure that pain.