The ultimate goal of mental health is

The ultimate goal of mental health is to gain "psychological flexibility" rather than to completely eliminate all negative emotions.

A while ago, I met a visitor who was working as an operator in a large factory. The first thing he said when he walked in was, "Doctor, can you help me turn off the emo function? I recently cried for three days after falling out of love, and my work was delayed. I feel that I am too mentally unhealthy." The "health standards" she set for herself are very specific: she must maintain high energy every day, be able to adjust her mood within ten minutes when encountering bad things, never conflict with others, and even do Tai Chi with a smile even when her parents urge her to get married.

Don't tell me, there are really many people who come to consult with this idea. Everyone seems to agree that "mental health" means always happy, always positive, and invulnerable. Even frowning is considered a psychological problem.

In fact, there was a similar debate in the psychology community in the early years. One group believes that all symptoms of anxiety and depression have been eliminated and the whole person is in a stable and happy state to be considered healthy. The other group believes that even if there are occasional mood swings, as long as it does not affect normal life and can be self-accepting, it is considered healthy. The two groups have been arguing for decades, and now they have basically reached a consensus: the latter is the more reasonable criterion.

Different schools actually have different expressions of this ultimate goal. Kohut's self-psychology school believes that the core is "self-cohesion." To put it bluntly, you will not feel that you are worthless just because you messed up a project or been rejected by others. The right to judge your self-worth is always in your own hands. Seligman of positive psychology has revised his theory in the past few years. He no longer advocates "stay positive" but says that the so-called flourishing life inherently includes painful experiences. You don't need to treat negative emotions as a scourge, as long as you don't be dragged away by them. The existential school represented by Irving Yalom is more straightforward: healthy people are those who can calmly accept the inherent troubles in life, accept that people will grow old and die, accept that choices always have a price, accept that no one can fully understand you, and will not force themselves to live in another way in order to escape these established facts.

I have been doing this for almost ten years, and the most common question I am asked is "When will I get better and never feel sad again?" Every time I have to laugh and pour cold water: If there is such a special medicine, I will give myself ten injections first. I rushed to the project at three o'clock last week. The next day, the client said that the plan would be completely revised. I sat in the office and rolled my eyes at the computer for ten minutes, and secretly cursed a few curse words. This does not mean that I am mentally unhealthy, but it means that I am a normal living person.

I used to have a friend who suffered from moderate anxiety. The biggest change after recovery is not that she is no longer anxious. It is that when she encounters a project failure, she will squat downstairs in the company and eat two skewers of sausages in the evening breeze. Oh, yes, she was hospitalized for acute gastroenteritis last month. When she was in so much pain that she cried, she took a photo of a diaphragm and posted it on WeChat Moments, with the text, "Who says I have a strong mind? Who am I to worry about? Now I am in so much pain that I want to explode the earth." I gave her a like and knew that she was really well.

Many people have a misunderstanding about "psychological flexibility". They think that they can bear anything, break their teeth and swallow it in their stomachs. In fact, this is not the case at all. There was a teacher who came to visit before. After his father passed away, he managed to attend classes for three months. Even the day of the funeral did not delay the parent-teacher meeting the next day. He himself felt that "I have a really good psychological quality and nothing happened to me." But one day when he went to the supermarket to buy something, the cashier gave him an extra $1.50. He stood at the checkout counter and suddenly broke down and cried, unable to stop him. You see, this is not called flexibility, it is called crushing emotions into explosives, which can explode with just a small spark. True flexibility means allowing yourself to break down for a while when you can't hold on any longer, daring to cry to your friends when you feel down, and daring to ask for leave to lie at home for two days. You don't have to force yourself to be an "adult who never falls down." When the emotion dissipates, you can still do whatever you need to do.

To put it bluntly, mental health is like a pair of comfortable canvas shoes that you have been wearing for several years. It is not that they will never get dirty or wear out. They can be wiped when they are dirty, and they can be repaired when they are glued. Even if the soles of the shoes are worn a little crookedly, they will still fit your feet and they will not sting you if you encounter a small stone that makes you unable to walk. You don’t have to force yourself to become an indestructible fiberglass ball. It’s good to be an elastic rubber ball. It can bounce up when it falls on the ground, and it can slowly return to its original shape if it is squashed.

Right? This is the most comfortable state of health that ordinary people can touch.