Assuming that a normal working professional gets up at 7 am, works from 9 am to 6/7 pm and then goes off to bed at 11 pm. This regular hardworking employee spends about 60% of his waking hours at work. When this person has deadlines to meet, she (or he) might end up working for more than 80% of these hours, and sometimes even end up working on the weekends. How stressful this person’s life would be? May be on a good day, she (or he) gets to sleep for 7-8 hours considering it was an uneventful day for this person. Otherwise, the stress of meeting the deadlines or having to deal with a difficult co-worker/ manager may hack away some of her (or his) blissfully sleeping hours. How can she (or he) deal with this everyday stress? She is a sincere employee who has the pressure of performing well and getting up the ladder just like the many others. This everyday stress and often long working hours have started taking a toll on her health, especially her mental health. Oftentimes the physical symptoms like headache or exhaustion are secondary to mental stress. If she has an understanding manager, maybe she can share her issues with the manager, who in turn can try to lighten her load or maybe help her deal with her stress. But what if the manager is not an empathetic person or has a hard time understanding such issues. These managers just like the employee are also in the rat race, wanting to prove themselves, show progress and move ahead in their professional career. Who should be blamed? Or rather should anyone be blamed for this situation? One of the simplest solutions is to change jobs. Perhaps the next one would be less taxing! Another solution that I can think of is to become a monk-like person that doesn’t care about climbing the ladder. You take up as much as you can deal with and refuse the rest. And when your manager/ co-worker is being difficult, just take a deep breath, let it all go and be at peace within you. Sounds easy, right? But are these the easiest options for everybody? Perhaps not! This is a universal problem. How do we deal with it? I don’t think there has been anyone who is immune to work related stress, be it an entry level employee or the CEO of a company. What can be done about it? Lately, there has been a lot of awareness about mental health and how it is the responsibility of each and every individual to take care of their mental health just as much as they are concerned about their own or their family’s physical well-being. What if it becomes mandatory for organizations regardless of whether they are private or public or government-owned to have a mental health counselor as a permanent or part time employee? The only job this mental health advisor/ counselor would have to schedule appointments throughout the year with the organization’s employees and make sure they are mentally healthy. This employee can also organize regular and mandatory workshops, and one on one as needed sessions to help individuals deal with stress and difficult situations. For larger corporations, perhaps a team of counselors would be needed.  These counselors can assess an employee’s mental stress level and recommend actions to the leadership to help mitigate such stress. The ones with high mental stress level can be followed up to check up on the progress of those actions. In an ideal world, we would not take our mental health for granted and welcome such a move. What do you think if such a motion should be passed?

If you too are an advocate of mental health awareness and believe that mandatory mental health supervision is the need of the times to strengthen a positive working atmosphere, then please sign this petition.

#mentalhealth #mentalhealthmatters #mentalhealthawareness #workstress #stress #healthyworkplace #healthyworkforce #healthyworkenvironment #WHO #UN #NIMH #WPA #TLLL