Understanding mental health through a knot-ty analogy

“We have biological indicators of physical health. Likewise, those indicators for mental health are our feelings, emotions, mood and thoughts. It is normal for our feelings, emotions and mood to fluctuate. Different positive and negative emotions come and go every day. Sometimes we have small negative emotions, like small knots created by tangled threads. Most of the time we can untie these small knots by ourselves. Some people do so by writing in a journal, taking a rest, going to nature and so forth…But these small knots (small negative emotions) need to be disentangled, or they can accumulate to form big knots. Big knots are like overwhelming intense emotions, that grab our attention and hand around for a long time. They might change our thoughts, behaviours, mood and mental clarity, making it harder to enjoy the things we use to. When we are physically unwell, we let people know, ask for help, see the doctor, take medications and have rest. Similarly with mental health, we need to share about our negative feelings, emotions and thoughts with others, as the knots can get so big that it becomes hard to disentangle them on our own. Art therapy’s symbolic and metaphorical communication is one gentle way to process these feelings, emotions and thoughts, preventing the knots from getting bigger, thus maintaining mental health.” — Shan Li Teh, MA, AThR

Understanding mental health through a knot-ty analogy