I’m Not Okay | The Journey from Not Okay to Becoming Okay

Welcome to the new season of Positivity with Dr. Aman Kapoor. In this compelling episode, titled "I Am Not Okay," we dive deep into the realities of mental health, challenging the conventional notion of positivity. Often, we equate positivity with constant optimism, happy thoughts, and spreading good vibes. However, true positivity goes beyond mere optimism; it's about facing life's challenges with resilience and grit.

In this episode, I share my personal journey of struggling with self-doubt, imposter syndrome, and depressive phases. Over the past year, I've encountered significant upheavals that pulled me into a dark place, leading to feelings of helplessness and a deep sense of being stuck. I realized that the first step towards healing is acknowledging that it's okay to not be okay.

The journey from "I Am Not Okay" to "I Am Okay" starts with acceptance. It's crucial to recognize that your mental health and well-being matter, regardless of whether others understand what you're going through. This episode aims to empower you to embrace your struggles, seek help, and take concrete steps towards healing.

Throughout this episode, I emphasize the importance of talking about your challenges and taking help when needed. The T in my MENTAL framework stands for "Talk and Take Help." It’s vital to break the cycle of negativity and helplessness by opening up and reaching out for support. Remember, taking help is a sign of strength, not weakness.

I invite you to explore the detailed MENTAL framework in my LinkedIn article here. The MENTAL framework is designed to guide you through mindfulness, exercise, nutrition, talking and taking help, awareness, and leading a healthy lifestyle. These elements are essential in rebuilding your inner strength and cultivating a positive mindset.

This episode is not just about acknowledging struggles; it's about taking actionable steps to overcome them. Whether you're facing stress, anxiety, or depression, it's crucial to know that you're not alone. The strength to heal and grow is within you, and by accepting that you’re not okay, you pave the way for recovery.

Takeaway: Positivity is not about suppressing negative emotions or forcing yourself to be optimistic. It's about resilience, the courage to confront your challenges, and the strength to seek help when needed. In this episode, I share my journey and encourage you to take the first step towards healing.

If you're struggling want to connect or share your own journey with everyone feel free to reach out to me via email at [e-mail] . I also personally request you to connect with professional counselors available through various free helplines. Let’s break the stigma around mental health together.

#PositivityWithDrAman #DrAmanKapoor #AKonnects #LetsConnect #overcomingtheodds #mentalhealthmatters

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
"I'm not okay". Why is a positivity podcast episode title I'm not okay? Have you

(00:07):
thought about it? And also I want to ask you all are you really okay?
Hi everyone and welcome back to this season of positivity with Dr. Aman Kapoor.

(00:27):
I'm your host Dr. Aman Kapoor and I welcome you back to this fresh episode
and to this new season. Now what you heard in the first few seconds is me
telling you that I am not okay. Well how does that really relate to positivity
and why did I ask you about it? Well to be very frank positivity according to me

(00:52):
the definition has changed over a period of time. Earlier I thought positivity was
all about thinking positive, having positive vibes, sharing positive messages
and talking everything positive. But now I feel that positivity is much more than

(01:13):
that. Positivity is beyond just being happy. It is not pseudo-optimism. Remember
my dear friends I'm not telling you to be pessimistic. What I'm telling you is
not to be pseudo-optimistic. Positivity goes beyond optimism, beyond being
hopeful of good happening. Positivity is actually facing the challenges head-on

(01:40):
with a grit, being able to bounce back when the things are not in your favor.
When you are low, when you are down and out, it is the capability to stay in that
framework of mind which will help you overcome the negative environment around
you. That's the reason why this topic fits in very much. Why I am not okay? Well

(02:10):
let me tell you of my own experiences when I start this. Over a period of last
maybe an year or so, probably a little more, I've been going through a tough time.
Major changes, upheavals and it started pulling me down and taking me into a

(02:36):
very dark place. Somewhere I was lost. I didn't know what to do. I started going
into the shell of self-doubt. I started going into the shell of what you call is
an imposter syndrome. That is when you have the abilities, when you know you can

(02:57):
do it. You have done it in the past but then you stop believing that you have
done it or you can't do it and you somehow start feeling that whatever
happened was a fluke. And that is what has started happening with me. I went
into a very low phase, a very depressive phase, sad, upset to the point that I

(03:19):
literally almost stopped doing everything. Now why I'm sharing this, why I'm
opening up to you is because I feel that not just me, a lot of you would have at
some point of the time gone through this or must be seeing someone who is going
through this kind of situation. And the struggles are there. First of all my

(03:44):
dear friends, I want to tell you if you are down, feeling, struggling at whatever
level it could be just stress. It could be little more than stress or it could
be the feeling of being stuck in a quagmire, in a quicksand where you don't

(04:04):
feel like you'll be able to ever come out. Irrespective of that. First thing
that you can do to help yourself and to be able to come out of this, to be able
to bounce back, to start being positive again in your life about yourself, about

(04:29):
the challenges because you should be able to face the challenges head on, is to
accept that you are not okay. The moment I started accepting that no I'm not okay
and I need to help myself, I need to do something, I need to talk, I need to let

(04:50):
it out, I need and vent and then I need to regroup and reassemble myself after
all the things that I'm going through. I told myself that I matter, my feelings
matter. It's the same thing I'm telling you friends, you matter, your feelings

(05:11):
matter, your stress matter, what you feel matter, your mental health and your
mental health condition matters. It does not matter whether others are able to
understand you or not or whether you feel that the others are able to
understand you or not. But what you are going through matters and also what
matters is you accepting that you are struggling. So if you want to go from

(05:41):
being I am not okay to I am okay, the journey of not being okay to journey of
becoming okay is to first accept that you are not okay. It is okay to be not

(06:03):
okay my dear friends. Until you do that you will not break the cycle of
negativity, you will not break the cycle of helplessness, you will not be able to
fight your own inner demons, you will not be able to fight the oppressive
feelings that come into your mind and the negative environment that creates

(06:26):
that you feel around you is trying to push you in. If you want to build that
positive inside you, build that positive vibes inside you then
start accepting that you are okay and know that it is okay to be not okay.
You are not alone struggling. I am telling you for a fact when it comes to

(06:50):
mental health in India and not just in India in the world a huge lot of
people are suffering through this and they are agonizingly suffering alone
with this whole trauma of mental health condition. So please don't think you are
alone. There are people who are going through whatever you're going through

(07:14):
and you can overcome it. It is inside you, the strength is inside you, the
positivity is inside you, the positive energy is inside your own soul and you
can take it out by first accepting you're not okay and then remember that
it is okay to not be okay. My dear friends, a stoic, a brave or a macho

(07:41):
person or a maco person whatever you pronounce it, a macho person is not a
person who is suffering in silence. A macho person is not the one who refuses
to take help. A brave, a macho person, a strong person is the one who says that
yes I am not okay and yes I will take help. My dear friend, please talk to

(08:07):
someone, journal it down, express your stress, let it all out, talk to people
and take help. The T of mental that is talk and take help is very important my
dear friends. Please do that and if you want to reach out to me, I have left my
email ID in the description, you can reach out to me, I would be more than

(08:32):
happy to help you but if you don't want to reach out to me, there are so many
anonymous sources that are available on the net, there are so many
helplines available, they are free, there are people who are ready to listen to
you. Please talk out to someone, if you cannot have, if you don't have somebody whom
you can call up or sit with and talk to then use these helplines and if you have

(08:57):
somebody whom you can talk to, please do it and if you are a person who is
seeing somebody else suffer through this, please encourage him or her to open up
to you because you never know those few minutes you may give to listen to
someone who is going through an agony visibly can change her or his life. If you

(09:25):
want to break this shackle, start adopting the mental of mental health.
What is mental of mental health? This is one of an article that I wrote some time
back and the reason for me to write it was to tell myself that yes I can do it,
I can overcome it and these are the steps I need to take. I am strong enough

(09:48):
to accept that yes I need help. I went, I talked to helplines, I talked to people
expressed, I used notes to myself, I would say notes to myself, I would I
recorded my stress out through voice recordings and I use certain AI tools

(10:09):
also like for example chat GPT to open up and express my stress and also the
helplines. When I did that, that's the time when I started telling myself that
I am strong and to be strong, that is the acronym mental that I started
adopting and now I'm going to adopt much more with the release of this podcast. I

(10:34):
would request you to pay attention, the link for the whole article is there.
M is for mindfulness, E is for exercise, N is for nutrition, P is for talking and
taking help, A is for awareness or self-awareness and L is for a healthy
lifestyle. I would encourage all of you to go through that article, the link I

(11:00):
would have shared in the description below. Please take care of your stress,
sleep well, eat healthy nutritionist food, spend some time maybe going for a walk,
dance it out, you know just put on some music and dance like crazy, run, jog

(11:23):
whatever you can that will help you a lot. I gained tremendous amount of weight
because of stress eating and binge eating and now I'm trying to help myself
overcome that. Please be mindful of what you're eating, at the same time be
self-aware of what you can do to yourself. When you're feeling low, be

(11:48):
self-aware and take steps to do it. There's a lot you can do in that. Mindfulness
in meditation, mindfulness of your environment, they are the ones that can
help you. When you're talking about everything around you begins from what

(12:11):
is inside you. The whole idea that I am trying to tell you is that positivity,
this is all about positivity, this is not about negativity. Positivity is fighting
those inner demons, positivity is being able to be brave enough to accept and to
rise above it and to say that yes I am doing it, I can do it, I have the inner

(12:35):
strength to do it, I have the courage to do it and I am going to fight it out and
to begin that it always starts by accepting that I am not okay, it is okay
to be not okay and to tell yourself that yes I will be okay now. My dear friends
please take help, that's the most important thing that I can stress over

(13:01):
and over again in this podcast. Talk to someone, take help, make yourself a note,
open the WhatsApp, send messages to yourself if you want, send yourself an
email if you want, if you like writing in a diary write it out and start
regrouping yourself because that strength is inside you. I invite any one

(13:25):
of you who's going through a struggle to feel free to reach out to me. I have my
link below, the email ID is there below, you can connect with me, send me an email,
I would be more than happy to talk to you but before doing that I would also
encourage you to reach out to a professional counselor. There are a lot of

(13:46):
counseling services available for free, reach out to a counselor, talk to them
and if any one of you wants to share your story of struggle or you want to
talk about your experiences and share it with the world, I would be more than
happy to have you join me as a guest on the podcast episode. So if you want to

(14:10):
join me on a podcast episode, talk about it, please feel free to drop me an email,
I would love to have you all over here. Now my dear friends before I end this
episode, again I am telling you the same thing that I started with, I am NOT OKAY
is your first step. The second step is to tell yourself that it is okay to be not

(14:35):
okay. The third step is to be strong enough to take help. You are strong when
you say that you want help, you are a Superman or a Superwoman when you say
that you need help. So take help and talk it out. This is the third step. The fourth

(15:04):
step is adopt the mental MENTAL framework. The link to that is there below
in the description and fifth is to be ready to bounce back.
Journey may be slow, could be fast, it depends on a person to person, it

(15:25):
depends from where you are and how hard you are facing the traumas or how hard
these traumas are for you. But remember you are not alone, we are all there for
you. Feel free to reach out to anyone including me and I'll be more than happy

(15:46):
to have you join with me on future episodes. Now with this my dear friend, I'm
your host and friend Dr. Aman Kapoor signing out of this episode and telling
you that yes I was not okay but now I am going to be okay. Remember to like, share,

(16:08):
comment and reach out to me. Bye bye.