Self-Care is Healthcare: Psychological Fitness
Self-Care is Healthcare: Part 3 of 3
In the third and final part of the Self-Care is Healthcare series, I want to touch on something I call psychological fitness. What do I mean by that? I define it as “the mind’s ability to handle challenges, stress, and change as a core indicator of well-being.” Just like physical fitness is important for your health, so is the strength and adaptability of your mind. When thinking about how to maintain physical fitness, things like going to the gym and eating nutritious meals might come to mind. The same principles go for psychological fitness, too: it’s about creating a routine of healthy habits that contribute to a resilient, motivated, positive mindset.
And yet, one of the greatest challenges humans face today is improving their psychological wellness. Personal growth, in many ways, feels like rewriting our genetic code. It may feel unnatural, uncomfortable, and even impossible.
But only if we choose to see it that way.
The truth is, it is possible if we decide to make it a core value. Just like humans once made survival instinctual, we can make mental and emotional growth part of our cultural DNA.
We live in a world obsessed with comfort. Instant food delivery at the click of a button, endless entertainment at our fingertips, climate-controlled rooms and memory foam mattresses. And while comfort is a privilege of modern society, it has a hidden cost: it quietly erodes our resilience. We’ve become so accustomed to convenience that we are rarely challenged and instead fear discomfort in all its forms. We’re unsettled by the sensation of hunger, we go out of our way to avoid social awkwardness, we panic at the thought of sitting in silence, or an uncertain future. Emotional courage, once vital for human survival and connection, is now an underdeveloped trait.
Besides the desire for comfort, technology is also one of the biggest factors in hindering our psychological fitness. While there have been incredible advancements and innovations in medicine, communication, and global connectivity, we have in turn fragmented our perspective and sense of self. We now spend more time online, curating our social images, than cultivating in-person relationships and inner-strength. Screens offer endless stimuli, but little space for reflection and authenticity. As we outsource the use of our minds, we risk losing the very muscles that make us psychologically fit: patience, grit, and presence. In doing so, we’re not just avoiding discomfort, we’re weakening our capacity to handle it when it inevitably arrives.
We need a shift.
If we want to reclaim our psychological fitness, we must embrace the discomfort we’ve been taught to avoid. We must retrain ourselves to face uncertainty, to endure boredom, to sit with silence, to lean into challenge — not as punishment, but as practice.
True self-care isn’t bubble baths or dopamine hits. It’s being brutally honest with yourself and doing the hard things that push you to change. It’s trading gratification for growth. It’s rewiring our mindset to redefine strength and success.
This is the next evolution of humanity: not more comfort, but more courage. Not more ease, but more endurance. Not more distraction, but more discipline. Let’s make it cool to have a strong mind!
