It’s not easy to say you need something, even when that something has to do with your own happiness and well-being. And it’s also a sign of strength and courage to want to go beyond your own personal limitations through reaching out for support and growth.

In terms of culture and family, positive role models for understanding and coping with pain and suffering are not common. Traditionally in many cultures, mental instability has been equated with genetic weakness and/or with a flaw to ones character. This stigma has affected the individual through social outcasting and has also spread to the entire family. As a result mental health problems have tended to be kept behind the closed doors of home, where they were ignored, suppressed or emotionally buried. No wonder we have had a hard time opening up about personal problems!

Likewise our educational system is still figuring out how to teach emotional and social regulation, and how to use “words rather than reaction” to convey feeling. Teaching children the reward which comes with expressing one's feelings appropriately and with making responsible choices is key to their mental health and fulfillment. In turn these children have a better chance of growing to form families where striving for that potential is an articulated goal. Psychological education can offer to schools and families an essential contribution to the growth of healthier societies and future generations.

There has been already many remarkable changes in the way our society perceives psychology. Within the last century, the intellectual class became pioneer in using psychological and psychiatrist services as a self-care commodity. Nowadays, more and more people talk openly about going to a psychotherapist, and are willing to share their experience of personal development with others. Schools are now offering permanent school counselors on staff to be a resource for children with difficulties and barriers to their well-being. People are more interested in exploring the mind-body connection, and meditation groups continue proliferating all over the western world. Activities such as yoga, tai-chi, acupuncture etc., are available to the general public throughout different public organizations. Psychological issues are regularly talked about on television, radio programs, and magazines, while the multi-billionaire self-help industry gives us an idea of how many people are searching for answers to their problems.

Most importantly, people are recognizing that they can ask for help. And in asking for that help they discover multiple perspectives and insights into a crisis which otherwise seemed insurmountable.

Asking for help is an act of strength, not a sign of personal weakness. By seeking help, you take responsibility for your life, for your choices, for your growth and for your well-being. When it comes to your life, you should not feel guilty in asking for help. Sometimes, that’s the only way we can get unstuck.