Eating a balanced mental diet optimizes the state and functioning of the mind and brain.

A balanced mental diet involves providing us with those “nutrients” that meet the essential needs of our mind and brain. There are no two brains or two minds with the same needs. In the same way that there are people with food intolerances to dairy, nuts or fruits and if they consume them to some extent they feel unwell, there are also people who will feel unwell if they are exposed to excessively competitive environments, if they maintain regular relationships with manipulative people or if they let the current of day to day carry them along. But they will rarely attribute that discomfort to the environment in which they move or to the lifestyle they are leading, they will give it a more trivial connotation such as that their boss is a pig or that if the subway still smells like filth.

And what are these nutrients and to what extent do you have to consume them? Well, I don’t have the exact formula, but just as in the food diet there are some food groups that are recommended to be consumed daily, in the mental diet there are also them. For example, anyone knows that consuming fruits and vegetables is more than advisable, in the mental sphere we could equate this to your personal development and your social relationships. If the pear is not one of your favorite fruits, do not eat it, there are many more and if improving your level of English tortures you, then learn to sew. If the cucumber gives you gas, avoid it and if going out of canes with pepe bores you, well, you know.

Consuming ultra-processed or fast food we could equate it to the consumption of social networks, on specific and justified occasions. They cannot be the main means in our development as social beings, it is a different form of social contact but its abuse skews and damages the evolution of our role in society, of the sense of identity and of belonging to the group.
That is, you make your daily mental menu, you make those decisions, nobody has to tell you what suits you and what doesn’t, you are sufficiently capable of knowing what you like, what makes you upset and what you don’t want to consume. Be critical of what you read or hear out there and trust the signals that your body and mind show you. This attitude will have a positive impact on your self-esteem and the functioning of your mind.