It's Time to Get Smart About Mental Health

 

"Moreover, this bill misses the crux of the problem altogether. Rather than making largely unnecessary -- and potentially counter-productive -- changes to the way we deal with mentally-ill people who have committed violent acts, we would do far more to protect the public by intervening to prevent such violence in the first place."

 

The average person responds to life.  The entrepreneurial person will proactively pursue their own interests.  The strategic person will proactively seek to improve the system.

 

We want to avoid crime.  We want to manage down health care costs.  We're supposedly after increased productivity and innovation and are trying to do something about the growing mental health crisis. 

 

Yet the great initiatives that have emerged in the past couple years are all reactions to a problem, like trying to identify and cure lead poisoning instead of taking the lead out of the pipe in the first place.

 

Yes, we have to try new approaches in how we deal with mental illness - but more than that, it's time we change our entire approach to mental health.

 

When you look at mental health holistically and not just as a problem, a proactive approach to fostering mental fitness becomes a key part of the solution.

 

We can do this - we can all move past this social barrier of stigma, but only when we're all on the same side, pushing forward together.