Marshall White Maintenance Day

Keep Striving for 200% Success!

The Role of Nutrition on Mental Health

Healthy eating to improve heart health, and reduce diabetes, and high blood pressure, is common knowledge now, but what about eating to help your mental state?

One of the most unrecognised factors in the development of mental health is the role of nutrition. The link between diet and mental health is growing as the field of Psychology expands.

There is now a large body of research showing how the food we eat not only nourishes our physical body but has a strong impact on our mind, mood and emotions. This is called the food-mood connection.

Let’s compare our brains to a car engine. We know a car has an engine and we need fuel to make it perform. The quality of the fuel we put in dictates the quality of performance. There’s little difference between a car engine and a brain in that sense. The type of foods we eat directly impacts our brains function. It can impact the chemical messengers (neurotransmitters) to either create focus, clarity and a sense of wellbeing or confusion, depression and anxiety.

With the brain though, it doesn’t just take the nourishment we give it to function, it actually uses that fuel to build other parts of the brain. So what we eat is going to affect what kind of brain we have. Choosing the right foods really makes a difference in our overall behaviour and wellbeing.

A few simple dietary changes can boost cognitive function as well as reduce symptoms of depression, anxiety and other mental health disorders.

The Art of Recovery

Manage fatigue and prevent burnout by implementing some of the strategies Tegan Wallis shared during your Maintenance Day.