Being a teen can be one of the most challenging times of a person’s life. The good news is there are many ways you can support your teen and help them build the good mental health that they need to thrive. One way is to find professional help with experience in teen mental health. Research has shown that children who experience trauma have a higher risk of developing mental health issues in the future. However, the risks can be dramatically reduced with timely interventions. Thanks to the internet, it’s easy to access specialized help using a search engine to find the best options. For instance, Alpine Academy Utah can be helpful if you’re located in or around Utah. Beyond that, here are some ways to help your teen build better mental health.

Encourage them to use proven mental health strategies 

One of the most straightforward ways you can help your teen build up their mental health is to introduce them to easy-to-learn and use strategies that have already been proven to work. For example, if you search for abc please dbt you will find a simple three-part strategy that is used in dialectical behaviour therapy that consists of three parts. 

The first part A refers to accumulating positive experiences. This means you help your teen to do something that they enjoy every day, even if it’s not related to school, or achievement. The second part B is about building mastery. This means doing one small thing each day that gives them a sense of achievement, which can help to keep them motivated over the long term. The last part is C which is about coping ahead of time. That is, you help them come up with a strategy of how to deal when specific challenges come their way, thereby not only supporting them in getting a better outcome but also giving them a sense of confidence that they can deal with the situations they find themselves in. 

Provide them access to exercise that they love

We all know that regular physical activity is essential for good mental health. However, simply telling your teenager to exercise may not be enough to engage them over the long term. Instead, it can be much more effective to provide them with access to a physical activity that they genuinely enjoy. 

Of course, this will be different for every teenager, with some loving team sports, like basketball, and football, while others will prefer cycling or dance. The main thing here is that they get to choose to do it, as this will help them stay motivated and not cause them to push back at yet another thing they are being told to do.

Support them in pursuing their values 

Lastly, one of the most important things any of us can do for our mental health is live life by our values. Indeed, doing so means we can create a meaningful life, one where even when things do get tough, we have the strength and motivation to continue.

Of course, for this to work for your teenager, they have to be the ones choosing the values that they live by. The good news is that there are plenty of prompts and supports for this that you can use. Additionally, it’s important to remember that values need to be more flexible than specific goals, and not just another stick that they use to punish themselves when they don’t quite meet them. Indeed, values are more about the way that we do things, for example with compassion. The idea is that once we have identified the value we can work out specific ways of acting that are in line with this.