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…because that sounds so much more official than mental illness.

By Wendy Benner Miller

"Mental health" is a somewhat ironic phrase because it is typically used when discussing the antithesis of a healthy mind and symbiotic emotions. While many may argue that the goal, when using this phrase, is to prioritize the need for society to focus on the importance of a person’s emotional health in the same manner as one’s physical health, this is rarely the case. All too often, when the term "mental health" is brought up in conversation on its own, it elicits a visible response in one’s body language, a shifting in a seat, or an actual bristle or uncomfortableness, which can sometimes conjure stereotypical assumptions, eye rolls, and slang references.

What might be the biggest irony of all is that for most of history, mental illness was not considered an illness at all, but a choice based on controllable feelings or "bad" attitudes. Historically, being...