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Three Tips to Help with Depression

How To Help Yourself

By Ellis stonePublished 6 years ago 3 min read
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You're going to have good and bad days, but you have to remember nothing happens overnight.

Tip 1: Be Proactive

Learn what triggers you to feel depressed, and try to avoid them. Life is hard, and you can't avoid everything that brings you down, but some things you can. On the flip side, learn what helps to get you out of the fog of depression. The next time you feel depressed, when you finally snap out of it, try to remember what helped you.

Was it a song?

A type of exercise you were doing?

Or someone you where talking to?

If you write it down it will help remember. The next time you feel depressed, YOU WILL HAVE SOME TOOLS YOU CAN USE.

One thing you can try is set a reminder in your calendar to smile or to do something that makes you happy. Taking some type of control over the way you feel is one of the most important things you can do.

Tip 2: Stop feeding your depression.

If you go around using negative terminology such as...

I'm so depressed today,

today is going to suck,

I'm worthless,

...you are feeding your depression; your subconscious hears these words and starts to make you feel them. So if you say today is going to suck, your mind starts to look for things to prove your point right, so you will start to notice all the negative things around you.

But if you use positive terminology such as...

today is going to be a great day,

I am an amazing person,

I feel so happy today,

...your subconscious will hear these words and start looking for things that are positive.

The way you stand and your facial expressions can also feed your depression.

People that are depressed usually don't stand up straight, they are slumped over and they look sad. There's a saying:

motion creates emotion.

The way you carry yourself can dictate your feelings.

Doing something as simple as forcing a smile on your face even when you don't feel like it can help change your mood.

Working out can also help you feel better; the hormones that get released get as you workout gives you a type of high that makes you feel a little happier.

Tip 3: Don't be hard on yourself or others.

They say life is a journey. When it comes to depression, you have to have that mindset. You're going to have good and bad days, you're going to take 100 steps forward and 200 steps back and your first instinct is to get frustrated with yourself, but you have to remember nothing happens overnight.

You're also going to have friends and family that have never experienced depression tell you just to get over it or just snap out of it, and that can be frustrating. They don't understand it's not as simple as deciding to not be depressed. You have to remember if they never experienced depression they don't know any better. Don't get frustrated with them, just try to explain to them how you feel.

The thing is, most people really do care and really do want to help, they just don't know how. The worst thing you can do is lash out or make them feel bad for not understanding your pain. Depression is not just hard on you, but also the people around you.

My Experience

I've been dealing with depression for most of my life and I have made a lot of mistakes.

And I used to get down on myself, but the more I thought about it, I realized that everything worth doing take some time to get right so I just have to learn as I go and never give up.

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