I know it is summer and that is the happiest, most cheerful and sunny time of the year. But we can all get hit with a bout of the blues anytime. I have had my fair share of times when I was battling with myself and my life. This Spring I wrote a post on how I get myself out of those times. I wrote it just as much to help anyone else out there, as to help my future struggling self. I think it qualifies for a rerun.
How do you fight the Blues?
With Spring just around the corner here, and a nice week of little projects behind me, I feel safe to say my blues is over. It lasted a lot longer then I counted on, or wanted to. I showed a bit of it in the beginning of February when I reached a low point and thought I had hit bottom. In fact I even sunk deeper, and it wasn’t until March that I felt I was going uphill again. I tried to hide it, but my half-hearted attempts at keeping up with my blogging schedule probably gave me away. I started some posts, telling you what was up, but I couldn’t find the words. I never can. Normally writing comes pretty easy to me. My life is full of words, in my professional work it is all about reading and talking and writing, and except for when I am holding a paint brush (and that has never stopped the talking part), my private life isn’t much different either.
But when I am struggling with my demons inside, words don’t give me comfort. Words become my enemy. My new years resolutions lists I wrote down so cheerfully and full of zest and enthusiasm to get them done, turned into a danger zone, mocking me and my inaptitude to cross anything off. Old posts I wrote myself seem foreign to me ‘who is that woman and who cares about her stupid vignettes’ and other peoples blogs turn into an accusation “look they have their act together”, “she get things done”.
Looking back at this latest episode of the blues I can see the warning signs clearly. These times usually start somewhere on a high, this time it was the beginning of the new year. That new year came with plans, lots of plans, big plans and big ambitions. As in true Songbird style I wrote it all down in my own personal planner. And thinking ‘aim big or don’t aim at all’ I wrote some hefty goals to go with those plans. I fully realized I might be stretching it, but I felt such a surge of energy and I thought ‘at least I’ll have lots of fun trying’. And for the first two weeks, it was fun. I was right on top of my crazy schedule and feeling confident and happy.
And then I stumbled, got up and continued. Then I fell, got up again and continued on, although a bit more hesitant. And then I fell flat on my face and didn’t know how to pick myself up again. And all my insecurities, my anxieties and my worries flooded me. And it all seemed so meaningless. I thought about tossing each and every one of my goals out the window, including this blog. But one thing I have learned about myself and my up-and-down periods, is that I should never make a big decision when I am low. So I struggled to keep my head above water, reminded myself to keep breathing and sat it out, waiting for the good times to roll in again. And they did. They always do, thank goodness.
Every time I hinted about not feeling so well, there were lots of comments and emails from other people telling me how they felt the same way. I guess we all have our occasional encounters with the blues. So this is how I pulled myself out of it, I hope it will help you too.
5 Tips to deal with stress and feeling blue.
1. Pace yourself.
Even when full of energy, slow down, enjoy the moment, celebrate your accomplishments and do not outrun yourself. When everything is going well I tend to pile up even more. I want the ball to keep rolling and gain momentum. Except I can’t keep up, and I forget to enjoy the process and celebrate my accomplishments because my eyes are too focused on the next project. So I have started to make a different kind of lists. Not of things I want/need/must do, but of things I have done, I have finished, I have accomplished. And I started keeping a gratitude journal to remind myself of everything that is good and whole in my life. Now every time I add something to my to-do lists, I have to add something to my ‘good’ lists too. Keeping the balance so to speak.
2. Take good care of yourself.
When the crafting and creating and decorating and blogging goes wonderful, I tend to overdo it. Stay up too late, forget to eat, don’t go outside enough etc. And then my body just slams on the brakes and forces me to stop. And then all I want to do is sleep and sit in my jammies and eat chocolate. And that is more or less exactly what I did. And it felt good, as long as I didn’t indulge in it too long. I guess we need rest and relaxation the most in the times when we feel the least like getting some. But in the end our bodies are just like any other machine, without proper maintenance they break.
3. Give yourself a break.
Yes I have goals, big goals and I am determined to reach those goals, but it doesn’t have to be tomorrow, and they don’t have to happen all at the same time either. It is ok to let something slide every once in a while. Every self-help book I have ever read always starts by saying that you should write your dreams down, that you can reach the stars if you just start trying today. I have grown up with the mantra of: think positive, work hard and you can do anything. Well folks, it just aint true. There are only 24 hours in a day, and some of those have to be used for sleeping, and eating and showering and everything else that needs doing. Goals are good, they can help you choose what is really important to you, but choose you must. You can’t do it all, and you certainly can’t do it all at once.
4. Talk to yourself like you would talk to someone else.
I am my own worst critic. Sometimes I force myself to say my own thoughts out loud and they scare me. If someone, let alone a friend, would ever talk to me like that I would cut them out of my life, and I would never ever be so judgmental and harsh to anybody else. Yet it always seems to be ok to be that hard on myself. I am like a drill sergeant for myself, and yet I know that I fare so much better with a gentle coach on my side. So I have to remind myself to shut up every once in a while, be quiet and think soft thoughts. Then say some nice things to myself, also out loud, and try really hard to believe them. And then repeat that, until the drill sergeant has taken a walkabout and I can feel my friendly coach by my side.
5. Cry if you feel like it, and laugh even if you don’t feel like it.
In the end what gets me out of these times is always to actively decide that enough is enough. And then I start to act as if I feel better. Waiting to feel better before doing anything, can take forever. Sometimes just faking it, works much faster. Did you know that your brain can’t distinguish between a real smile and a fake one? Your brain recognizes your smile muscles moving and draws the conclusion that you are happy. So smiling even when you don’t feel like it, is the fastest way to feeling like smiling. So when my body was rested enough and my mind was fed up with being low, I gave myself a good stern kick in the booty and started doing things again. It didn’t take long after that for me to start feeling better again. Hiding from the rest of the world in my basement and restoring things to order there, gave my spirit a gigantic boost. With every shelf I decluttered and with every bit of junk I got out of my house I could feel my mind and spirit declutter itself from junk too. Being active turned out to be the best medicine.
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And here I am up to my old tricks again and hoping that I will finally have learned my lesson and keep the blues at bay for a really long time. And when he does pay me a visit again, at least I’ll have this post to help me get out faster.
I know this post is a bit different from my regular ‘let’s look at something pretty’ writings. But I felt so touched by all the heart-felt good wishes I received and strangely comforted in the fact that so many of you let on that they were struggling themselves, that I felt I needed to write this. So if this post just touches one of you out there, and helps you in your fight to find yourself again, I’ll be happy. And please don’t feel offended if you are suffering from a real depression and my little tips seem trivial and unrealistic. I am talking about the everyday blues here, and I am in no way saying that this will solve any true medical problem.
So does any of this sound familiar to you? Do you have occasional encounters with the blues? Do you have your own set of rules that help you fight the blues?
Love,
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