3 things I do daily to manage mental illness

It’s no secret around here that my mental health is… let’s just say less than 100% hahaha!  And can we be honest and recognize that crazy people attract other crazy people?

So my one girlfriend says to me she basically wants to learn from me how to manage her crazy because “nothing works for [her].”

It was a humbling conversation to have! Honestly, I know I’ve got a few things right in my life, but most of the time I feel like I’m galumphing around as clueless as they come! Adulting? What the hell is this nonsense? It’s as though my 16-year-old self is trapped in this old-person exterior, except that someone was stupid enough to give me a mortgage. And KIDS!

So, I guess the question is…how do I do it? How do I keep myself from tripping on my adulthood and giving in to the depressive blackness that’s constantly hovering around?

1 – CHALLENGE YOURSELF

Maybe a weird spot to start, but it’s so important! While I may spiral into the pit trying to decide what to make for dinner I also recognize how important it is to challenge myself with something every day!

You hear all sorts of quotes about this sort of thing – do something that scares you, every day; your magic happens outside of your comfort zone; shoot for the moon and at least you’ll land amongst the stars – you know, that motivational crap plastered everywhere.

Guess what: IT’S ALL TRUE.

Well, except the bit about the stars. The stars are a helluva lot farther away than that moon is.

Honestly. Think about yourself. When are you your best? What are you doing when you’re your best? I would bet anything that your absolute best self happens when you are accomplishing something. Something HARD. For a species who is by nature lazy (see just about every single human invention EVER!) we FLOURISH when we are learning, growing, and expanding ourselves.

I don’t mean that in order to function regularly as a person you have to drop everything and climb Everest. Unless, of course, that’s something you want to do! In which case get to work! But I do mean do SOMETHING. Try a difficult recipe. Learn how to paint. Try a new exercise class. Lately I’ve been neglecting my love of reading and spent one day sitting by the pool on vacation bored out of my skull waiting for the kids to finish swimming. Um, hello? Challenge: pick up a freaking book, woman!

Challenges don’t have to be HUGE. But challenge yourself and go for it!

2 – SET GOALS

Now you turn your challenge into an actual GOAL… This should be no surprise, given the overarching subject of this blog! 

Identify your goal – what do you want to do? If it’s something you actually want to do then stop thinking about it and figure out how to do it! I’ll give you a basic example: 

A couple of years ago I was playing on Pinterest and saw a friend pinning a whole bunch of stuff about something called “zentangle.” I had never heard of it before but the pins were interesting and I thought, gee, that looks like fun! And ever since I have wanted to learn how to zentangle!

So finally, this year, I set the goal: learn how to zentangle!

Next step, figure out how to get there!! For zentangle I spent some time on Pinterest, and hunting for how-to books on Amazon. Then I added a few items to my wishlist right before Christmas time. My hubs picked up on the uh, SUBTLE hints O:-) and got me a how-to-Tangle book for under the tree! So then…

The next step! DO IT!

This can be a struggle, I won’t lie. I sat with my pens and pencils and looked at the blank practice page for a looooong time before I actually made my first few, very stress-inducing lines. But then suddenly, it was done!

My first tangle was NOT perfect. I even ignored some of the instructions I wasn’t comfortable with (work in PEN? Are you KIDDING ME?!) to get it to a level I was okay with starting at and worked my way up. NOW, a whopping month later, I have a little collection of tangles finished and a few others on the way! I can point out every single flaw in each of them, of course, BUT, I learned how to do it.

Set goals. Crush them. Boom.

Learning Zentangle was a slightly bigger goal. Your daily goals don’t have to be as big as acquiring a new skill every time, of course! Honestly, sometimes the goal for the day is to unload the dishwasher. Fold the laundry. Legit, those are some of my daily goals. But I treat them like the big goals and prioritize them for that day and they get done.

3 – SCHEDULING

This is IMPERATIVE for me.  I know that there’s something wonderful to be said about impulsivity and just going with the flow, but that DOES NOT WORK FOR ME on the regular!!

No, the more things I have planned out day-to-day the better.

I recommend using a good planner. SOMETHING that works for you. Some people are okay with just their phone calendars. I am not. I do SO much better with a paper planner. I have a fantastic one that I just LOVE that has space for all my appointments and work schedule, to-do lists, and prompts to help me identify and execute both those itsy bitsy and mondo humongous goals.

I write EVERYTHING down. Appointments, ideas, tasks, grocery lists, meal plans, where my family has to be at what time, voicemails, budgets…

Decision-making makes me anxious. Stupid, I know. But something I’ve learned about myself over the years. So…I can FIGHT with that every day, or I can make my life easier and just work with it. If I can take out as much of the daily decisions as possible BEFORE I get to the day my life just runs more smoothly!

What am I doing with my free time today? Oh! Today’s assigned focus is vacuuming! What are we going to eat for dinner? Oh! Today is Taco Tuesday! Who do I need to follow up with at work? Oh! There’s a list right here! Gee, I haven’t taken any time to do anything just for fun lately. Oh! I have a few hours on Wednesday – I’m going to make note to work on sewing myself a dress! 

Get it? As much as I can, I schedule EVERYTHING. If everything is scheduled then in the moment I don’t freeze up and land myself unproductive and on the couch and hating me because I just can’t figure out what to feed the kids for dinner today, and stop judging me, Netflix, of COURSE I’m still watching! 

Sometimes the deadlines turn out to be impossible, honestly – last week I set a deadline to finish sewing that dress for myself I mentioned above. But when I actually sat to do it there was a whole section of hand-sewing I hadn’t remembered was coming up in the instructions aaaand that did not fit in the rest of my week. So that plan will be adjusted, BUT, I FINALLY made significant progress and it’s ALMOST finished.

I schedule my workouts. I know at the beginning of the week when to expect to be home and able to crash and watch TV for the night. I schedule piano practice when I’m working on a piece to perform. I literally schedule myself time to schedule. Usually it’s Sunday afternoons. Sometimes that time needs to be given to something else and it happens Mondays. But if you look in my planner you’ll see what day it’s scheduled for each week!

Schedule your life, and respect yourself enough to stick with that schedule. When my schedule is tight I get SO much done. And accomplishing all these little challenges, and then the big goals…that feels AWESOME. Probably the best natural antidepressant I’ve found so far!

There’s so much more I could say about living daily with depression and all the little steps it takes to get me through life. I’m sure that they’ll emerge  as this blog continues! But this is a good place to start. At least, if your brain matches up with my brain.

What tips and tricks do you use to get through the daily grind? Tell me in the comments!

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