If you are experiencing feelings of depression, anxiety or stress there are some standard practical changes you can make to help improve how you’re feeling. FACT

If the changes are mild enough, these changes alone can make the demons disappear. 

If you feel like things are a little heavier, then these changes alongside therapy support can help 

You can contact us here at Wellbeing Support for free adviceandguidance@wellbeingsupport.co we’d be happy to support you

Deal with your legitimate problems and stresses of life – using the steps above, you can often start a plan to address some issues – sometimes just the very fact that you have designed a plan helps! 

Look for other forms of support to inform your plan, research and decide what works well for you – consider past time you’ve have dealt with difficult successfully and ask ‘what did I do then?’

Talk to people you trust and get their support – this might seem obvious but often we bottle things up and are afraid to talk to others, for fear of people judging us as looking weak or incapable – choose your audience for qualities that you would offer others in that situation – trust your instincts!

Exercise and get out into the fresh air as much as you can – Its no myth that exercise and air are good for you – vitamin D and vitamin C from the sunlight improves mood and reduces psychological distress – clinical studies prove it. 

Increased blood flow and oxygen around the body from intense movement feeds the brain and stimulates dopamine (the feel good hormone) and oxytocin (the love hormone) to be produced and flooded i. 

Its not a cure all and it takes a while to ‘top up’ the levels (a few weeks) to a point where you feel the benefits but it happens eventually, especially when paired with some of the other mood changers

Understand your anger – Anger is completely normal and necessary as a warning that something isn’t right. Unfortunately, if we’re angry often without processing its origins, it can start to lead to those destructive and undermining emotions we discussed earlier.

 Sometimes the actual reasons for anger can be rooted somewhere deeper than we realise; the family environment, having angry people around us, the culture we live in, using anger as a way to control or manipulate something

Find ways to manage the anger and process those deeper roots;

Visualise a calmer, happier place

Use a breathing or grounding technique

Leave the situation and take some time to process what went wrong

Repeat ‘good advice’ to yourself – sometimes it helps to visualise a person we respect and wish to emulate giving us the advice

Picture calming images

Do something physical or active to burn off the angry feelings 

Take responsibility for your anger and realise you cannot change anyone else’s reaction to anything, just your own

Learn to recognise the signs, that triggers and the possible situations in which you’re getting angry and bring yourself into that awareness before it gets to the point of explosion 

Get in the habit of ‘checking in’ with your anger on a daily basis and reflecting on what you could do differently next time

Finally, and not least, add a range of calming practises to your day  Make time for yourself, allow yourself downtime to just ‘enjoy’ being you and recharge yourself, get enough sleep and that can include naps (don’t feel guilty, cats do it all the time!), 

learn to do something relaxing that you will enjoy; yoga, stretching, a quiet hobby, have a lovely warm bath or shower, read a book or watch a good movie, do straight up relaxing activities like sunbathing, going in a sauna or getting a massage.

Do fun things, laugh at things, laugh with others, allow yourself to be a little silly and enjoy and be silly alongside people you like – we’re not robots, we’re human and allowing imperfection in our humanness is what makes us warm, kind, tolerant and forgiving – be those things towards yourself xxxx