Activities to Help Depression

As Moms, especially stay-at-home Moms, it can be so easy to slip into depression.  One minute we’re marvelling at our wondrous newborn or our toddler taking their first steps and the next we’re down in the dumps, bogged down by mundane tasks that have to be done. Everyday.

When this happened to me, I started looking for a creative outlet.  Which is why, when I read this guest post, it spoke to me. Though it may seem counter-intuitive, tackling seemingly boring tasks like housework may be just the thing to counter depression because exercise is one of the keys to happiness.  Keep reading, listed below are some more interesting activities to help depression.

Staying Active: Why Passivity leads to Depression and How to Avoid It

Guest post by Alex Wise of Loveawake.com

Our lives are a constant struggle where we try to avoid bad emotions. We try to avoid them as much as possible.

However, what do you do when you fall into it and can’t get out?

How do you get out of it?

Why did you even get into it?

And how do you stay out of it?

Depression or the wave of bad emotions can happen to anyone regardless of social status is or how good you perceive your life to be.

It can strike anytime and any place.

Nowadays most of us live a pretty comfortable easy going life. We have a roof over our head. We don’t need to harvest and hunt for food. We don’t really need to worry about safety.

All in all our lives really aren’t that bad, so why are we seeing an increasing number of depressed people in modern-day society?

An estimated 1 in 10 U.S. Residents are reported depressed according to the CDC. These numbers are quite high considering we’ve never been better in terms of how far our society has come.

So what’s wrong?

There’s one big reason for why people are getting depressed.

It’s passivity.

I’m not saying it’s the be all and end all of depression. But in my field of expertise, I’ve come across this over and over again.

People who are passive are much more likely to end up in a depression.

When I’m talking about passivity, I’m talking about people who live their lives in a daze.

They are not actively doing anything every day to improve their lives.

They stick to their boring routines.

They order their pizza or TV frozen dinners, sit in front of their couch and watch their latest TV shows.

They do this over and over again.

It becomes mundane. It’s boring. It sucks the life out of you.

Once you’re in it it’s hard to get out of it. This depressive cycle continues and continues. It’s so much easier to just stay home and do nothing. Fall asleep to your favorite TV show. While you constantly tell yourself that one day you’ll make it happen. Who are you kidding?

How Passivity works in sucking you into the depths of depression

When you’re just sitting at home doing nothing. Working at a job that doesn’t fulfil you.

Going day by day just to make by. You can’t help but get sucked into the well of depression and bad emotions.

You’ll sit around unfulfilled. While you watch your friends updating their Facebook profiles telling you about their latest adventures and their awesome lives.

You get sad. You feel sad for yourself.

You’ll end up sitting there feeling sorry for yourself. Day in and day out.

You are consumed by all these bad emotional thoughts. Because you do nothing but sit at home.

The worst thing most people do is deny they have a crappy life or simply they just ignore it.

So they keep going with it and don’t try to change anything because it’s much easier to stay here than to actually try to make something happen.

When you just sit there and do nothing. All you’re surrounded by are your negative depressive thoughts.

They engulf you so that all you can think about is your failures and how you’ll never achieve anything in your life.

You’ll start to blame everything and everyone around you and maybe even yourself.

You’ll get stuck in this vicious cycle of doom and gloom, slowly spiralling down into the abyss of depression.

How to break out of it and avoid falling in again

So what do you do?

Well, the opposite of passive is active.

So you need to get active. But purposeless activity just won’t cut it.

You need to have a purpose and a goal. You need to have something to aim at, so you can keep yourself accountable and work towards the goal day by day.

I highly recommend that you start hitting the gym. There’s nothing greater than actually exercising your body.

There is simply no excuse in the world that you are not finding some form of exercise and getting healthy.

After a week you’ll start to feel better and look better.  Start hitting the weights and also don’t shy away from the cardio.

When you workout your body will also release something called endorphins, which triggers a positive feeling in your body.

Helping you get a more positive outlook on life!

Another thing to do is to start cleaning up around your life. Start small.

Start cleaning up your room and making your bed (if you haven’t done that already).

Then start organizing your books. Your papers. Everything.

Maybe even sit and read a book and learn from it!

Start taking steps to make your life better. You don’t need to find a new job if the one you have pays well. You can if you want to but realize we all need financial stability, and a lot of people have jobs just for that. Use the financial income you get and spend it on things that enrich your life. Whether it be travelling to places you’ve always wanted. Buying that new dress you’ve been dreaming of, having a make-over or taking martial arts classes. Whatever you’re into, go and do it!

Remember that the only goal you should have every day is to work to make your life just a little better than yesterday.

But also remember you need to consistently apply the fundamentals.

The Long-term Goal and How to keep going

No matter what your long-term goal is. You should still keep the fundamentals going.

For me the fundamentals consist of:

• Hitting the gym
• Eating healthy
• Reading 1 new book every month
• Going out at least 3–4 times a week pushing myself hard in the field
• Meditating daily for 15min

If it makes it any easier you can write them down as a daily “To-Do-List”.

Anything else you can add on top of that is great. But you need to keep the fundamentals going!

Meaning it doesn’t matter if it rains or you’re having a bad day — you do the fundamentals! You stick to them.

Once you have strong fundamentals, you can build on top of that and try to achieve even bigger things.

However, don’t forget to give yourself a pat on the back when you accomplish the things you set out to do.

Give yourself that little acknowledgement and be proud of yourself.

About the Author

Alex Wise is the Founder of Loveawake.com Dating Site, a place for single users to connect based on their common interests. He’s a long time blogger with an appetite for technology. During the day, Alex also works as a marketer in the online marketing industry.  Follow him on the company site or on Facebook and Twitter.

Editors PS:

Moms, please note: If you suspect you are suffering from Post-natal or clinical depression, please seek the advice of a trained medical professional.

One thing I’d like to add to this post:

I think it’s important to find activities that YOU really enjoy.  Personally, I haven’t hit the gym since my son was born. What works best for me is walking.  I just love being out in nature and this is something I often do with my children and hubby or with my Mother.  I find combining family time with activity is a win-win.  I also enjoy jumping on the trampoline with my son and it’s great exercise.   My all-time favourite form of exercise is dancing… looking forward to getting back to that once my youngest is a bit older.

Over to you: What’s your favourite form of exercise? What do you to beat depression?  Feel free to leave a comment below…