How To Find Time For Mental Health

Does this sound familiar? Between juggling a demanding job, maintaining your relationships, and staying on top of your tasks, you barely have any time or energy to manage your depression. If this scenario applies to you, you know how difficult it is to find any time to devote to your mental health.

Productivity can act as a mask, concealing the debilitating and draining effects of depressive symptoms. Even worse, an overflowing schedule can stifle your ability to care for yourself.

Thankfully, setting aside a little time each day for antidepressant activities can lead to a noticeable improvement in your mood and emotional health. Even the most packed schedule can be adapted to make room for mental self-care.

The Best Depression-Fighting Activities for When You’re Short on Time

When life gets hectic, it’s common for many of us to forget to check in with ourselves and assess our emotional state. We might prioritize everything above ourselves – our work tasks, our families, or other people’s feelings and thoughts.

When you are busy, taking time for yourself can trigger an avalanche of guilt. How can you relax when XYZ is not done? The truth is, making time for mental self-care is not lazy or selfish. In fact, if you have depression, it is an essential part of your recovery.

Prioritizing yourself can make you infinitely better at handling your responsibilities and taking care of the people around you. You can stay in tune with your inner world by having a go-to list of quick, evidence-supported techniques that you can use to process and manage your emotions.

If you have less than an hour per day to focus on your mental health, here are the activities I recommend:

Breathing breaks (1 minute): Focused, deep breathing can reduce stress by initiating the body’s natural relaxation response. Breathing breaks take less than a minute and you can do them as often as you want.

To give this a try, follow these steps:

You can take breathing breaks at any opportune time, like while sitting in traffic or during down periods at work.

Mindfulness Meditation practice (13 minutes): Shifting your focus to the present for as little as 13 minutes a day can reduce depressive symptoms. Philosopher Lao Tzu noted the connection between our emotions and our thoughts when he said:

Mindfulness meditation is a way to consciously focus our attention on the present. Studies have shown that meditating for at least 13 minutes on a regular basis can lower stress and improve emotional health.

With all the distractions in our daily life, this may sound difficult to do. Start by integrating antidepressant activities into a routine you already follow. While it would be nice to have 20 minutes to spend solely on meditation or another activity, it might be impossible to find the time inside a super-packed schedule.

Instead of rearranging your plans, you can simply make the actions you already do more supportive of your mental health. Here are a few places where you can squeeze some time for meditation into a packed day:

• The start of your morning or night routine, right before you get up or get into bed.
• Before eating
• In the car before leaving your workplace
• While your children are napping, reading, or watching t.v.

If you have difficulty quieting your mind, try following a 10 to 15-minute guided meditation. Many are free on websites like Youtube or available on meditation apps. The Flow app (for Android andApple) includes a beginner friendly meditation practice. Even if you’ve never tried meditation before, the step-by-step guide is easy to follow.

Practicing mindfulness outside of meditation is also helpful and easy to incorporate into our daily activities. All we have to do is pay more attention to our senses than our thoughts.

So, the next time you walk the dog, or do the grocery shopping, notice the sounds, sights, and smells around you. Focus on your breath going in and out or how your muscles feel throughout your body.

If mindfulness sounds interesting to you, check out the article How to Use Mindfulness for Depression and learn a few simple ways to get started.

Healthy Food Choices (5-30 minutes): What you put in your body can have a profound effect on your mind. The Mediterranean diet is chock-full of foods that reduce depressive symptoms. This includes:

• Oily fish such as mackerel or tuna
• Seafood and shellfish
• Nuts and seeds
• Olive oil
• Avocado
• Lentils
• Eggs
• Low-fat dairy products
• Yogurt
• Vegetables (f.x. spinach, broccoli, and cabbage)

The Mediterranean diet also recommends reducing or eliminating sugary or processed food and red meat.

While studies have shown that following a pure Mediterranean diet produces the best antidepressant effects, it can be tough to switch to a completely new style of eating. You can start out small with the following ingredient swaps and work your way up to a fully Mediterranean diet.