It’s a spiritual truth that the mind takes on the “vibe” of wherever you put it. When you’re depressed, you need to pull your mind out of depressive environments and put it in brighter places.
For Immediate Relief
- Get outside.
Go on a hike (preferably), take the dog on a walk, or walk around the block. Clear air and exercise do wonders for lifting you out of the swamp. - Turn off the TV and video games and stay off the Internet.
Both TV and the Internet can make you feel really dull and uninspired. They sap you of energy even though you are not physically doing anything. While it’s not practical to avoid the Internet entirely, when you’re depressed you’ll be well-served to avoid it as much as possible. Limit your Internet time to necessary shopping and banking transactions and then get out. Here’s more on how to fact check for yourself that the Internet is a depressant.
Video games are worlds that you immerse your mind into, so when you understand that where you put your mind determines how you feel, you understand that you need to protect where you allow your mind to go. Most video games are not bright, happy places and should be avoided when you’re trying to escape depression. - Get away from toxic people.
We pick up the moods and energy of other people, so hanging around toxic people will make you feel tired, angry or depressed. When you are mired in depression, it’s imperative you get away from these people. - Get to work—whether at your job or on a personal project.
Staying busy keeps you from focusing on yourself and your predicament. - Read a spiritual book.
Immersing your mind in bright energy will make you feel so much better. Here are some easy reads that will lift you up. - Believe in yourself.
Absolutely everyone is worthy of happiness.
For long-term relief, you need to get in touch with your soul. This is the way I recommend.
Here are a few related posts: What You Focus On You Become, Remove Emotionally Heavy Items From Your House, Practice Mindfulness.
Note: While I’ve helped many people successfully overcome depression through meditation and mindfulness, I have no expertise nor experience working with addiction or severe mental illness. The above steps are not intended to treat those illnesses.
© 2013 – 2015 Sara Weston. Sara is the author of the book How to Be Happy NOW…Even if Things Aren’t Going Your Way, available on Amazon.com and Amazon UK, CA, FR and DE. A FREE excerpt of the book is available here.
Get clear on what you want, because that is what will manifest. If you’re really clear that you want the benefits of meditation and mindfulness, then you’ll do what it takes to make it happen. (It’s also helpful to get clear on not wanting a practice—if that’s the case—because then you stop wasting your energy with thoughts like, “I should be meditating,” “I should be reading spiritual books,” “I should be, should be, should be…”)
Reinvigorate your mindfulness
When we love, light comes through our being and brightens us, lightens us and makes us feel happy. The love you express doesn’t have to be towards another person, it can be towards a great number of things—pets, plants, your artwork, sports, challenging experiences. In fact, love has very little to do with a person. It comes from us and it grows the more we love. We are happy when we love. We are unhappy when we stop loving.
When you don’t love yourself, it’s because you are misidentifying yourself as your body and your mind. And indeed the body and the mind have things about them to not be crazy about. Our bodies can fail us on a spectrum from perceived failures (thighs too fat, not good at sports) to the literal failures of disorder, disease and death. Likewise, our minds can fail us on the same spectrum from frustration at not being smarter or wittier, to the literal failure of mental disease and degeneration.
Jealousy has nothing to do with the person you are jealous of. When you feel jealous of someone, the feeling is really pointing to the fact that it’s time for you to work for the thing you’re jealous of. For instance, if a friend tells you about a jump she made in her career and you feel a twinge of jealousy, it means you need to make a jump in your career or in your life. It doesn’t mean that you need to make the same kind of jump, but rather that you need to look at whether you’re being too complacent in your life and whether it is time to step it up by taking new classes, getting a new certification, writing a book, etc.
Get out in nature, away from people, at least once a month, as this will slow down the activity of the mind and clear you out. You’ll feel better and be able to see things about your life more clearly.
Honesty with yourself is essential to being happy. You have to check that what you are doing in your life is working for you. Sometimes we have such a strong idea of how our life should be and what will make us happy that we don’t want to face that these ideas aren’t right for us anymore. We may have grown out of them or they may have never been our ideas and dreams in the first place, but instead were imposed by family or society and accepted by us as ours. Other times we have invested so much time and energy to get our life to where it is, that we don’t want to face the fact that it is no longer working. When we honestly recognize that something is no longer working, then from this place of recognition we can begin to change it.
How to Be Happy NOW 
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