How do we beat the blues? Isn’t it bazaar that somedays we just aren’t in a great place emotionally. We’ve all had those days, we all know how it feels. I confess I’m having one today. Not sure why and can’t think of anything significant that may have caused it. On the contrary, I’ve got quite a few things to look forward to. I’ve got a weekend in one of my favourite cities, Cape Town, coming up and I’m in the process of planning an amazing trip around Thailand and Laos. I’m meeting up with an old friend of mine next month whose flying out from the UK and generally speaking everything looks pretty good in my life. So how do we beat the blues?
Like the majority of us, I’m not a great fan of feeling blue and melancholic. I’d much rather be in a happy and in a positive space. But some days that choice is not ours, so what are some of the best things we can do under these circumstances?
Firstly remember that feeling blue serves a purpose and carries with it an important meta message. It’s crucial that we learn to listen to our emotions. Embrace whatever feeling you are experiencing and allow yourself a day or maybe two to indulge in the sadness you are feeling. I often find the moment we permit an emotion to exist and stop resisting a feeling, the intensity of it lessons. If you’re feeling sad then be sad, embrace the feeling. We often think of it as “wrong” to be sad or angry and have incorrectly placed negative connotations onto these emotions.
So how do we beat the blues? Here are 10 tips;
1. Get in touch with nature, take a walk, breath fresh air
2. Spoil yourself – listen to what you need and indulge yourself. Whether that be a massage, a hot bath or a game of golf. Do what makes you feel good.
3. If you’re not in the mood to do “stuff” that’s ok. Rest up, go to bed, read a book, giver yourself permission to be a slob.
4. Reconnect with the small things in life. A child’s smile, a delicate spiders web, listen to the way the rain falls.
5. Listen to some good music, turn it up loud in the car.
6. Eat something you love, nurture your senses.
7. Get out of your head space and into the body. Drag yourself to a yoga class or the gym. Just do it and you’ll feel better.
8. Meet up with some good friends for a coffee or a drink. Get out of “your” internal space and into the “group” external space.
9. Connect spiritually, whether through prayer or mediation.
10. Stop and breath.
Keep in mind that feelings don’t always have a logical reasoning behind them.
Stop over analysing and accept.
I sometimes ask my clients the question, “Can you give yourself permission to “just be” today?
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