Mental Health
Here’s How I Healed Depressive Feelings by Scheduling and Prioritizing Fun.
We need to trick the mind by planning pleasure.
Significance of Intentional Fun in Life
Having purposeful fun daily makes us happier, more joyful, and more productive. It also helps us have better relationships with our beloved ones, friends, and colleagues. Fun and pleasure can be the best investment in our health and well-being.
This story does not encourage hedonistic tendencies. It is about the therapeutic use of fun and joy to address mental health disorders by taking personal responsibility.
I experienced mild depression at a younger age. Living with depression is not fun. Learning to schedule and prioritize fun helped me beat my depressive feelings, made me happier, and gave me a joyful life. I am grateful for these opportunities. I share my unique experience and life hacks in this article.
Intentional fun is essential because we are hard-wired to experience negative emotions. This wiring serves the purpose of survival. Our several brain regions compete with others, and most of the time, the anxious part wins. I shared my experience with this anxious and worrying part in my article titled How To Deal With Amygdala Hijacks.
Even though my customized diet, and skipping meals significantly contribute to reducing my depressive thoughts, in this article, I focus on five simple and powerful fun activities that helped me beat my depression.
Pleasure and joy from these activities were the most significant factors for getting rid of mild depression and having a joyful and satisfying life.
More importantly, talking to myself was not crazy but therapeutic.
1 — Daily chores
This may sound ironic and paradoxical to some of us but turning chores into fun and pleasure significantly impacted my happiness.
I will give you three simple examples from my experience. I perform these three activities every day at least twice. I brush my teeth twice, wash the dishes at least once, and declutter my house once.
Brushing our teeth may seem a chore, but to me, it is fun. I made a deliberate decision that whenever I brushed my teeth, I’d feel in the moment.
Every stroke of the brush on my teeth gave me pleasure. I visualize healthy and shiny teeth. This inspired me because, in my younger years, I suffered a lot from dental pain. I shared my experience in this article titled I Prevented Gum Disease With A Simple Hack.
Washing the dishes is another chore, but I love it. I don’t use a dishwashing machine even though we have one. Washing the dirty dishes keeps me in the moment. Living in the moment is the secret to joy and happiness. Gratitude accelerates this joy.
When washing the dishes, I only focus on cleaning grease. Each plate I clean gives me tiny dopamine spikes. When I clean several dishes, my brain gets noticeable dopamine. This rewarding neurochemical, released when we achieve something, is critical for our happiness.
Removing clutter is another fun activity for me. I find an opportunity every day to get rid of the clutter in my house. Decluttering my mind and environment gives me an instant dopamine rush.
2 — Exercise with music
I turned exercise into fun. I only perform joyful exercises as discussed in this book chapter titled How I Got Fitter, Stronger, and Healthier.
What is unique about my joyful exercise is adding uplifting music to my workouts. I noticed that exercising with music increased my motivation. It helped me work out longer and more effectively.
Music and exercise help us activate different brain regions. Both music and movement create happiness hormones and neurochemicals. It is a double whammy.
I schedule and prioritize my workouts with music. Setting the alarm for every hour and spending three to five minutes stretching, jumping on a trampoline, and doing a few pushups instantly increased my mood and enhanced my motivation.
By scheduling my fun workouts with music, I produce better and stay away from depressive moods. Scheduling and prioritizing fun workouts were critical to beating my mild depression.
3 — Regular sunlight exposure
There is something magical in sunlight. Even though excessive sun can cause harmful effects, regular sun exposure brings many benefits to me. Vitamin D and nitric acid formation on my skin gave me extra joy.
When I fixed my vitamin D deficiency, I felt like a new person. After optimizing my Vitamin D levels, many other blood markers also improved.
Spending 10 to 15 minutes exposing my body to the sun improves my mood instantly. Sunlight is like a fun-starting pill for me. I always use summer days to get sun exposure.
Even in winter, I watch the sun appear. As soon as I see the sun shining, I stop my work and take a break. Even a few minutes of sunlight helped me improve my mood quickly. I made sunlight a priority contributing to my happiness.
4 — Walking on the grass
This point may sound unusual to you, but I reaped many benefits from a barefoot walk on the grass. I shared my experience in this article titled Why I Enjoy Barefoot Walking So Much.
I made a barefoot walk one of my daily rituals, at least 10 minutes in our garden during the day or night. In summer, I love a barefoot walk on sandy beaches.
The most convincing argument for the benefit of walking on beach sand or grass was related to electrons that can be transferred from our bodies. Negatively charged electrons from our bodies can be absorbed or neutralized by the earth.
The most significant benefit for me was neutralizing the negative electrons in my body. I shared my experience in an article titled Why I Enjoy Barefoot Walking So Much.
5 — Purposeful smile and laughter
As the adage says, laughter is the best medicine. I believe in this. Laughter is an indication that we are joyful. I learned to smile and laugh intentionally. I also enjoy laughter therapy and yoga.
Starting with a smile, I find ways to laugh at things. There is always a humorous part to anything. Looking at things with unique and fresh eyes can help us learn to laugh quickly.
I understand that not everyone may have the same creativity, but using the products of laughter can also help. I used to schedule to watch funny videos for five minutes every day. Those funny videos enabled me to smile and laugh quickly.
Learning not to take my ego too seriously was a significant happiness investment. Humor was the best skill and practice contributing to my health and well-being. It served as an excellent stress-reduction tool for me.
Conclusions and Takeaways
Unless we schedule and prioritize fun, it can be challenging to have a joyful and happy life. Setbacks never leave us alone.
There are, of course, other factors for happiness, but intentional fun, pleasure, and joy are the most motivating factors for happiness, productivity, and success.
I don’t underestimate the impact and implications of clinical depression. This debilitating experience certainly requires professional advice and intervention.
However, I managed my mild depression with a schedule and prioritized joy and happiness without medication.
Investing our time by spending a few minutes intentionally on fun activities can do wonders for many of us. It is worth the effort and time.
Here’s How I Eliminated Depressive/Suicidal Feelings in 7 Steps in My Younger Years
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