Achieve your career goals without burning out
Can meditation help relieve your depression? Not everyone agrees. My very dear Yoga teacher Michelle Chand Michelle Chand certainly does not. She thinks that there couldn’t be anything worse than sitting in silence having to contemplate what is inside her own head when she is feeling low. Granted, if you put it like that…, it doesn’t sound too appealing.
Has depression ever impacted your love life? Have you ever met someone amazing, that one person that seems to be ticking all of your boxes, but for some strange reason out of the blue you start panicking? That horrible internal voice kicks in and tells you that you don’t deserve that person. That person is too good for you. That person is too amazing. You are not playing in the same league. And if you persevere you are going to get hurt. Because why would someone so amazing want to be with insecure you?
Whether or not you should take antidepressants should be your choice. Antidepressants are drugs and they will have effects on your physical and mental wellbeing. This should not be a treatment that you agree to lightly. However it is difficult to know how medication will affect you if you haven’t taken any before.
I have been on antidepressants for 18 months. Actually I can now proudly say that I was on antidepressants for 15 months as at the time of writing I have been off medication for 7 days. Getting off the meds need to be handled carefully, ideally with the support of the doctor who subscribed them to you in the first place. This turned out not to be as easy as I thought, which gave me the idea of writing this post, but this is getting ahead of ourselves.
If you are battling with depression I strongly recommend that you record your progress in writing. Why? Because it will make you feel better.
Back in December 2015 I was at rock bottom. As in I was crying every day, for most of the day, and all I could think about was ending it all. With the support of my friends I made the first step to recovery; asking for help. Unfortunately for me it was December, a busy time of year for counsellors in Denmark where I was living at the time, and I was given an appointment at the hospital… for January!! Not ideal when you are in the state that I was in… Going private was the same. It was impossible to get an appointment for at least 2 months.
As you guys should know by now, I am a fan of personal development and all things coaching related. I have even managed to get myself certified as a life coach recently – who would have thought!
Back in April I attended the Ultimate Leadership Programme from Ed J C Smith. In one of the Q&A Ed shared with us his morning routine and told us he was starting his day every day by bouncing on a trampoline for 10 minutes.
Everybody knows smoking is bad for you. But apparently it’s even worse for you when you have depression.
Recent research suggests that smoking increases risk of depression because nicotine damages certain pathways in the brain that regulate mood. As a result, nicotine may trigger mood swings.
Depression comes with a critical inner voice. You are being very harsh with yourself all the time, you tell yourself off for something you have done or not done, you beat yourself up constantly. Fighting this voice is one of the most difficult things to do, especially when you are feeling low. Here is how to do it.
‘How to fight depression’ was my very first article, written for friends and family, a simple summary of my personal research. Even though I no longer experience depression, I have kept the original text as it was.