These aren't bipolar blahs, they're just plain blahs. Lots of rejections, one dead cat (RIP Snowy), nothing exciting to look forward to. Except my birthday, and I have my psychiatrist's appointment that day. So lots of reasons to stay blah.
If I want to stay blah, I can rehearse my hurts and aches and pains, hoping that I can win some sort of concession from God ("Look at all this crap that's happened to me. I deserve some compensation!"). Note: It doesn't work, and it keeps me from seeing good things that could be happening.
It's my responsibility to do what I can to get into a better mood. I wouldn't say happiness is a choice, because that's unfair to people like myself who face depression. But I can help myself until I feel better or. in the case of depression, till the meds kick in or I can talk to someone else. When I'm depressed, it's so much harder to think of these, much less do them. Work helps me connect with people, and that helps a little, as does forcing myself to write. These things don't get rid of the depression, but they take the edge off it.
What can I do? I think I've talked about this before, but I need a refresher, so here I go again:
- Gratitude journaling -- three things I'm grateful for every night. I admit I fall behind on this, because at night I generally want to sleep.
- Walking -- I could walk to coffee this morning. That might be a good thing.
- Pet therapy -- with five cats, this isn't hard to do.
- Getting out -- I'm contemplating the Board Game Cafe, as usual.
- Accomplishing something using my character strengths -- I have a story I'm writing which I'm not currently in love with; I can send Whose Hearts are Mountains off to dev edit; I could come up with a new story. Or submit more queries/submissions.
- Connecting with people -- Board Game Cafe works.
So I'm off to take care of my mood.
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