18 Simple Ways To Improve Your Mental Health and Avoid Burnout
By: The Good Men Project
Tags: Burnout, Self Care, Self-awareness, Mental Health, Mindfulness

18 Simple Ways To Improve Your Mental Health and Avoid Burnout

Photo credit: iStockPhoto

By Sean Clarke

As a society, we’re hell bent on finding ways to improve our physical health. We spend thousands of dollars on gym equipment and memberships, supplements, and fancy diets. However, why don’t we try and find ways to improve our mental health too? It’s always been apparent that you should avoid high trans fat foods to avoid heart attacks down the road, but are we taking care of ourselves mentally? How can you improve your mental health and learn how to deal with stress and anxiety better? I believe that just like looking after our bodies, it’s important to look after our minds, not just for now, but for our futures too.

There are tons of ways to improve your mental health that you can start doing now. Most of them are super simple and yet powerful. If you’re in a high stress job for example, you might be working all the hours under the sun. You probably know that it takes its toll on your mind over time. It’s easy to experience burnout, and even depression. Some time after I got the anxiety I had been experiencing under control, I started working night shifts. During this time I started to experience depression, and I wanted to make sure I was doing everything I could to get myself out of it.

With our busy and hectic schedules, it’s important to support our mental health now more than ever. Everything on this list of ways to improve your mental health are simple habits and lifestyle changes that you can make right now. It’s time to take control of your mental health and be mindful of how you manage it.

Here are some super simple ways to improve your mental health, lower stress, and live more mindfully day to day;

1. Put Your Phone Away

How often do you go out for dinner, feel the need to take a picture, or reply right away to every text message you receive? Too many of us can’t leave our phones alone and just enjoy being in the moment. It’s like that moment when you’re at a music concert, and everyone has got their phones out recording it rather than watching it themselves. Our lives are currently being lived through our photos and our social medias. When someone puts their phone down on a table when you’re having dinner, it signals to everyone else that they’re just not that important.

The problem with this behavior is, you’re never completely settled into your current moment. Your brain is always searching for that dopamine hit from getting a new notification. What you need to do is, find joy and peace with the person you are currently with physically. The only way to do that is to turn your phone off, or leave it at home when you go visiting.

2. Mindfulness

This brings us nicely onto mindfulness. A key attribute to overcoming anxiety and fear for myself, mindfulness is a very important way to improve your mental health as a whole. Being totally aware of your thoughts without judgment allows you perspective. If you’re the type of person who worries about yesterday, or frets about tomorrow, never being able to sit still, it’s time to start practising mindfulness.

Mindfulness in a nutshell;

‘being totally present and aware of your thoughts without judgement‘.

Mindfulness is exactly that, being mindful of your thoughts. We live day to day in our running cycles, never really stopping to evaluate how we feel in a non-judgmental way. Often times, we’re hard on ourselves, telling ourselves that we’re just down or depressed. Mindfulness techniques are used to not just give you the tools to live in the present moment in peace, but to open up your foggy mind.

3. Set Realistic Goals For Yourself

One of the most important ways to improve your mental health is to start setting yourself realistic goals. Everyone feels like they should be ‘perfect’ or have what everyone else has. We set ourselves goals without really thinking about how we’re going to achieve them. It’s always good to be driven, but sometimes we cause ourselves great stress when we don’t reach our goals. For example, you might say off the cuff; “I’m going to make $50,000 next year”.

If you reach only $30,000, you’ll be disappointed and discouraged. However, it’s time to start asking yourself if that goal was realistic in the first place. Often we don’t break down the steps we need to take in order to reach our goals. By breaking down your goals into smaller chunks, you’ll find it easier to see the bigger picture, and all the steps you need to take in order to reach your goal.

Obviously, your goals might not center around just how much money you want to make. It could be losing a few pounds of weight. If you tell yourself you’re going to lose 10 pounds in two weeks, you need to again ask yourself if it’s realistic or not.

4. Start Being Kinder To Yourself

Often times, we’re our own worst enemies. We’re the ones who will find fault in ourselves, most of the time. There are things that we all don’t like about ourselves very much, but sometimes we can take it to the extreme. We can get into vicious cycles of telling ourselves ‘we’re no good‘. The problem with this is our self-talk comments become negative affirmations. Over time, this can lead to anxiety and depression when our self worth tanks.

When bad things happen to us, or there are things that we don’t like, it’s easy to blame ourselves as the ‘problem’. The truth is, there are always alternative ways to see the situation at hand. The low sense of self-worth we encourage on ourselves becomes the evidence we fall back on as us being the ‘problem’.

When we feel like we’re starting to be hard on ourselves, it’s important to catch it when it’s happening. Once we are aware that we’re behaving this way, we can then look to stop the negative self-talk in its tracks.

5. Fall Back On Affirmations

Negative self-talk can lead to low self-worth and depression. What if we talked nicely to ourselves? Positive affirmations are the key to unlocking a better sense of self-worth and confidence. There’s numerous studies which point out that by talking to ourselves positively, we can flip our minds back into a state of positivity.

As I’ve said before, I used to look down on affirmations. I thought they were silly, and you had to be insane to stand in the mirror and talk to yourself. I couldn’t see how they would help, and so I put them in my ‘crazy box’. The truth is, positive affirmations can re-instil confidence. If you think a certain way for long enough, you’ll surely act that way, so why not try and think in a more positive way about yourself? It’s worth a go right?

Positive affirmations are not something I use vocally, instead, I make them an important way of how I talk to myself in my own mind. The number of affirmations you can use are endless, but here’s just a few;

I am worthy

I can do anything I put my mind to

I have control over my life

Now, here’s a big list of positive affirmations to improve your sense of self-worth.

6. Do Something New

Why is it we enjoy going on vacations so much? Yes the sun and the sea is great, but the effects of exploring new places gives our mental health a big boost too. Stuck in our ways, we run through the same cycles every day of our lives. We wake up at 6 am, get dressed, go to work, get home, make dinner, watch some TV, then go to bed. Although impossible to avoid everyday life itself, it’s important to do something new once in a while.

Not only because it’s exciting, it also widens your mind and can change your core beliefs. Our core beliefs are the things we believe to be true in our individual lives. Most of us go through life believing the same beliefs because we don’t try things, or put ourselves in front of our fears. However, the only way to get out of a ‘mental rut’, is to try new things and go to new places.

7. Own Who You Are

Too often we are chasing an ideal of how we want to be, and be seen by others in our lives. We want people to think we’re likable, friendly and outgoing. This usually means acting and behaving in a certain way to make others feel these things towards us. What if you just owned who you are and didn’t care what others thought? If you thought you were crazy, or you do things differently than others, just know that the vast majority of people in the world feel the same way.

How often do you hear people say “boy, I’m a little crazy when you get to know me“. The people who own their ‘craziness’ are the people who are comfortable just being them. They are not worried if others think they are odd for the way they do things. These are the people who are comfortable within their own skins, and are at peace with who they are.

Issues arise because we can become resistant to who we naturally are. You might hear yourself telling yourself you’re not good enough. You then find yourself resisting this self-talk, only to be shot down by yourself again. If you can let your ‘crazy’ happen without judgment or resistance, you can improve your mental health naturally.

Stop trying to chase perfect, because perfect is just a personal idea we each have.

8. Surround Yourself With Those That Also Share Your Values

It’s not just negative self-talk that can lead to depression and anxiety. Other people in your life can also hold you down. If you’re trying to get out of your mental health ‘rut’ but you’re with others who keep bringing you down, it might be time to walk away. Losing friends is difficult, but we all owe it to ourselves to look out for our mental health first.

For example, you might have friends who are always being negative. Although you like them as friends, you notice that all they seem to do is complain. If you’re looking for ways to improve your mental health, this way could be the hardest. Some people are just very set in their ways. Their core beliefs about life, in general, can often rub off onto you, so it’s important to rise above it when you’re with them.

They might also try and make you do things you don’t want to do, like take drugs or go drinking. Surround yourself with people who are on the same journey as you in life, or those who can support you.

9. Stop Dwelling On The Past

Many of us let our pasts haunt us, or make our future decisions for us. It can be hard to shake off painful memories or things you’d rather forget. Instead of dwelling on the ‘bad’ that has happened to you in the past, it’s important that you simply look at past events as experiences to be learnt from. As human beings, we have the advantage of learning from our mistakes. Everything that has ever happened to you can be learned from and seen as not failure, but an experiment.

When scientists undertake experiments, they do not see negative results as failures. They see them as something to learn from. This is how we all need to approach life. We need to stop labeling things as good or bad, and see things for what they are, experiences to be learned from.

If you can allow yourself this simple outlook, you can improve your mental health dramatically.

10. Get Out In Nature Baby!

improving your mental wellbeing

There’s a reason why ecotherapy works. Getting out in nature and doing activities is the perfect way to clear your head and improve your mental health naturally. If you work a high-stress job in a city, this is even more important for you. As humans, we are not naturally built to withstand the pressures from such urban environments. A mammal like any other, we need the natural stimulation of grass, trees and water. A city is a highly toxic environment for your mental health. The unnatural structure of skyscrapers, and the pollution in the air damages your mental health in the long run.

Ecotherapy involves undertaking exercises in a natural environment. Ecotherapy is used to treat depression for example. The exercises are not just traditional running and swimming though, these can simply be walking or even gardening.

A recent UK report shows that using at least 3 ‘nature interventions’ a week and significantly improve your mental health. The best part about this is it’s free. Anyone can pack up their car and go visit their local forest or nature walks.

11. Don’t be Afraid To Go To Therapy

People who go to therapy sometimes get looked down on, in my opinion. When we hear someone is in therapy, we might think that they are truly in a desperate spot. However, therapy has never been more successful and there is less and less stigma around it. Therapy can improve your mental health simply by allowing you to talk to someone who understands how you feel.

These days you don’t have to wait months before you can be seen by a therapist. Using online therapy from places like Betterhelp.com (find out more here) allow you to get connected with a therapist in a matter of hours. The process is simple. You fill out a questionnaire, wait for a maximum of 24 hours, and then get paired with a therapist you can chat to on the phone, message, and video chat.

Chatting with a therapist has the advantage of shedding some perspective on your situation. Trained therapists work with those who encounter mental health issues regularly, so you can have a truly qualified conversation and learn techniques that have already worked for others.

12. Practise Gratitude Like It’s Going Out Of Fashion

We already know that get wrapped up in day to day life activities. Little do we stop and remind ourselves of what we’re grateful for. Perhaps we’re wired to keep wanting more and more out of life. Gratitude is a basic thing we can all use more of. So many of us forget about the ‘good’ we already have in our lives. By simply showing gratitude consciously on a regular basis, we can improve our mental health and uptick our moods.

This can be done by spending just a few minutes with our pets, indulging in our favorite songs, or mindfully eating our favorites dishes. One of the best ways to mindfully show gratitude is to use a gratitude journal. This simple act can bring more grateful awareness to you in a couple of minutes a day.

13. Educate Yourself To Get Empowered

When I first started to experience anxiety and depression, I had no idea what was happening to me. I literally thought I was going insane. I thought anxiety and depression were things that happened to people who had been through extreme trauma in their lives. I was still a young kid, and hadn’t experienced any trauma in this sense. It wasn’t until I read up on anxiety and depression that I started to realize that they can affect anyone, at any time in their lives.

This simple piece of knowledge helped to give me a sense of perspective. I realized that I no longer was alone, and others had already been where I was. Knowing this, I knew that there must of been ways to get myself out of it all. It’s difficult to get out from under your bed sheets and face things when you’re experiencing them. However, the only way to empower yourself, and see these things for what they really are, is to learn about them.

Only then can you start to learn about ways to manage them, and then of course overcome them. Take back the power, and start educating yourself. If you’re reading this right now, you already are!

14. Listen To A Balance Of Happy And Sad Music

Another of the ways to improve your mental health naturally (and one of my favorites) is to make sure you’re listening to a balance of both happy and sad music. There’s a reason we all love music so much — it affects us emotionally. No matter what mood we are in, a song can turn our mood in an instant.

I have always naturally steered towards sad music, for whatever reason. However, it’s important to balance that with happier music. Research indicates that sad music can indeed help you after a breakup for example, but, we should not simply continue to indulge in sad music for long periods of time.

Happier music can lift our moods, get us into a state of excitement, and temporarily boosts our immune system.

15. Get Higher Quality Sleep

Your depression or anxiety could be the number one reason you feel so low. Getting more, and higher quality sleep can wreak havoc on your mental health. Sleep helps us to regulate our moods. For example, when you’ve had a bad nights sleep, or lack of it, it’s easy to become agitated, annoyed and feel discomfort. This overtime increases the likelihood of anxiety and depression.

If you’re the kind of person who likes to stay up late and watch Netflix until the early hours, it’s time to rein it in. Try going to bed 30 minutes earlier and watch how your mood improves. Try leaving your phone charging in another room so you’re not tempted to wake up and check it.

16. Ditch Your Social Media.

Say whaaat?? Yep I said it. Ditch your social media. Can you imagine a world where you don’t sit on Facebook all evening participating in pointless conversations (controversial I know) but this is truely how I feel. the point is, we waste so much of our lives scrolling through a news feed that returns nothing but garbage back at us.

Social media is the opposite of a mindfulness lifestyle. When you use social media a lot, you’re never living in your present moment. Not only are you looking at your phone when you’re in the company of there’s, you’re always playing catch up on previous comments and posts. Can I get a yawn?

I personally went on a Facebook detox which then lead to my gradual use of it becoming less and less over time. Not only did I free up a lot of my spare time to do other more productive things like draw and blog, it has improved my mood and contributed to a more ‘present lifestyle’.

My only regret is, I should of done it sooner.

17. Make Time For What You Love

We all need to make time for what we love to do. Yes, we all have responsibility after responsibility, but by cutting out things like social media, we can free up more time than we realize. What is it that makes you feel truly happy in your heart? Are you doing that thing enough? One interesting way to improve your mental health is to eat that soul food. If you’re suppressing what it is that makes you feel alive, I truly believe you can easily bring on depression.

Life is full of monotony. That’s something I’ve had a hard time accepting. I’d rather spend my time doing the things I like doing. However, it’s all about time management. You need to make time for what it is you love, normally these are your hobbies. If your friends keep saying, come out to the bar and have a drink but all you want to do is stay at home and create clay sculptures (random I know) then it’s time to start saying no.

The point is, you have to scratch that itch. Otherwise, you will end up internalizing it, and a scratch that never gets itched becomes unbearable and toxic for your mental health.

18. Feel sad? Let It Happen.

Whilst we all chase happiness like it’s live or die, we must also allow ourselves to feel sadness too After all, sadness has a place in our lives just like joy does too. If you are truly feeling sad, there are ways to get yourself out of it, but you also need to let yourself just be. Pushing the sadness down can lead to an explosion in the form of depression or breakdown. We must learnt to be vocal and accepting when we are feeling down as it’s crucial to improving your mental health.

Each of the emotions we are capable of feeling as humans have a place in our lives. Feel angry? shout it out. Feel sad? Have a cry. Feel happy? Have a sing.

The problem is we’re often told not to cry or get upset. This is okay when you’re a small child that is learning to control your emotions, but growing up thinking your can voice your emotions is an issue. There is no shame in feeling sad or even crying from time to time. Give yourself permission.

Maintaining Your Mental Health

All of the above ways to improve your mental health are habits. They are all lifestyle changes we need to be mindful of, just like when we take care of our physical health. When we want to lose weight, we don’t simply go on a 2-week fad diet and then fix our weight issues. We have to consciously work towards our goal over time. If you can change your habits, and even pick up good ones along the way, you can change your life. Simply because you’ve changed how you mind works.

It does not need to be complicated!

I hope this helps you in some way.

Here’s to your success,

Sean