HIP Tips for Anxiety During Mental Wellness Month

HIP Tips for Anxiety During Mental Wellness Month

As January is Mental Wellness Month, we wanted to share some of our favorite tips that our past guests have shared on our podcast. Since we’ve learned about so many tools and skills from all of our guests, we’ve decided to focus on anxiety this time. We hope you enjoy revisiting these ideas and find some inspiration to use in your own mental wellness journeys!

Keeping an Anxiety Index or Note Card With You

As Tracy Eisen shared with us in our Anxiety Series, she always keeps an index card in her wallet that contains a list of things to do if she finds herself feeling anxious. On one side, she has ideas for when she’s at home. On the other side, she has a list of things to do if she feels anxious when she’s not at home.

Some of Tracy’s ideas for when she’s at home are: 

• Watching her favorite TV show in the world, “The Golden Girls.” This show never fails to take her mind off things and get her laughing! We can definitely relate - we love the show too!

• Going into the bathroom or other isolated, safe area to get away from others and to have a place to take a few deep breaths.

• Grabbing her favorite blanket and sitting on the couch or another comfy spot for a bit.

• Spending time with her cat - research shows that dogs and cats, as well as many other types of pets, are important to our emotional and mental health due to their unconditional love for us.

Some of Tracy’s ideas for when she’s not at home are:

• If she’s traveling and in a hotel room, she’ll turn on a night light of some kind - just having a little bit of light in an unfamiliar space is helpful for her.

• Heading into the nearest bathroom or any available private space, just like at home - a place to get away from others and, again, taking a few deep breaths.

• Heading outside to move around and get away for a few minutes. Even if you don’t have much space available outside, you can do several laps in a big circle. 

• If it’s an option, listening to music can really help during these laps as well. This helps her to calm down and get some excess energy out. Need a good playlist to get moving? Check out our 30 Second Dance Party Playlist!

As Tracy also reminds us, everyone has their own coping skills or methods that work best for them. Think of some ideas that may work for you when you’re in a difficult moment, and write yourself some reminders on your own index or note card. 

Research shows that using tools such as these coping cards can do wonders for improving our mental health and wellness. This great resource provides even more ideas for what they call “Cognitive Coping Cards” too! What might you write on your own card?

Practicing a Healthy Morning Ritual Every Day

In our very first episode, Michael Miller discusses something that none of us realized would become so influential for so many people - his Morning Ritual. 

Even though we may sometimes falter, having a healthy morning ritual for yourself is an important way to start each day. We all have our own methods already, such as Michael’s old routine of getting up, feeding the cats so they weren’t angry with him, making some coffee, and then checking his phone and emails right after. 

This routine contributed to his stress and anxiety, so he decided to make a change. After all, if he sees those emails or Facebook posts 30 minutes or an hour later in the day, does it make much of a difference? Why not put it off for a bit, he recommends!

On that note, here are 3 reasons why you shouldn’t check your phone within one hour of waking up. This is a struggle for many of us, of course, but as Michael also reminds us, we don’t have to be perfect about it. We also don’t have to jump right in - making small changes one day at a time is the way to go. 

In Michael’s episode, he also talks about the importance of zooming out and zooming in when necessary. This is another great case of a time when we might want to look at zooming in a bit and thinking about the next little victory. For example, perhaps tomorrow I will only look at my phone for 15 minutes first thing in the morning instead of 30. The day after that, I might only look for 10 minutes before starting my day.

Here’s a list of 8 great things you can do instead of scrolling through social media in the morning, too! Sometimes it can be easier to implement such a big change in our lives, so finding new, healthy, positive things to replace them with can help during these transitions. Instead of letting our phones dictate how our days will go from the very start, let’s take control of our days with a new Morning Ritual!

If you’re curious about Michael’s Morning Ritual, he first starts his day with mindfulness exercises through the Insight Timer app - particularly their five minute morning gratitude meditation. Since he’s efficient, he does this while his coffee is percolating! 

Michael doesn’t like exercising or going to the gym, but he tries to do that every morning too. These moments of mindfulness, meditation, and reflection help him set his intentions for the day, which helps to change his mindset for exercise and the gym as well. Oh, and it makes waking up at 4:15 in the morning a little bit less terrible too.

Some other great ways Michael has started his day include listening to his favorite podcasts, especially Dr. Gameshow, or putting on his favorite music. Of course, if you’re not aware, Michael LOVES Christina Aguilera, and she is always a favorite go-to for us as well!

Implementing Some “Car Therapy” Into Your Routine

In our episode with high school senior Henry, he shares with us a great tip he and his friends used throughout high school - “Car Therapy.” Of course, this does not need to be done in a car, but any private space like the inside of a car will do. 

If you notice that someone is stressed or anxious, or maybe they’re having a difficult time, it is often a good idea to ask them if they’d like to go somewhere and talk. The same goes for yourself - if you’re feeling this way, do your best to reach out to someone and ask them to do a little car therapy with you.

As Henry notes, sometimes people can be hesitant to share, especially if they’re around others or in an open, vulnerable space. His most important tip? Be patient. Sometimes, it may take 30 minutes or an hour, but being there for our friends or loved ones is important work. Laugh it out, talk about other things, and try your best to share what’s truly on your mind when the time is right.

Talking about our feelings and situations can be a difficult task even for the most well-adjusted among us, but it is important to do our best. Talking about our feelings can help us stay healthy and get through all of life’s challenging moments.

Do you have people you can turn to and talk about these things with? Do you have a safe spot where you can have a little “car therapy” yourself? If not, as Tracy shared with us in her episode, there are plenty of apps and hotlines that can help too - especially 7 Cups!

Remembering to Fill Your Cup (or Bucket)

If you’re familiar with our podcast, you know we talk about filling our cups all the time! This is something that has been on our minds for a long time, but Michael Miller got us started on the right foot with his strong reminder that we can’t fill others’ cups unless ours is filled first. In other words, when we give so much to others and the world around us, we can’t forget to take care of ourselves too!

We also discuss this with Sarah Baxter in her episodes about Psychosis and Suicide. Instead of a cup, she uses the term “bucket.” The end result is the same, though - we must remember to fill our own buckets, and we must remember to be aware of what’s in our own buckets first. Then, we can start looking at others’ cups or buckets and help them fill theirs with good stuff too.

In just about every episode of our podcast, we ask guests what fills their buckets or cups. We’ve received so many great responses, and they usually tend to revolve around favorite music, favorite books, and favorite TV shows. Here is a list of 20 wonderful ways you can fill your own cup. 

Of course, if you have any of your own methods that work best for you, especially when it comes to mental wellness or anxiety, we’d love to hear them! Please share on social media and tag us. Also, we’d love to know… How are you filling your cup?