How To Stay Motivated | Mental Health

=Hello My Moons,

This post is kind of a part II to last month's motivation post   But for this article I wanted to focus more on managing mental health which I think is truly one of the biggest factors when it comes to motivation for many people.

Organization 

I spoke about organization in the last article but here is why  it is so important to me.   I used to be highly disorganized and still struggled to keep on top of things even though I was working 16-18+ hours a day! You can read more about my general schedule here and here.  Being a very high anxiety individual, knowing that I have a schedule to come back to gives me far more peace of mind and a sense of freedom.  Especially because I always leave room for evolution and change in my methods. 

Breaks

Learning to take breaks is so important.  If you find yourself feeling guilty for blowing off work to watch TV for hours, consider schedule breaks into your day instead, so that they almost become part of your schedule.  You might need to take more sometimes if you are not doing well mentally, and that is okay.

Rewards 

Rewards can be a super great way to motivate yourself.  My mother homeschooled me and used the rewards system a lot.  I was obsessed with Beanie Babies, (90’s child to a cliché I guess), so she would sometimes buy a special Beanie and give it to me if I accomplished a heavier task in my school work.  And for me, this worked very well.  As an adult, I still use a reward system of sorts for myself.  Minus the Beanie Babies. 

We all have days we are not so proud of.  And we have to be okay with that!

Forgiveness 

There is a somewhat toxic culture of consumption and want in my society here in the US. But there is also a surprising lack of self forgiveness.  We want and want and often we cover up our shame, guilt and pain by over consuming things that only mask it, like aimless scrolling on our phones or over indulging in nonstop junk food.  Instead, practice truly learning to forgive yourself for the things you do not accomplish.  This one is very, very difficult for me, but I also know how damaging it is.  There are going to be so many times in this harsh world where we are unable to get enough done because we put too much on ourselves, or our minds are not well, or the world itself is not well and we are feeling its weight.  We cannot always accomplish things.  

You will see people who seem immune to these weights.  They do not matter to YOUR path.  You will see people getting way more done than you.  Again, they do not matter to YOUR path.  Yes, we can practice self-discipline and grow our work ethic, but sometimes we genuinely are not going to do as much as we want and we need to learn to be at peace with that.  The more we practice this mindset of acceptance, the better.  Some small tips I have for this would be to pair a ritual with your mindset. If you are feeling horrible about a “bad workday” light some incense, do a ritual, pray, if you are spiritual, or meditate on it.  Taking a walk, dancing, and allowing yourself to cry, can all be part of your healing ritual.  It might sound ridiculous, but creating a routine to go with your forgiveness can sometimes help keep you from going over the edge.  

The month of September was a little bit trying on my own mental health for various reasons, some of them simply due to my own chemical imbalance within my brain and body.  These articles don’t guarantee success.  But the things I wrote about in them certainly do help me during difficult times because they give me some sense of control when my brain starts to lose it a little! 

Please stay well~
~Aria