Must-Read: Lift Your Mood, Cheaply

Cheer up

We all get the dulldrums from time to time. Usually, it’s when you’re sitting at home on a Friday or Saturday night with nothing to do, through really no fault of your own, and you begin thinking about what the rest of the crowd is doing, and maybe you hear someone having a party or laughing, and you’re thinking to yourself some kind of hope that you wish you were them. Which is fine. That is the human condition. It is easy and normal to be jealous of others now and then, but what happens is that that jealously occasionally turns into depression, and that depression turns into one goddamn shitty night at home.

Luckily, there are ways to jump-start yourself out of this depression. And no, we’re not talking about actual medicinal anti-depressants — although, really, those are helpful if you’re in need of those. Instead, we’re talking about simple small tweaks to your system that will put you in a better mood in no time. So today, we’re heading over to Men’s Health as they list a variety of changes in order to get you out of a mini funk. For instance:

Listen to Your Feet
Heading out on a run? Focus on the nitty gritty details, like the sound of your feet hitting the pavement, the number of stop signs you pass, and the faces of the people you breeze by. That technique is called mindful engagement, and it?s been scientifically proven to alleviate depression,?says Michael Addis, Ph.D., author of the book?Invisible Men: Men?s Inner Lives and the Consequences of Silence. ?Leave your worries behind: ?If you enjoy exercise, don?t do it while ruminating or worrying about whatever is troubling you?that only reinforces your negative mood,? he says.

Head on over to the link for some more, and then have yourself a wonderful day.