You’ve probably thought of many ways to improve your mental health from time to time. Have you ever thought “outside the box?” Sometimes, the most obvious ways to improve our mental health doesn’t work for us. It’s time to think of ways that not a lot of people know about to improve our mental health. Before I start, I have to admit that some of these things are obvious and not creative at all. The reason being is that these ideas are just too good to be true. So without further ado, let’s get started.
1. Vlogging
Yes, you saw that right, I said vlogging as a way to improve your mental health. If you start vlogging, you’ll essentially go places and record what happens during the day. It will make you feel better about yourself because you will express yourself in a way that you might not have before. It also allows others to see what really goes on in your life and get to know you a tad more. I bet you’ve seen a vlog and thought, “dang, this guy is pretty cool. I would hang out with him!” You could be that next person that people say that too. The best thing about it is that you can be yourself.
2. Blogging
Ahh, blogging. Who doesn’t love a good blog? Blogging is great for people who love to write and have a lot of valuable information about a specific niche.
I started off with the idea of making a blog to provide information regarding mental health, counseling, and therapy to people. That is my niche or what I want my audience to be centered around. My main goal is to build a brand of my own and grow an audience of people that actually enjoy my content. Is my content perfect? No, but I do my best and enjoy doing it. I’ve learned so many things that are useful in the business world. These things include search engine optimization (SEO), digital marketing, web development, building a brand, email marketing, etc. I learn something new each time I get on my computer and make a blog post.
I’m just one example out of millions of bloggers. I may never grow or I might grow into a really big website. Who knows? That’s the fun thing about it. You can express yourself freely and be yourself. You always see an improvement in your mental health when you can be who you are. If you’re not convinced yet, here’s an awesome blog about why you should start blogging.
3. Scrapbooking
Have any of you guys heard of scrapbooking? If you said no, I’m in the same boat as you. I never realized scrapbooking was a thing until an old friend of mine told me about it. If you like to collect things, scrapbooking is ideal for you. Scrapbooking is basically putting different things that you’ve collected into a book. The things that you put into this book can be whatever you want. It’s a way to organize everything that you’ve collected and motivate you to find more unusual things to put in there. Seashells? Sand dollars? Rocks? Feathers? Stamps? Coins? Those are all unique things that can be put into a book. Here’s a blog post that talks about the mental health benefits of scrapbooking.
4. Learning a New Skill
Learning a new skill is a great way to improve your mental health. It may be frustrating at times when you don’t understand things, but the outcome will be phenomenal. Just think of something that you always wanted to learn how to do. Maybe you want to learn how to play the piano but never went to a music class. Maybe you want to learn how to cook, but never owned the proper utensils needed. Once you learned something new, you’ll feel good about yourself. If you felt depressed about your life, this is something that you can look up to and say to yourself “I did this!” You can learn anything as long as you put your mind into it. Once you do that, nothing can stop you.
5. Trying New Foods
This one will really bring out your adventurous side, if you have one. Trying new foods is always a great thing to do. It will allow you to learn about different kinds of foods and present you with a new experience. The point I’m trying to make here is that trying new things can improve your daily lifestyle. It will make you wanna try something new everyday to the point where you’ve done everything. Food is a great example because everyone loves food. Go to a new restaurant or try something outside of your comfort zone. What’s the worst thing that can happen? You don’t like the food, that’s fine. You don’t have to eat the whole thing.
6. Prioritizing Your Life
Who likes a messy and cluttered life? It’s like looking in your room when you don’t feel like cleaning it. There are so many things going on in your life with absolutely zero organization. What do you want to accomplish right now? Make that a priority. Your mental health will improve once you set priorities for yourself and what you want to do in life. It’s not difficult to do either. Just get a piece of paper and make a list of all the things that you’d like to do this year. Make sure that this list is realistic as well. Remember that it’s okay if some things on the list don’t get completed. That’s totally fine. Just save those things for the next year and keep moving forward.
7. Reorganize Your Priorities
This is probably one of my favorite things to use when I want to improve my mental health. You take your main priorities in life and organize them from most important to least important. Now, you don’t have to think of all the priorities that you have. Everyone has the same priorities in life. Marriage, Family, Relationships, Work, Finances, Money, Safety, etc. Here’s an example of my priorities in a list:
- School
- Work
- Blog
- Health
- Finances
- Family
- Safety
- Relationships
- Marriage
As you can see from this list, I value school more than anything. I also don’t value marriage as much as the others because I’m too young for marriage and I feel like marriage isn’t needed to love someone unconditionally. Start your list right now! It only takes a few minutes to do. It will make you see what you need to put time into and what you don’t need to put time into.
8. Camping
Now this is something that I have never done before, but it sounds like a pretty cool thing to try out. It doesn’t have to be this extra fancy camping trip either. You can grab a couple of friends or even your family and find a place to camp. It will make you appreciate the great outdoors more. Camping is generally more calm and peaceful because you are away from people and social media. It’s just you, your friends, and mother nature. You will become more creative because you have to think of different activities to do. There’s no video games and smartphones when camping.
9. Read Books
Who doesn’t like reading? Two of my favorite books are The Great Gatsby and The Perks of Being A Wallflower. I’ll never forget those books because they had amazing stories involved in them. I bet as a kid, you probably didn’t like reading books that much. All the books schools had to offer was not really exciting. The good news is: you’re probably not in school anymore. There are so many genres of books out there that will peak your interests. Don’t believe that reading books can improve your mental health? Here’s a blog just for you about how reading improves mental health. It’s time to pick up a book and start reading! You don’t even have to pick up a book nowadays because of technology. You can get an ebook or even audible for those that prefer listening to a book.
10. Make a Book
This may sound crazy to a lot of you, but why not? It doesn’t have to be the next best selling book out there. If you are someone that loves writing, this may be good for you. Take a bunch of your short stories and put them all together in a book. Trust me, it can work. You’ve seen those books that contain hundreds of short stories in them. It’s something that you can do for fun. You never know, you can actually have people out there that would want to read your content. How amazing does that sound! It sound pretty incredible if you ask me.
11. Play Sports
Who doesn’t love physical activity? Whether it’s running, soccer, basketball, or softball, sports is a great way to get your mind off of things that ruined your mood. You can take out all of your frustration in the game. By the time the game is over, you’ll forget about the guy that accidentally spilled coffee all over your new shirt. Playing sports will also improve your physical health as well as your mental health. Who doesn’t like a 2 for 1 special? It doesn’t matter if you’re really good at sports or terrible at sports. Just having fun and performing in some sort of physical activity will do wonders for you.
12. Play Video Games
For those people that don’t enjoy sports or generally can’t play sports, this one is for you. Name one person that you know that doesn’t like video games. I’ll wait for your response. I bet you couldn’t think of anyone or it took you some time to think of someone. Video games are designed to entertain us and make us feel good. Even when people rage at video games, it’s because they are fully invested in them and don’t want to lose. If you have no friends, playing video games will improve your mental health. If you have friends that love video games, playing with them will improve your mental health. It’s all about having fun and enjoying yourself.
13. Getting Some Fresh Air
We all need fresh air to feel good. When we are not exposed to sunlight, we get depressed. I don’t know if any of you know that, but it’s true. You can do anything outside to improve your mental health. Try going for a walk to clear your head of things if you’re feeling bad. Go to the beach if you’d like to have a more peaceful scenery to look at. It doesn’t matter what place you decide to go, just make sure that you’re getting some fresh air and enjoy yourself. You could even stand outside of your house for a few minutes and go back inside. I don’t know how fun or exciting that would be, but it’s an idea to try.
14. Meditate
You’ve heard me talk about meditating before and for good reason. Meditating allows you to relax and calm down when you’re at your worst. It doesn’t take any skill to learn how to meditate as well, so it’s easy to do. Just close your eyes and focus on your breathing. Notice the movements of your body, particularly your hands and feet. Allow all thoughts that come into your head and just sit with them. The whole point of meditation is to be able to accept all thoughts. It doesn’t matter if all of the thoughts you have are negative. Just close your eyes, breathe, and relax.
15. Listen to Instrumentals
Listening to music is a wonderful self-help method to improve your mental health. You might have seen that I have instrumentals here and not music. There is a good reason for that. Listening to instrumental music improves productivity and focus. When you listen to music that has lyrics, you get distracted. You start singing and dancing to the beat. It’s the equivalent of multi-tasking with school, work, and personal hobbies. It’s good to make a playlist of your favorite instrumentals and relax to them. Your mental health will improve and you will listen to some good beats at the same time. Sounds like a win-win situation to me.
16. Be With Friends
It’s always beneficial to be with your friends. Social support is one of the two most important factors in improving your mental health. We will get to the other factor in a second. Having a social support system will come in handy during the worst of times. If you’re feeling really down and upset in life, you have your friends to go to. Friends are there to help and support you through your ups and downs. If they are not doing that for you, then they are not exactly the best of friends.
Call a friend and check up on them. See how they are doing and just ask if you guys can talk for a while. If not, ask to hang out with them. I bet you’ll end up smiling and enjoying yourself. If you don’t have any friends or friends of quality, then this next thing is for you.
17. Be With Yourself
Self-improvement is the second most important factor in improving your mental health. Spending time with yourself is really important because you are with yourself for your whole life. If you do not enjoy being with yourself, your mental health will never improve to the standard that you have for yourself. Be involved with your favorite hobbies, learn something new about yourself.
Trust me, during this process you will learn a lot of new things about yourself. I never saw myself as an interesting person. When I spend time with myself, I learn that being interesting doesn’t matter as much. The thing that matters is that the things I enjoy doing are interesting to me, Find things that you enjoy doing and stick with it. Don’t let anyone tell you that you can’t do anything or the things that you like aren’t interesting enough. It’s your life, so take full control of it.
18. Take Psychological Tests
I left one of the most confusing and interesting ways to improve your mental health. Taking psychological tests allows you to learn more about yourself in ways that you would never think of. My favorite psychological tests are personality tests. Personality tests allow you to learn about who you are as an individual. You will learn what your personality type is all about and compare that to yourself. You’ll be surprised at the similarities that you will find between yourself and your personality types. Some tests really go in depth and give you information about your personality, love life, and friendships. So go ahead and take a psychology test and learn something new about yourself.
There you have it! Here are 18 different and unique ways that you can improve your mental health today. Try a few ideas and see what happens. I bet you wont be the same person that you was before you tried anything. Good luck and start feeling good today!
