A Little Tip — At the End of Every Day, Write Down the Positive Things That Happened

[Rainbowsheep]

Not quite sure where this fits so I'll just put it here, because I guess it's where it fits the best.
Anyhow I just wanted to share a little something that I frequently use when I'm going through a rough time, which helps me a lot.

It is actually quite simple. At the end of the day write to positive things down that have happened. And I know a that lot of you who suffer from depression, like I do, might be thinking: "impossible, nothing good happens these days! Everything's hopeless," like I did when my therapist told me to do this. But it doesn't have to be big things. It can be as simple as: "I got out of bed today," which is a succes in itself when you are clinically depressed.

The change does not happen over night but to me it has been a great help because it helps to break the vicious cycle of the negative thoughts and interpretation (which I'm not sure I've spelled right) of the world that follows depression. It has also been a great way for me to cope with my spike. Again because it allowed me to see that even though I feel (or felt) miserable a lot of the time there where some, allthough sometimes small, succeses and happy moments despite my T.

I cannot guarantee it will work but give it a try. You have nothing to loose anyway, do you?

 

[Luman]

Very good stuff! Some of the popular self-help books by Dr. David D. Burns, M.D., of Cognitive Behavior Therapy, have strategies like this, also. I have two of his books, Feeling Good, and The Feeling Good Handbook.

 

[billie48]

This is basically an CBT approach as Luman puts it. The approach requires us to write down any negative thoughts and challenge them with positive or more realistic ones.