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Wellness Tools for Your Hardest Times

by | Jul 21, 2015 | Blog, Children & Teens, Creating & Using Your WRAP, Daily Plan, Elements of WRAP, Signs that Things are Breaking Down, Stressors & Triggers, Wellness Toolbox, Wellness, Recovery & Lifestyle Topics | 0 comments

Below are tips from our Facebook friends, when asked “What do you do to get yourself out of the hardest times?”

  • Art. I like to make cards with quotes and flowers. Coloring helps me get out of my head and brings me peace.
  • Wait!
  • Music!
  • I take an Ai Chi journey then swim~~it teaches and strengthens body, mind and spirit so much.
  • Listen to music, meditate, go for a walk, look at my wrap scrapbook, watch a good film or have a bath with candles smile emoticon
  • Practice humility. Trying to realize that my toughest times are nothing compared to the suffering of many others. Then I remember that it can’t storm forever, the sun will come out.
  • Write poetry.
  • Rest my head in many ways…Find solace in nature.
  • Pray and talk to my husband and go to my psychiatrist.
  • Look back at what else I have beaten and got through the other end and survived
  • Look at your WRAP
  • Listen to music, and think about all the good that is yet to come
  • Take a shower, read a book, go outside, pet my cats & dogs, listen to music, dance, draw, write about it, watch good tv, call a friend.
  • Turn to my wellness toolbox and meditate and refocus.
  • Believe me when I say this. When I’m really depressed, I’ll walk to the library. I’ll put on my high end audio gear. I’ll watch TV. I’ll take deep breaths. All of this helps me
  • Try to stay positive, work on my wrap, listen to upbeat music, take photos.
  • Talk to supporters.
  • Patience and persistence. Never lose sight of who you are.
  • Review my WRAP and make sure I am using all of my tools from my wellness tools
  • Make music, food, poems, love, etc. I just make sure I make… something.
  • Sew and crochet
  • Do something. Anything. Just move.
  • Talk to supporters.
  • I allow time to acknowledge and honor the situation and feelings from the hard time. This is how I start to begin to ‘peel apart the triggers’ and begin to take control and try to understand why it was a hard situation for me.
  • I go to my WRAP. Initiate some new coping strategies. Pray. Go for a Walk.
  • Pray
  • When in doubt look up and pray or find something that you enjoy doing to take your mind away from things that are so overwhelming
  • Support is the only working for me right now. my tool box is useless.
  • Have a good support system.
  • Process what is going on, see what part I play in it and think pro-active not reactive
  • Journal or exercise.
  • I make myself go over the blessings in my life and tell myself, sometime over and over, to focus on the good.
  • All of this is in my WRAP and many of my action plans
  • I use my toolbox
  • Take action, using wellness tool: take a 1000 mile road trip; go shopping…and not necessarily buy anything; bake a delicious set of goodies, pack them up and mail the “care package” to a most delicious friend; recite many times…”this too shall pass”!
  • Peer support and remember my WRAP
  • I put into practice my wellness training
  • Baseball. check out light comedy videos. Call a trusted friend, Get on treadmill, Take in a free play or show, volunteer.
  • Talk to my husband/peer support and use my WRAP
  • Go swimming, listen to Mozart, visit a friend, meditate, walk in the woods, cuddle with my cat, breathe, “I have gotten through it before and I can do it again,” practice gratitude.
  • Also love relaxation music, and I knit and crochet
  • I also try to be in learning mode. I like to consume myself in like a free on line course, Great courses library. You know those things you thought were a great late night purchase like learning to draw, the piano or guitar. Its always good to force myself out among people publicly because I am perfectly happy to isolate myself.
  • Roll with it, get up and over it and keep on going.
  • Go into the woods and scream and cry and dig
  • Get outdoors. Once I am out the door, there is a chain of events where I feel better and better. Sunlight, birds, trees, flowers, the sky, the feeling on my skin of the sun or breeze or rain or whatever….it goes from there.
  • Music – classical, before 1750, for me.
  • The hardest times are the toughest so I need to be very deliberate and intentional with wellness tools such as seek out support, journal out loud and physical activity.
  • Phone a friend. We talk for hours. So much better then a few words text or post.
  • I pray and speak with friends and family who I know love and care for and about me.
  • Chant!
  • Facebook is a good distraction. Roll with it if I can. Being in love helps too. My other half is very supportive.
  • Absolute hardest times I talk with those who have “been there”, won’t judge and help me remember who I really am.
  • Keep busy and focus n a project to distract myself. Pray, and talk to others who understand.
  • Pray and wait for the answer. God shows me what I need to do to feel better. Usually it’s helping someone else. That makes me feel better.
  • Eat
  • Help someone else
  • Go into garage studio and paint. Or sit on my front porch and look at the little park across the street. Go to one of 3 local bistros with live music order an iced tea, sometimes alone among friends, or talk with a friendly face. Pet my cat or go for a walk. All brighten my day.
  • Take my dogs to the hiking trails in the park near my apartment…I can totally disconnect from the city there
  • I take long walks
  • Take my daughter to the park/playground. The hardest times were those situations where I had no control over the outcome, or had to wait for someone to make a decision and instead of anxiously waiting and making myself sick, i am with my daughter, enjoying the present, and focusing on her.
  • I do my daily maintenance stuff, and add whatever it is I feel up to. Sometimes it’s taking time to myself, sometimes it’s spending time outside, sometimes it’s drawing, sometimes it’s music or dance, and sometimes it’s just existing…it’s whatever I can bring myself to do above and beyond my maintenance.
  • Walk really fast and listen to loud music with my headphones
  • Write
  • Depends on state of mind. Intense anxiety: very long walks, ab crunches, and if all else fails, soaking in a tub of ice water (hydrotherapy)
  • Breathe mindfully. Swim laps. Talk with people who are consistently kind to me. Go outside. Learn something new. Stay hydrated.
  • Write, cry, write some more.
  • Make a new start… Focus on old and new goals
  • Talk with loved ones, who know me. Take walks, listen to music, write, pray, exercise.
  • Deep breathing, self-talk, music, coloring books, bubbles….and lots of sleeping it off….staying connected to friends even if not feeling sociable…try to not burn any bridges
  • Breathe, think emotional mind, logical mind and decide with my wise mind.
  • Pull in my closest supporters. As I am doing now with the Seth of my husband.
  • Work on my WRAP program and then go do the things I like to do to keep my mind off them… Like go on a roller coaster!
  • Meditation, yoga, chanting, singing, gardening, exercise
  • Draw on hope, and if I’m feeling hopeless, I’ll allow myself to think outside the box.
  • I rely on my support system and if that fails I always have Tae Kwon Do.
  • Do the next right thing
  • Listen to my oldies station.
  • Talk about them so I don’t get stuck, and find a solution to loving forward
  • I explore nature and meditate to renew my inside vision.
  • I visualize what I’d like it to be instead smile emoticon
  • I tell my dog the story of her life. She always listens attentively. I may tell it to her again with embellishments. Then I sing to her and instead of lyrics, I just sing her name to the tune of the song. She loves all of this attention, and her innocence and love for me pulls me out of just about any hard times I may be enduring.
  • I write. . . I visualize “where I want to be”. . . and create the “steps” to get there!
  • I live in the present moment. The future is frightening sometimes, and it brings me peace to remember that it isn’t in my control nor should it be. I don’t have to read the last page of the book to know what to do in the middle of it.
  • Pray and walk outside… hug trees, talk to the flowers…sing to the plants in my garden.
  • Hug my beautiful grandchildren
  • For me it’s waterfall therapy, if a waterfall isn’t available, spending time in nature.
  • I go to my daughter’s house. It is a place of sanctuary for me.
  • Reach out to my supporters
  • Take some down time to myself and reflect in order to access many times that allows me to see clearer. Write and speak with those I feel safe with. get out in nature which allows me to feel calm and more at peace. Mostly its more about being aware in the first place so that I am able divert to avoid potential problems. Knowing me has been key to my well-being.
  • Call a friend after praying, praying, praying g
  • I guess I keep my mind occupied with the dreams of the things I would do if only I was mobile. And keep myself as positive as possible
  • Dance
  • During retirement leave of Japan are daily Rapids WINS are difficult to rely on the family.
  • Focusing on the natural life around me…
  • Pray, meditate, go to meeting & help someone else.
  • Play my Xbox and listen to music or I read a book
  • Wait it out or make a change
  • Hug my dog she keeps me out of trouble more than she knows.
  • I write down positive self-affirmations, inspirational quotes.
  • I go to my written WRAP and look at what I have committed to me to do. Music, and nature!!
  • Breathing
  • Keep busy
  • Love myself. Radical self acceptance. Organize.
  • I allow myself ten minutes of tears. Then much prayer and then follow with a few phone calls to my supporters. Then to my Wellness Toolbox