Tag Archives: self-care

Start with Something

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In The Subtle Art of not Giving a F*ck the author makes a compelling case for improving your life, starting with something simple. Something small. This is not easy. As the author says, “It’s simple, but not easy.” If you have depression you know this is very true. So true in fact, that starting something, where that something is getting out of bed, can be a huge challenge.

In Lost Connections the author talks about how different treatments positively impact depression. One of the scales he references, Hamilton Depression rating, notes that many patients that use anti-depressions only see a 0.25 increase in their overall mood, while a good night sleep gets you that much or more.

I’ve always had problems getting to sleep. It can take me up to an hour to fall asleep after I’ve gone to bed. This is a combination of anxiety, too much screen time – which can mess up your ability to fall asleep, and just being a super light sleeper. So, I’ve decided to start with something where I have a decent amount of control. Where it’s easy to make a change.

For Christmas my brother got me a start set of the Philips Hue lights. I didn’t know much about them, but i wanted to try using them to see how it impacted our house. So, I put a bulb in the nightstand by the bed. I found out there’s a setting that allows you to wind down the lighting before bed. So I’ve started to use that setting. It gives you about 30 minutes to wind down as the light dims. I’ve made it my routine to go to bed about 15 minutes before it starts that process. I use this time to get ready for bed and do some night time writing or reading. I’m also going to start adding in some nighttime meditation to help me unwind.

This really helps me get away from the screens. It pulls me out of the hellscape that is social media. It allows me to write creatively without typing on a screen or read an interesting story. Writing has really helped get ahead of my anxiety because, whatever I write just kind of comes out.

The meditation is also a great addition, because it’s another way to address the spinning that your mind goes through at night. You are intentional about your mind spinning. You intentionally walk through the past day. You then put that aside and tell your body that it is OK to relax. This short circuits the spinning and anxiety. You control your night.

This is something small. I’ve made sure that it’s been relatively easy to make the change. I started with the light and time away from my computer. Then I added the writing and reading. Last night I added the meditation. These changes have positively impacted my mood. I’ve gotten better sleep and that, has helped with my depression.

Start with something. Start with making it easier for you to sleep well.

Meditation and Owning Your Response to Others

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In The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck the author argues that we have responsibility for everything that happens to us. He stresses, accurately, that we are not at fault for everything. Which means that bad things happen and these bad things can happen to us in a way that there was nothing we could do to prevent them from happening to us. For example, emotional abuse or physical abuse that you suffered at the hands of your parents are not your fault. The resulting trauma is not your fault. You are not responsible for what that person did to you. You are responsible for how you respond to that abuse now. this is a subtle but important distinction. You are not responsible for the actions of another nor are you not at fault, instead you are responsible for your response as an adult and how you carry that trauma into other relationships.

This is something that’s taken me a long time to understand. I knew I wasn’t responding well to situations all the time. I’d get a lot angrier than I should over something small. I didn’t understand I was responding the way I would have to my mother when I should have been looking at the situation differently as it was my wife that I was talking with. I should not have been as angry, because my wife didn’t do anything to warrant that reaction. Furthermore, I thought it was my wife’s fault and responsibility to not upset me.

I needed to own how I responded to her. I needed to take that as my responsibility to understand why I was responding the way that I was. Especially if we were having a series of blow ups, it was even more important to understand what I was feeling and why. This was not something I had the skills to handle.

Through the course of my therapy and reading, I’ve found that meditation has really helped me with my responsibilities. Whenever I’m very stressed, I’ve used a few minutes to step aside and do a breathing exercise. According to The General Theory of Love, this is a way for your body and mind to reconnect. It is a way for your rational mind to give your emotional mind a hug. This is similar giving a dog a hug during a thunderstorm. The dog doesn’t understand why there is thunder. Just that there’s loud noises and bright lights. Things that can hurt the dog. We know that we’re safe in our house. That the thunder is noise and the lightening bright, but not something that will come and get us. So we comfort the dog through hugging and petting.

We need to do the same to our own mind. The emotional part of our brain isn’t much different from a dog’s and our rational part is the same part we use to comfort the dog. Meditation and focusing on breath allow us to calm ourselves. Over time meditation is a powerful tool for beginning introspection.

I use Headspace, but there are other apps like it, such as Calm and YouTube channels, etc… There’s no one perfect tool for helping you with meditation. Each one does have guided meditations to help you understand your behavior in relationships with friends, family, and colleagues. The technique asks you to imagine yourself happy, then other people. This approach makes you think about why you get angry. Why you respond the way that you do and think about how you have hurt other people. It’s a step in understanding yourself better. It’s a way to both hug yourself and take a look at who you are and what type of person you want to be.

Book Review: The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck by Mark Manson – A guide for finding the right values to give a fuck about the right things

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The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good LifeThe Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life by Mark Manson
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

I actually first heard of this book while I was reading an article about Millennial Burnout. The author of that article knocked this book, which now I realize that author clearly hadn’t read this book! I think this book is completely misnamed, because this book isn’t about ‘Not Giving a Fuck’ it’s really about ‘Giving a fuck about the right things.’ I think this is an important distinction and one that, if you judge the book by its cover, you’ll definitely miss.

I’ve been doing a lot of reading on depression. I’ve read 1 book written by a layman that covers a great deal of different research on depression, Lost Connections. I’ve read another book that deals with Trauma and how that can cause depression, The Body Keeps the Score. Finally, I’ve read a book on the science of love and how unhealthy relationships while growing up and as adults can cause depression, General Theory of Love. I believe that I can add this as a fourth book to this list. In Lost Connections the author argues that a major cause of depression in our lives is a misalignment with our core values and the values of society. I believe that this book, The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck, is an entire book about that.

The author’s premise is that we are valuing, and thus giving a fuck about, the wrong things. That could be chasing material items, women (the author himself is a self confessed womanizer), a bigger paycheck, a new job that will solve all their problems, and other things. We are chasing these things, because this is what we’ve been taught to value through our friends and families.

However, these things do not make you happy. Solving the right types of problems can make you happy. Those problems that you solve are what you value. Seeking them out can help make you happy. The pain and struggle of solving those problems lead to happiness.

This rings true to me. I’m struggling with work and finding balance and happiness with my life. I’ve had great success in my work and have made significantly more money since entering the job market. However, I am not less depressed. If anything my depression deepened. As a result, I feel like I’m flailing.

This book helped me put into context a lot of different ideas that I had read in the other three books. In a way it synthesized those ideas into something that was more actionable. In some ways, the action is to do something, anything. But start by putting one step forward. Try something small and take responsibility of that.

Responsibility is a key theme in this book. You take responsibility to how you respond to anything that happens to you. This isn’t to say it’s your fault this thing happened. For example, if you get sick, that is not your fault. How you deal with being sick is your responsibility. If someone treats you like shit at work, that’s not your fault, but how you respond to them is your responsibility. If you set boundaries and make it clear that behavior is unacceptable and act professional, you can start to change that relationship. If you retaliate and escalate things, you are responsible for that. Even if the person, really pissed you off.

I think this book is also important given the conversation around Toxic Masculinity. Toxic Masculinity is all about entitlement. This book argues that entitlement is one of the major reasons why people are unhappy. It leads to shitty values that make you a shitty person. If you are pissed off that people don’t like toxic masculinity, it’s because you’re concerned some of your behavior may be construed as toxic. You’re responsible for that response. You’re responsible for inspecting your values and your behavior to understand if you are a toxic person. If you find yourself wanting, then it is your responsibility to change and improve yourself. You can. This book helps provide a roadmap for it.

This book isn’t perfect, of course. The author definitely leans into the title during the beginning of the book, which can get old. There are other places where the author does this as well, because it seems to fit. However, if you are able to get past that bit of childish fun to get into the meat of the book, it’s well worth it.

I would strongly suggest that if you find this book interesting to read the other books about depression I suggested above. These together can help you work through your depression, if you are also depressed.

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