OK, so you probably know by now I definitely don’t want to inform you of your pill of choice when it comes to stabilizing your mood. I’ll leave that to my colleagues in medicine, including my husband who often prescribes or refills these types of medicinal needs.
But even my spouse and other Christian colleagues in medicine, who likewise sees a person in a biopsychosocialspiritual kind of a way also, readily admit that before their patients need medicine, typically they need a counselor. Sadly, by the time they come to see a medical specialist, often they have been on psychotropic drugs for a number of years and aren’t interested in processing their moods with the help of a counselor even at their physician’s urging.
Why is this? Still surprising to me, as I’ve discussed in the past, is people’s reticence to talk to a trained professional with the same values about their emotional troubles. The Bible says, “In the abundance of counselors there is victory,” (Proverbs 11:14) and to me it seems a seamless transition when times are rough emotionally.
But the sensitivity comes not from within in most cases, it comes from social stigma who even still encourage people to embrace medicinal solutions more than a combined or just holistic approach when it comes to mental health needs.
I love seeing more and more synergistic medical teams who are only satisfied when they look at people on multiple levels and treat them as such, and ever since I dreamed up Reflections many years ago, I always knew I wanted to cover multiple layers of care. Coaching and counseling are wonderful to complement one another and one day, perhaps there will be more elements of care directly involved in our team, such as massage, nutrition, and the like.
Today my job is something more pressing. It isn’t to get you away from medicine that you may indeed need, it’s to help you feel the effects of the natural, the behavior and social and spiritual measures that may indeed reduce your need for new prescriptions or even reduce or eliminate your current need for these measures.
Don’t ever stop taking medicines without talking to your doctor, but do read on if you’d like to make new goals for yourself, if you want to be your healthiest, and most especially, if you’re tired of your moods dictating your life!
Here are five tips for kicking a bad mood to the curb!! 🙂
- Exercise even when your mood bites. Take it to the pavement whenever possible or for those who can only do modest exercise, to the couch for leg lifts or arm circles during commercial breaks. And do whatever you can handle, no more, no less. This regular activity boosts brain health as we all know by now though multiple upon multiple studies, including this one at Mayo, echo this sentiment.
- Pray the Thrive prayer upon waking or whenever the bad mood shifts your way of thinking. Whether you got a jolt from a family member, a bad grade, a paycheck you thought would be more, or just because you felt blah, reshift your thinking with this Thrive Prayer quickly and effectively!
- Take a few minutes to journal positively! You may remember me saying that negative journaling can actually make your symptoms worse but that truly processing the needed info stuck rolling around in your brain will help you to release it and to receive God’s best for you!!! Read it here if you missed it! I often do deep breathing prayers to release and receive if I don’t have a journal handy or want to write (totally rare), it’s so awesome to give everything to God and to cleanse your mind of unhealthy thoughts!
- Make lists! Remember when I gave you the One Sheet Shortcut Planner? Days when your mood is in the gutter is when you need it. When you’re already primed for action, nothing can stop you. When you write down your goals with intention, you get a positive boost by completing them. Example, “Even though I was in a bad mood today, I got a lot done./ In fact, I got a lot of the stuff done I don’t like doing, which perfectly suited my bad mood.” Nice, right?
- Finally, after attacking your bad mood with such vigor and intention, there’s only one thing left to do. Head to a healthy celebration. It could look like watching an entire movie, a short program, getting some luxurious sleep early, taking a long soak in the tub, having a square or three of chocolate as I like to do sometimes, or just chilling to music and a glass of your fave bubbly or soda! Just be moderate and you’ve got the ticket so you’ll have positive strength and God’s blessing on your tomorrow as well and possible even a good mood to begin it.
And If none of this is working, you know the drill by now, and that’s why I’ve got such joy over reminding you that our staff can be there to help you as well.
That means there’s no way you can lose!
Love Living Intentionally With You,
Christa
