A Summer Of Better Mental Health

Summer is the worst for my hair but the best for my mood. I feel like I’ve been in a huge slump for the last six months, and I’m only just starting to leave it.

I think every year people decided to have a glow up over the summer, but it’s always physical and never a ‘mental’ glow up.

Sometimes, in a relationship, we completely lose ourselves and I never really had a strong sense of self anyway.

Since I’m spending the next four months at home, I’ve decided I’m going to dedicate it to improving myself and my mental health.

I’m currently doing a writing internship where I write 2 articles a day, and working full time as a bartender at a hotel, so I think I’m going to be very busy, but here is how I’m planning on getting better.

Eliminating Stress

Stress makes me ridiculously anxious, and I know that not being able to sleep at night because I’m panicking over money doesn’t help me at all.

With the cost of living rising constantly, budgeting and saving is so important. At the beginning of uni, I spent allll my overdraft and student loan instead of paying my rent etc so I ended up having to take out a separate loan.

Working full time means I can pay off my overdraft and loan, and when my student loan comes in I won’t have to use it for any debt I’m in.

I’m also calculating my rent, phone bills, contact lenses & food shop for the term before I spend a penny of my loan and making sure it’s all paid off.

Meditation And Mindfulness

Practising patience and being of a wise mind helps to improve your reactions to situations. I’ve been doing weekly DBT sessions to try and regulate my moods and improve my reactions.

Meditating once a day, even for only 10 minutes, helps to calm your body and mind, see new perspectives on situations, visualise your goals and motivate you and increasing patience. I felt my happiest when I woke up and meditated and had more time in the mornings, and I miss it a lot.

Sometimes, I delete my social medias for a month or so to focus on actually living my life. I haven’t done that in six months or so, but I’m considering it again.

I always feel like I’m wasting my life on my phone, and I’m so much more productive when I’m not on it. The only downside is it’s harder to stay in contact with people because you can’t swipe up to a story etc, so sometimes it does feel like I’m isolating myself.

Do you have anything you do to motivate yourself and improve your mental health? Let me know, because I think it’s such a good idea to have a little mental health glow up over the summer. Focusing on losing weight & getting prettier is kind of detrimental to your happiness if it only links to how you look, not how you feel.

Beth xo

(Also, I don’t know why the pictures in this post are so small and ugly but whatever, I’ll fix it on my next post!!)