People Are Applauding This Twitter Thread That Lists Actions People Struggling With Their Mental Health Can Take To Feel Better

Life hits hard. And when it knocks you down, getting back up can be even harder. So writer Beth McColl made a list of “baby steps” that people who struggle with their mental health can take in order to get back on their feet.

“Try to pick a few and do them, but if you can’t, that’s valid too,” she tweeted sharing the tips.

Even though the thread is a few years old, its content is timeless. With everything that’s going on in the world, we need to find time for ourselves more than ever. According to Mental Health America, even before COVID-19, the prevalence of mental illness among adults was increasing. In 2017-2018, 19% of adults experienced a mental illness, an increase of 1.5 million people over last year’s dataset.

Throughout 2020, the number of people screening with moderate to severe symptoms of depression and anxiety continued to increase and remains higher than rates prior to COVID-19.

So let’s revisit McColl’s thread. It’s worth it even if it helps just one person.

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Dr. Tamar Chansky, who is a licensed psychologist and the Founder of the Children’s and Adult Center for OCD and Anxiety in Plymouth Meeting, PA, told Bored Panda that people don’t have it together one hundred percent of the time. Ups and downs are normal.

“Anxiety that comes and goes is part of the human experience,” Dr. Chansky said. “But when anxiety takes on a life of its own, in other words, it’s not in response to a stressor, it’s a default setting and feels uncontrollable, interferes with one’s functioning or negatively impacts the subjective experience of life and well-being, then we consider the anxiety at a clinical level.”

The author of Freeing Your Child from Anxiety and Freeing Yourself from Anxiety has an article on her website, called Name that (Worry) Tune: How to Catch Worry Early, Before it Catches You. It’s a comprehensive read that also tries to help people to regain control — just like McColl’s thread.

“The key to ending the torturous repetition of anxious thoughts comes from that classic television game show where you win by being able to recognize a tune from just the first few notes,” Dr. Chansky writes. “Instead of dropping everything when you hear—’You screwed up!’ or ‘How do you know it’s going to work out?’ and launching yourself on a worry mission to identify and address every single negative outcome you can imagine, save yourself the trip. And the anguish. Everyone’s worry sounds the same. Right? Mine, yours, your Uncle Joey’s, the equivalent of Uncle Joey half-way across the globe. What does that tell us?”

The psychologist explains that “if we can name that tune of Depression’s Greatest Hits and Worry Classics, instead of thinking that these doubts and fears mean something specific about you, you can realize that they mean something universal about change or uncertainty.”

“It’s a knee-jerk neurological reaction to not knowing. Nothing more, nothing less,” Cr. Chansky adds. So when you hear the tell-tale, ‘what if?’ or, ‘oh no!’ give your anxiety a nod and acknowledge its presence. However, you then have to get back on track with what you were doing before you were so (rudely) interrupted. “Your best information comes from your thoughtful mind, not the jumpy part that’s ready to give up or freak out at the blink of an eye.”

Fire up Dr. Chansky’s piece to learn more strategies to quickly pinpoint and dismiss the sound of worry.

Here’s what people said about the list after it went viral

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