Twenty Wellness Tips
1. Support groups are safe, welcoming, confidential, and understanding gatherings. Visit www.DBSAlliance.org to find a group near you.2. Music has the power to help us calm down or motivate, whether we are listening or performing.3. Healthy eating. Voiding fats, sugars, cholesterol, and salt, drinking water, and balancing our food groups can help improve mood.4. Exercise/walking/movement can get us through depression or use up extra energy if mania seems close at hand.5. Pet therapy. Our pets offer us, unconditional love, a shoulder to cry on when needed, and they never get tired of us.6. Journaling. Setting aside time each day to think through what has occurred and write about it can help us look for patterns and better understand ourselves.7. Sleep. It's impossible to overestimate how important, regular sleep and wake times can be for people living with mood disorders.8. Creative writing and poetry allow us to process information in ways that can be healing and safe.9. Meditation can help us become calmer and more focused. It isn't complicated; sit quietly and do your best to clear your mind. It gets easier with practice.10. Arts and crafts can help us explore issues non-verbally. Pick your favorite and try it out. Don't worry about the result.11. Mood tracking. Taking 60 seconds a day to track our moods can alert us of problems earlier and help us address them.12. Friends and family can be our shelter from the storm.13. Work. Having a job that forces us to get out of bed every day helps our self-esteem and self-discipline.14. Education about our illness empowers us to make decisions with our health care providers, so we can say, "Don't work on me, work with me."15. Spirituality. Belief in and reliance on something more powerful than yourself is an essential aspect of wellness for many people.16. Volunteering. Whether you are working or not, adding a volunteer job helps you give back as a part of your recovery journey.17. Yoga. Combining the benefits of exercise and mediation, yoga is a beneficial wellness tool for many.18. Getting clean and sober can work wonders on your moods and treatment effectiveness.19. Gardening. The combination of exercise, beauty, and being outdoors makes this wellness strategy irresistible to many of us.20. Tracking triggers (predictable actions or situations that destabilize moods) and preparing for them can help us avoid severe mood episodes. Consider downloading DBSA's personal calendar, as found on the website.