Overcoming Depression: 4 Powerful Strategies to Find Happiness

Are you one of the 16 million Americans battling depression? First, it helps to know you’re not alone. There is comfort in numbers.

However, depression can take a toll on your physical, emotional and mental wellbeing. It weakens your immune system, causes insomnia, lowers your appetites, increases your risk of heart attacks, and takes away your happiness.

While depression isn’t an easy condition to overcome, it’s not a life sentence. You can beat it. In this article, we’re sharing 4 strategies that will you give you a strong chance of overcoming depression and, ultimately, regaining your happiness.

1. Keep Learning About Depression

In combat, the best way to defeat your enemy is to learn their strategy and attack it. The same goes for your battle against depression.

The more you know about depression’s mode of attack, the greater your chances of halting its advances. Read about the various types of depression, their warning signs and symptoms, as well as potential consequences.

If it’s difficult to read (depression can drain your concentration), try listening to podcasts or watching videos on the subject. To be forewarned is to be forearmed.

2. Stay Connected to People

Depression has the power to push its victims into a corner of isolation. Unable to fight back or ashamed of their situation, the victim cuts off communication with the people in their lives. In isolation, depression thrives, and it’s easy to start harboring fear and negative thoughts.

If you’re already in this state, it’s not too late to reach out and reconnect with your loved ones. Begin by drawing a list of the people you’d love to talk to, and then initiate contact.

Don’t just say hello and stop there. Schedule a social activity that will help you get closer.

What if you don’t have anyone to reach out to?

Attend social events and try to make new friends. Plus, technology has made it possible to connect with new people from the comfort of our homes.

3. Break Some Sweat

Physical exercise isn’t just good for losing weight and building muscle. It’s also a powerful stress reliever, and here is the science behind it.

When you work out at a high intensity, the body releases endorphins, aka the feel-good hormone. And when you do low-intensity workouts sustained over time, the body releases neurotrophic proteins, which improve cell connections in the hippocampus – the part which regulates mood in the human brain.

The challenge for people with depression is getting the energy to exercise.

Well, there is no one-size-fits-all solution that works for everyone. Some people will just get up and start exercising for a few minutes every day. Others need a friend’s hand.

Once you start exercising, it’s vital to keep the momentum. It takes a sustained effort to reap depression-reducing powers of exercise.

4. Get the Right Professional Help

It’s not uncommon for depression patients to get clinical treatment from their primary care physicians. While this isn’t a wrong decision, primary care physicians are not mental health specialists and are, as such, not best-placed to help you.

The professional you need to see is a psychiatrist.

What’s more, you don’t even need to leave your home to get the right professional help. Some psychiatrists, such as Sandip Buch, offer telepsychiatry services, enabling thousands of patients to access help remotely.

Overcoming Depression Step By Step

Depression has the ability to wreck your physical and mental health, and condemn your life to untold sadness.

Fortunately, overcoming depression isn’t out of your reach. We’ve fleshed out some powerful strategies you can use to fight the mental health condition and reclaim your happiness.

All the best, and keep improving yourself.