Practice self-care on lunch breaks. Daily lunch breaks are more than just opportunities to eat — they’re also the perfect time to practice self-care.
When we know ourselves better, we can more effectively assess why we react the way we do in certain situations. To do this, you can ask yourself the following questions:
If you want, you can use the above questions to reflect on specific situations in your life. Another method might be writing a diary for example.
Mentalizing is the ability to understand the mental state – of oneself or others – that underlies overt behaviour. Just like empathy mentalizing allows humans to understand others, through the representation of their mental states or their mood. You can train mentalizing within this exercise, by asking others.
Find a friend or someone in your family to ask how they have been during the day. Ask how he or she is doing so far in the day. Try to ask your questions with a curious, non-judgmental attitude and try to bring out as many moods, thoughts, and emotions as possible by your questions. Notice how this makes you feel and how the other person feels.
Mentalizing is also used by professionals. An example of how mentalizing is used in the treatment of borderline disorders can be found here: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2816926/
A daily schedule will help you to structure and manage your daily life again and gives you motivation, in case you are in a depressive mood.
Positive activites, or activities that you used to like in the past, can help you to motivate yourself and get more active again. For a list of positive activities, you will find a large selection online, where you can choose suitable activities for you and get inspired to try new things.