Did you know that more than 300 million people suffer from depression around the world and it is the leading cause of disability around the world? If you have been dealing with depression and want to find unique ways to help yourself, you are in the right place. A very effective tool to help those suffering from depression is called activity scheduling.
Keep reading to learn how to use it to increase your productivity:
What Is Activity Scheduling?
This tool will combat passivity and help someone suffering from depression gradually re-engage in daily life routines. Depressed people tend to withdraw from life, in turn, causing energy levels to go down, reducing motivation, and end up having less and less interaction with anyone else.
How to Use an Activity Schedule?
You will first monitor your activity over the course of a week and record it on a piece of paper or online. For example, if you lay in bed from 8 am – 10 am, write that down and write what you were doing while you were laying down (thinking, meditating, going over things, etc).
Once you have your activity written down each day you will rate how intense your depression was during that activity. Anywhere from 0% to 100%. Next under each activity, you will rate your sense of Achievement on a scale from 0-10, sense of Closeness to other people on the same scale and sense of Enjoyment.
Under each activity, you should have something like A=(0-10), C=(0-10), and E=(0-10). Once you are done writing everything down you will have a clearer vision of what activities take the edge off your depression and which ones make it more intense.
You can use an online schedule maker to keep track every day and have somewhere you can go back and see week by week how far you have come along.
Breaking the Cycles
In order to break the cycle, a therapist will take the activity you record and will help you identify the activities that boosted your mood. Then together with your therapist, you will take the time to schedule in these activities that help you.
Every week you will evaluate if those activities still helped your mood or not. If they did, you continue to schedule them. If they didn’t, then you replace them with a new activity.
Now that you are familiar with the ins and outs of activity scheduling, you can start working on your own activity schedule. this will help you not only with any feelings of depression but it will also help you with feeling more motivated every day.
You will be able to find yourself enjoying life more and feeling like your best self, instead of opting for laying in bed all day because it feels easier.
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