49. Using Service to Help You Manage Your Mental Health

Anxiety and depression have been a reality for me like they are for many others. In this episode I share what I’ve learned about the nature of managing my own mental health, and one way of doing it is to find regular things I put in my daily life and routines that help me navigate those challenges and keep moving forward. I share why I truly believe service can be a great thing to incorporate when someone is wanting to improve their mental health. I also give some concrete ideas anyone can use to find ways to put service into their life, even when they might be struggling.

I feel passionate about this topic, and that might come through on the episode. :) Service is cool guys! It really can do good things not only for those who are receiving it, but those who make an effort to give it too.

Links mentioned in episode:
JustServe

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Transcript

Melissa: You're listening to the do something more podcast, and this is episode 49, using service to help you manage your mental health. Welcome to the Do Something more podcast, a service show where we highlight the helpers who inspire us all to do something more. I'm your host, Melissa Draper. Thank you so much for being here. Hello and welcome to this solo episode of the podcast. Today, it's just going to be me, Melissa Draper, sharing some thoughts and ideas for why I believe you truly can use service to help you manage and cope with your mental health. And I'm going to share a few ideas, going to share some stories like always, and some of my own experiences with using service to help me with my own mental health. But before we get into that, I just want to give a friendly reminder. If you enjoy listening to this podcast, if you've found some episodes that have brought you some inspiration or encouragement, I would just like to encourage you to show the podcast some love. Follow us on social media I leave the links to our social media in all the show notes. We're on Instagram at dosomethingmore podcast and on Facebook at the Do Something more podcast. Or you can leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Any of those would mean so much to me. Or I also have my email that's there in the podcast description. It's dosomethingmore podcast@gmail.com. Feel free to send me an email or leave a comment, or give me some good positive feedback, or even give me some constructive criticism. I'd take that too. I'm looking for any ways to grow and improve this podcast. So any feedback I appreciate. Well, I wanted to get into this episode today. I'd actually been thinking about it for a little while, and so I know this can be a very sensitive topic for many, and I'm hoping that I can share some of my ideas and be able to give maybe some insight, some encouragement, and just some support and love to anyone out there that might need it. As I talk about this subject of mental health, and before I get into why service really can be a beneficial tool in managing mental health, I wanted to kind of explain some of my own perspectives from my own experiences. So I have struggled with depression and anxiety, leaning more towards the anxiety end of things. It started several years ago after I had my third child, and it's something I've continued to navigate. Kind of accepted that. I think anxiety will maybe be my buddy. I'm trying to get to the point to call her my friend, but she's definitely going to be my buddy. For the rest of my life. It's something I think I'll always kind of be managing, but I've learned a lot from that experience. And there was a time, though, that it was very dark, very hard, and it was really, truly just navigating each day, one day at a time. And so I do want to make sure that if there's anyone that's currently listening to this and navigating that own difficult time, please know that there are many out there that understand to some extent how you're feeling and that things can truly get better. It won't be like this forever. And I do believe that we live in a world where there are so many tools available to us to help us navigate those challenges. And so today I'm just giving a few. And if these are helpful, great. If this episode is causing you anxiety or it's feeling like it's not working for you, the message that I'm sharing, you have my permission to turn it off. I have done that many times myself, especially when you're in one of those times that you're maybe in a low spot and you're navigating things, you've got to be really careful about the media and the things that you consume when you're in a position like that. And so I give you my full permission to only listen and consume to those things that will help lift you and encourage you. And if this isn't one of them, that's okay. I hope it is for somebody else. So I want to get into this idea first that I kind of navigate and look at the way that I manage mental health. So there's kind of two different things that I look at. The first is that I have a toolbox and this toolbox I will use and pull out at those necessary times. This toolbox, I gain the tools by seeing a therapist and learning some good strategies from there, gain some of these tools from life experiences and having to just navigate this journey of mental health and trying to have better mental health. I've gained some of those tools from family and friends who have been so good to listen to me and to give me advice and encouragement lots of different ways. So my toolbox I see as I use it, when my mental health is really like, I'm driving a car and we've gotten a flat tire, I can't keep driving on a flat tire. I've got to stop. I've got to pull out those tools, and I've got to address the emergency at hand. And so I think sometimes with our mental health. That's how it works. We've got to pull out our toolbox, we've got an emergency, or we're in that low spot, and we need to take the time to fix it and to help us change that tire, get a new tire on there, recover a little bit so we can get back on our way. Then I have another way of looking at our mental health, and this is more in the managing part. So sometimes we need that toolbox to address the emergencies, the hard situations. But for everyday life, for managing, the way that I look at it is we kind of need to have pillars. So we have pillars that we set up in our life to help us keep going. Or to go back to the car analogy, there's things we do. We do like oil changes, right? Or we rotate our tires or check the tread on them and see if they need to be changed, or we get that little checkup on our car. We do those things. And as we do those things, we have a less likelihood of breaking down with our car. And as we do those things, it's more likely that we'll be able to keep driving. They will not take away the emergencies forever. There's still going to be emergencies with our mental health. There still might be rough bumps in the road and times that we got to stop and pull over and fix it, or we got to pull into the mechanic shop and get it fixed. But as we do the maintenance things, the likelihood of those happening is going to be less and we'll be able to continue to maintain and keep going. That's kind of my analogy. I hope that makes sense. And so these pillars or these routine checkup things that we do with mental health are kind of the things that we can incorporate into our routine and daily life that help us manage our mental health. So for me, some of those routine things, and also they might change. Actually, they change at different times. There might be different things that you focus on because of the stage you're in or because of what you're navigating. But as long as we have some of those things in place, I do believe it can really help us navigate our mental health. So, for example, at one time I mentioned therapy was something that was part of that routine and that checkup, and I did that, did the hard work of therapy. At this current time, therapy isn't one of my things that I have there to do. It's not one of my pillars that I'm using to navigate my mental health, although I've used it in the past for some medication might be one of those pillars for me personally, medication is not one of those pillars right now, but one that is for me is exercise and especially doing cardio and running. I have found with my anxiety that it's really good for me to just get out and get all that energy out and pound it into the pavement. It feels so good. So that's one of my pillars. That's something I do regularly. Another one that's been really big for me is sleep. I try to get a good amount of sleep each night, and I've always been a huge proponent of naps. I am a nap taker, even a small, quick nap. My kids know that. They know that I function better, and I'm a happier mom, and so I unashamedly do that. Now. I do not apologize for it. It's something that I know that's necessary for me to keep navigating life and to manage my mental health. So those are just a few examples. There's lots of things that people use. People use meditation. People are really focused on their diet and what they're eating and doing. Others might do things like journaling regularly. So there's lots of different things that can help us as we're driving down the road of life to help us navigate that mental health and prevent some of those breakdowns. So why am I saying all this? Well, obviously, I think service is a huge part and can be a great asset to use for one of those pillars to help you manage your mental health or one of those checkups or one of those things that can help you to keep moving and navigating. And also, why am I making the emphasis on my toolbox or my checkup things? Is because I want to make sure that nobody out there thinks I'm saying, just do service. That'll fix all your mental health problems. If you're struggling, just go do some service. Just go help someone and you'll be fine. No, that is not what I'm saying. And I know from personal experience that mental health, the different challenges that we have, they can be very different for each person. We can experience them differently. And also the ways that we address and we take care of those things and we find what works for us in our lives are going to be different as well, as I just explained with both of those. And so sometimes you're in a situation where you need to stop. It's an emergency. You need to pull and use your toolbox. You need to use resources like a good therapist or the support and family and friends to help you navigate. But then hopefully, we can get to a point, like I said, where we don't have to keep pulling that toolbox out as much and we can start doing the regular routine things in our lives that will help us to keep going and moving forward. So that's kind of what I'm saying with this podcast episode. And now I want to explain why service can be one of those awesome routine things that you can use to navigate your mental health and to keep you moving. So first, I want to give the why or the proof, I guess. There have been multiple studies that have indicated that volunteering and service is great for your mental health. It's shown to decrease stress levels, depression, anxiety, boost overall health or satisfaction with life. It's been documented, well documented, to help with a lot of those things. And this isn't just for adults. This is for teenagers and kids as well. It's been documented to possibly help with depression and anxiety in those younger populations as well, or in kids, even at times to maybe even help with behavioral problems or other things. So these have all been things that people have done studies on and shown how great volunteering and service can be for a variety of age groups and age ranges. And another reason that I love using service, and I think it can be a great tool for helping us with our mental health, is service incorporates so many things that individually have also been shown to help with our mental health. So, for example, the feeling of isolation, that comes often when you are experiencing depression or anxiety, I have experienced that for myself. I grew up in a big family. I've got kids. I'm married. I've got a great neighborhood community, a church community, the school communities of my kids. And I remember looking back on that and thinking, I know so many people. I've got so many good relationships in my life. It just did not make sense for me to feel so isolated and alone. But those are feelings that mental health struggles can bring. That's a natural thing that a lot of people struggle with. And so service can help with those feelings of isolation, especially when we're doing it with other people. We're serving alongside other people, we're maybe meeting new people, and then we are serving other people on the other side of things as well. And so all of that can bring some good, positive socialization that helps with those feelings of isolation that unfortunately come when we're struggling with our mental health. Another thing service can bring lots of times, is physical activity. You're doing things like yard work, or maybe you're organizing cans at a food pantry or maybe you're helping someone clean their house, or you're watching kids, or you're doing lots of different things that service often we can be up and doing and doing physical activity, and it's been documented that exercise and physical activity are really beneficial for managing mental health. Another thing that service can bring is it can help us develop a deeper sense of purpose and meaning with our life. I know, unfortunately, if you've really struggled with mental health, often you feel like you're a burden to those around you. That's one of the struggles that can come, or you wonder if what you do matters or if it makes a difference. Those are feelings I've all struggled with and sometimes still struggle with. And service can help give you that sense of meaning and purpose. It can kind of redirect and focus and help you see that your efforts, your talents, your efforts to connect with others are needed and they matter. Service can give you a new perspective. Even just doing this podcast, all the different nonprofits I've talked to so far, the different people I've talked to, has given me a huge perspective on some of the challenges and things that others are navigating and how blessed I am with my life and how wonderful it is that I get the opportunity to look outside of myself and I can help others navigate some of those challenges. There's so many organizations out there helping with so many different things. If there's something that you want to help people navigate, you most likely can find an organization doing it, and it can give you some great new perspective as you help and assist and think outside of yourself. Service is really good at doing that, just some other things. Service can reduce stress, and stress can be a major contributor to mental health struggles. Service can also increase your confidence, help you feel like you can do something, even with just a very bit of skill and even with a desire just to be there. You can be used to make a difference and to do some good things. Service can ignite a passion. We've covered that on this podcast. We've had people who have kind of stumbled on an opportunity and discovered some passion that they had in life. And having some passion, caring deeply about something, can again give you those feelings of feeling like your life has meaning and purpose. So those are lots of different areas I just explained, and that's why I love service. Service incorporates all of those. You could go do one activity for like an hour and it would incorporate all of those things. And all of those things contribute to improving our mental health, to helping us navigate some of those things. That come the struggles that come if we're struggling with our mental health. And that's why I love service. So I hope I gave you some really good whys there of why service can be an essential part of managing our mental health, why it can be one of those routine things we might want to think about incorporating so we can keep driving our car down the road. So after I just gave you all of those whys, the third and final thing I wanted to share here was the ways that you can incorporate service, especially if you're struggling. And I thought about this one for a little bit, because, again, with my own experiences as a young mother, where I really was literally just getting up each day and putting 1ft in front of the other, it seemed so wonky, I guess is the right word, so backwards. To say that to help me improve, feel better, be able to get beyond those struggles I was having was to do more. And I know that's what it can feel like sometimes when someone suggests service for helping you with your mental health. It's like I'm in a period in a stage now where I am barely doing the essentials each day and you want me to try and do more. That doesn't make sense. And I know it doesn't make sense. And I'm of course saying that you might need to navigate it day by day. I understand that. I've completely been there, but I've also now kind of navigated after doing this for several years. Know that, yes, even though that seems wonky, weird, or out of whack or whatever phrase you want to use, that yes, there's some miracle that happens when we decide to look outside of ourselves and to help other people. That many times it ends up adding more to our own life and giving us more, maybe even giving us more energy, giving us more clarity. All the things I mentioned earlier, the things that service can give us. And I know it sounds wonky, I know it sounds weird, but I do think that as you find ways to incorporate service in your life in this way, it can actually end up adding to it more than being a burden and taking away from it. But I do know I have been there and it has felt overwhelming. So I wanted to give you just a few ideas. If you're in that space or if you know someone or you're saying, okay, Melissa, I get it, I know all these whys, they make sense to me, but there's just no way I can make that happen. I want to give you some encouragement and ideas for maybe some ways you can make it happen in simple ways. So my first, and these aren't going to be new if you've been listening to the podcast, these are things I've mentioned in many different ways on the podcast, but I think they're worth saying. So. First, I told a story, I think, back in episode ten of during this time when I was struggling and I wanted to be involved in my kids school community more, but I couldn't. I couldn't be. I needed to focus on my family and focus on taking care of myself. And so a way I found to be involved in the community was I simply sent thank yous. Sometimes they were in the form of a card. Sometimes they were in the form of a text. Sometimes I just told someone, a mom that volunteered on a field trip with the kids, or a card to the bus driver, or a thank you note to the teacher, whatever it might be. I just did thank yous. Those didn't take very much time and expressing that gratitude for someone else, for the good that they were doing and that I observed them doing, or I was so thankful they'd done for me and my family, it was an act of service, and it was so gratifying to me. It gave me so much, and it was simple. It didn't take a lot of time or effort. So that would be my first way. To say that you can incorporate service if you're struggling is to do it in the form of positive words. So I just gave the example of giving thank yous. You could do that, focus on thanking those around you. You can do it by just reaching out with text, texting someone that comes to your mind, telling them you thought of them and saying something you appreciate about them, or sharing a cool thing you saw that made you think of them, or whatever it might be. Or you could even do phone calls. I know that seems archaic, right, in this world of social media, but, man, there are some people that I know still would love and appreciate a phone call. And you can sit down and do that for five or ten minutes. It will lift you. And there are people that will definitely lift them. So that's my first kind of way that I think you could start to incorporate service in your everyday routine is to use the power of your words. Use them regularly to lift people up. It really does matter. It makes a difference, and I know it's made a difference to me when I've had people do that for me in turn, and I've loved doing it for others. Another idea that might be helpful, because sometimes when you're struggling with your mental health, it's hard sometimes to get your feet moving. It can be hard even to get out of bed some days, right. Find something consistent that you can go to. So we've mentioned, just serve on here. There's a lot of things that you might be able to find on there in your community, but I would say to find something consistent you can go to might be a good tactic for you if you're struggling with your mental health and wanting to do service. I know for me, there were times it was so good to have that something on the schedule that made me get my feet moving, that let me focus on something I could get up and go do. And so this might be something like volunteering at an organization, maybe 1 hour a week. I've had more than one friend I've talked to that has done that, that has signed up. There's one friend in particular. There was a local kind of thrift store and food pantry, and she signed up and went there at the same time every week for an hour. And that consistent of just having to get up and do that. And there were days that she was like, no, this feels hard, I don't want to. But she committed to do it and she was going to be there, and she knew that she could help, and she always was so glad when she'd made the effort to do that. And that might be something you need to do. Find something consistent that you can do on the same day, the same time, maybe for an hour, and that will help you get in that routine and give you something to look forward to and to motivate you. So that's another idea. Another one I'd like to share is to just think of a talent or a gift that you have and think of reasonable ways that you can offer that to your community. So an obvious one might be baking. Maybe you're good at that. And you find a way to make a little batch of cookies and take that to the person that comes to mind in your neighborhood that might need a little pick me up. Maybe you're really good at art, and you find a way to make something super simple and give it to someone that means something to you. There's lots of different ways you could do this. So, one example I saw recently a news story that was done where a man, his wife had passed away, and he struggled with PTSD. He was a Vietnam vet, and this was a real struggle for him. And he knew it was going to be hard after his wife passed away. So he decided to got on a local community Facebook page, I believe it was. And he said, hey, if anybody out there has honey dues on their honey to do list or handyman repairs that need to be made, I will do them for you. Because he had a gift for fixing things and making things better with his hands. And so he got responses, especially from other women who were widows or didn't have the help and support that they needed. And he had spent his time being a handyman and volunteering that gift, that service to people in his community. And he did say, they asked him in the news story, how has this helped you with your PTSD? And he's like, this has done everything I hoped it would do, and I've been able to manage and to move forward. It was just a really beautiful story. But that's not just for him. That could be anyone. Think of that talent or gift that you have and a way that you could offer that to your community. So those are three ideas that I've shared. I wanted to share one more is look for opportunities to say yes. I think sometimes in our culture we get in this mind frame of we got to say no, got to set boundaries. And it's true, you can't say yes to everything. But many times the service opportunities that come, the ones that oftentimes to me, have mattered, have meant something. Were when I opened my eyes, looked around me and said yes to an opportunity, said yes to going up to a stranger that was emotional and just needed someone to say, hey, I'm so sorry. Whatever it is you're experiencing right now, but I see you, and I wanted to put my arm around you and tell you that, or to just look around for those opportunities. Maybe you're at an event with your kids and they need someone to help put the chairs up, put a few chairs up. And it's amazing how some of those small things, some of those opportunities to say yes can really be helpful. And lots of times they're simple. They don't have to be huge, but we can say yes to serving and helping those around us. So those are just a few ideas. But I honestly believe if this is something you want to incorporate, this is something you believe that can really help you, that you can ponder on it. And ideas will come for ways that you can fit service into your life if you are struggling with your mental health and for ways that you can use it to benefit and to bless you. And of course, we're not just doing service because it's all about me. We're doing service for other people, and it will benefit and bless those around you. And that's a beautiful thing. It's a beautiful thing to realize that you do matter, that your talents, your gifts are needed, that someone needs your smile, your perspectives, someone needs to have a conversation with you where you uplift and encourage them, or you share stories from your experiences, or where you open up and are honest about your current struggles, whatever they may be. It's a beautiful thing. And service really can help us navigate all of that. So that was my episode today. Kind of went over my own analogy theory of mental health, of our toolbox versus our things we do to routinely check in. And if mental health is a reality in your life, then you know, you need both. You are going to have emergencies, you are going to have times, you just have to pull the car over and you got to take care of what's not functioning. You got to pull out that toolbox and use it to fix it. But there are many times that you're going to be able to keep driving. And it's because you've put some of these routine things in place that help you keep your body, your perspective and everything healthy. And then I also shared why service can be a way to do those routine check ins and to help us manage our mental health. You can go find studies yourself. There's so many out there if you google it on the Internet. But basically, service incorporates so many things that have shown to help with the struggles that are unique to mental health. And that's what's fascinating to me, is many of these things are unique to mental health struggles. A lot of people can identify with what I shared, and service can help with so many of those things and be incorporated all together in one act. So that's amazing. And why service can be a great way to manage our mental health. And then the third thing I shared was ways that you can make it happen, especially if you are struggling and you're just trying to get your feet under you. I wanted to give some concrete ways that anyone could use to simply make service part of their life and be able to see some of those good benefits that it can bring as we reach out and help others. So that's my episode today. Please, if you know someone that would benefit from some of the things I've maybe rambled on a little bit about today, but I think they're important, they're good. Share it with them. Say, hey, I think you might benefit from some of the things she's talking about in this episode. So thank you so much for being here. I'll see you next time.