Nowadays, a lot of times, one may unconsciously become depressed. There are many reasons for this, ranging from work, life, emotions, and various objective and subjective factors that can all potentially lead to depression. The incidence of this condition is increasingly rising. I myself have gone through such an experience. Now, through self-decompression and self-expression, I have found it to be a very effective method. How can we prevent such situations from occurring? In my opinion, the following points should be followed:
1. Pay attention to sleep, diet, and exercise: We cannot ignore the basic physiological factors that may lead to low moods. If your sleep quality is poor, and you have no appetite, allowing yourself to remain in a bad physical state makes it easy to experience low moods because daily activities drain your energy and can quickly overwhelm you. Insomnia is a common consequence of low moods, and it can also make you more prone to depression. During depressive episodes, it's difficult to take direct measures against insomnia because you need to focus on combating depression. Therefore, when your mood is better, you should cultivate good sleep habits. Exercise can prevent the onset of depression and help boost physical strength. It can also quickly elevate your mood and provide short-term relief from depression.
2. Clarify your values and goals: If you are prone to depression, you should examine your life goals and values, as well as how you spend your time. A major reason for recurring low moods is that what you actually do does not align with what you truly value. This misalignment itself may not be explicitly manifested but will appear as general feelings of depression.
3. Build reliable interpersonal relationships: When something unfavorable happens, having someone you can fully trust, whether a relative, spouse, or friend, is one of the most important guarantees for preventing depression. If you don't yet have a close, dependable interpersonal relationship, and your friends cannot provide emotional support that helps prevent depression, you should find ways to start building such supportive relationships.
4. Bring joy into life: Depression often leads to decreased self-esteem or even self-abandonment. People who are prone to depression are often kind, considerate of others, altruistic, but they tend to undervalue themselves, belittle themselves, and refuse the happiness they deserve. Even when their mood is normal, they always feel they are not qualified for happiness. They believe they don't deserve joy and always prioritize the needs of others over their own. Many parents are like this. They place their children's needs far above their own, leaving no time or space for themselves.
5. Don't put all your eggs in one basket: There are no smooth sailing things in the world. Everyone will encounter situations where work or certain aspects of work progress poorly, or marital conflicts arise, or personal hobbies aren't satisfied, or life seems filled with various problems. Therefore, if you tie all your self-esteem to one aspect of life, you will definitely become very vulnerable. Review your history of depression; was it closely related to the progress of a particular aspect of your life? For example, did you feel down when work wasn't going well? If your depressive process is indeed closely related to a specific aspect of your life, it indicates that you might be too focused on just one thing.