30-Day Mental Health Challenge: Part III

How’s the 30-day mental health challenge going? If you’ve been following along, then you’re a couple of weeks into it. You’ve probably missed a day or two of the challenge here or there, and that’s okay. You’re still making a huge step toward improving your mental health by participating! What have you learned so far?

Remember, this mental health challenge is designed to help you

• Move from thinking about changing to actually changing
• Practice the skills you’ve picked up from all your research
• Discover new strategies for managing your mental health
• Establish a habit of focusing on your mental health on a regular basis

If you missed the first couple of weeks, no problem! Head back to the details for the first 7 days here and follow along from there.

Keep This In Mind As You’re Doing the Challenge

If you’re having trouble keeping up your momentum, review the tips for success with the challenge. Here are the highlights:

• This is a mental health challenge, not a self-care challenge
• Most of these strategies aren’t a quick fix
• There’s no good time to start, so start today
• You don’t have to complete the challenge in 30 days

If you need a refresher on those tips, grab that here.

If you’re ready for the next installment of the challenge, let’s get started with week 3.  For a summary of what you’ll be up to all 30 days, grab this PDF download. 

Here are more details on your tasks for the next 7 days.

30-Day Mental Health Challenge: Part III

Day 15 (February 21, 2021): Check In On Your Habits

Day 15 is the halfway point of our 30-day mental health challenge. So it’s time to regroup and check in on some of the goals you’ve been working toward. On Day 2, you identified your personal and mental health goals. And then on Days 3 and 4, you determined what habits would be helpful to break and what habits would be helpful to add to help you improve your mental health.

How are those habits going? If you’ve been able to keep up with them, even semi-consistently, for the past 2 weeks — CONGRATULATIONS! That’s seriously an extraordinary achievement.

If you’ve had trouble getting it going, no worries! Habits are notoriously hard to add and remove. Make sure you grab the PDF worksheets to help yourself figure out what to do differently moving forward:

Take a few minutes today to review what interfered with your success over the past couple of weeks and establish a plan to try a different approach during the second half of the 30-day mental health challenge.

Day 16 (February 22, 2021): Learn How to Manage Worrying

Are you a worrier? When we’re anxious or uncertain about actual problems in our lives…or even potential problems….some of us allow our minds to dwell on those problems. This can interfere with your concentration, sleep, and overall wellbeing.

Today’s your chance to practice an evidence-based strategy for combatting worry. It’s called Worry Postponement. Find all the details about what Worry Postponement is, how it works, and how to do it here. Make sure you grab the worksheet to practice the skill — it doesn’t work if you don’t use it, and this challenge is all about using your skills!

Day 17 (February 23, 2021): Unwind After Work

On Day 12 of the 30-day mental health challenge, you practiced a strategy for getting motivated after work. Today’s challenge is another after-work challenge. Today, your challenge is to learn how to unwind after work.

Here are 7 proven strategies for unwinding after work. Review the list and choose one to practice today. While you’re there, grab the checklist so you’ll have it handy for future days when you need to unwind after work (Hint: That should be every day…).

Day 18 (February 24, 2021): Start Fixing Burnout

Burnout is becoming a serious issue, and it’s one we’ve got to address. Whether you’re burned out at your job or with your home life or with your life in general, most of us are burning out somewhere. And if I’m honest with you, the burnout problem is really not your problem — it’s a problem with our culture.

We certainly need to be addressing the bigger issue, but that’s not something we can do in a 30-day mental health challenge. So your challenge today is to address how you respond to the bigger issue. Your challenge is to change the thoughts that contribute to burnout. Do you hear thoughts like these running through your head?

• Nothing I’m doing works
• I can’t do anything right
• My kids never listen
• My husband never helps out

These thoughts contribute to burnout, so today is your chance to learn how to swap those thoughts out for thoughts that are less burdensome. I walk you through exactly how to do it here. Make sure you grab the worksheet to see examples and practice with your own thoughts.

For even more on burnout, these articles might be helpful:

• Identify Your Burnout Stressors (free download)
• 44 Signs of Lifestyle Burnout + 9 Key Differences Between Stress & Burnout (free download)
• How I Avoid Lifestyle Burnout With 3 Unregrettable Things (free download)
• 7 Ways to Fix Burnout Now (free download)

Day 19 (February 25, 2021): Try a New Stress Relief Strategy

You probably know lots of ways to relieve stress, but do you use those strategies? Today’s your chance to practice a new stress relief strategy. It’s even better if that strategy is research-proven to relieve stress. Head to this article, where I walk you through 6 proven stress-relief activities, and choose one to try today.

Day 20 (February 26, 2021): Do a Social Media Detox

Just for a day (unless you want to go longer!), challenge yourself to detox from social media. No posting, no scrolling, no “I’m just keeping up with the news” (you know the real news isn’t on social media…). Get the apps off your phone’s home screen to reduce temptation. And head to this article for ideas about 6 things to do during your social media detox.

Day 21 (February 27, 2021): Practice Positive Self-Talk

If you read my articles, I know you hear some pretty nasty self-talk in your head from time to time. And positive self-talk is legitimately hard. Luckily, research has given us several strategies to break the habit of negative self-talk and start making a habit of more positive self-talk. Getting good at those strategies will help boost self-esteem and build confidence.

Here’s your challenge for today: Head to this article and choose one of the 17 strategies for practicing positive self-talk. Then — DO IT.

30-Day Mental Health Challenge: Part IV

How did it go this week? You worked really hard to keep this challenge going! Congratulations! Remember, even if it takes you more than 7 days to get through these 7 days of challenges, you’re still showing your commitment to improving your mental health. What an accomplishment! Next week, I’ll be back with the details for the rest of the challenge. You’re almost done!!! Don’t miss it.

In the meantime, for a summary of what you’ll be up to all 30 days, grab this PDF download. 

Talk to you soon,

Dr. Finch

P.S.    Remember, this is education, not treatment.  Always consult with a psychologist or therapist about your mental health to determine what information and interventions are best for you.  See the disclaimer for more details.