Wellbeing during Covid 19

It is always important to look after your mental health, but this is especially true during Covid 19. These ideas may help you. Adapt the advice to suit you.

1.Connecting with others is so important for our wellbeing and helps to make us feel safer, less stressed and less anxious.

Some ideas to connect include: going for a walk with a friend, joining your local craft or sports club. Being more active in your local Deaf club. Pick one source of news you trust (like the official COVID-19 website) and check it once per day. If you want to keep checking in with news coverage, take notice of how it makes you feel and set time limits or restrict your news sources to just one or two if you need to.

2. Take Notice. Notice the beauty in the world around you. Take time to feel the sun on your skin, breathe in fresh air, make a list of what you’re grateful for. Take the time to thank someone for how they make you feel, either in person or via Zoom or online. Paying more attention to the present moment, to thoughts and feelings and to the world around, boosts our wellbeing.

3. Be Active. Being physically active, including at work, improves physical health and can improve mood and wellbeing and decrease stress, depression and anxiety. Getting outside and exercising is good for your overall health and wellbeing and strengthens your connection with nature. You don’t have to run a marathon to Be Active. Routines sound dull, but they’re good for our mental health. Try to go to sleep and wake up at the same time, eat at regular times, shower, change your clothes, do your chores.

Use the stairs instead of the lift, get off the bus one stop earlier, join a local sports club, , do some gardening – find whatever physical activity you enjoy, and try to do it as often as possible!

4.Give. Give your time, your words and your presence. Carrying out acts of kindness, whether small or large, can increase happiness, life satisfaction and general sense of wellbeing.

Give compliments, think about a skill you have you could share with your whānau, check in on neighbours and members of your community who may need a helping hand.

5. Keep Learning.

Being curious and seeking out new experiences in life positively stimulates the brain.

Staying curious and engaging with the world around you is a great way to uplift your wellbeing. Pick a question you’ve always wondered about and take some time to research it. Contact your parents or grandparents and ask them questions about life when they were growing up. Research your whakapapa or family tree. Ask your tamariki/kids to teach you something they learned at kura/school.