Why Blue Monday is the most depressing day of the year and how to overcome it

From standard.co.uk

Follow our tips to help you beat those January blues and lift your spirits

The excitement of Christmas has come to an end, and we’ve all returned to our routines, with sunnier days still feeling so far away.

It’s no wonder that January can feel particularly tough, particularly because it’s the month with "Blue Monday”, falling on January 20 this year.

But what if you don’t want to be overwhelmed by a wave of sadness in the coming weeks?

Follow our tips to help you beat those January blues and lift your spirits.

What is Blue Monday?

The term "Blue Monday" was coined by a UK travel company, Sky Travel, as a marketing ploy to encourage people to book holidays for something to look forward to. They first introduced the concept in a press release in 2005, using it as a strategy to help people beat the winter blues by planning a getaway later in the year.

Sky Travel labelled Blue Monday as the "most depressing day of the year," as it often coincides with financial struggles, less-than-ideal weather, and the failure of New Year’s resolutions — leading to a collective low mood. Blue Monday typically falls on the third Monday of January each year, though it has occasionally landed on the second or fourth Monday instead.

The darker winter months can coincide with suffering from seasonal affective disorder (SAD)

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How to beat Blue Monday

The darker winter months can often coincide with struggles from seasonal affective disorder (SAD), a condition linked to changes in seasons. If you find yourself feeling more down in January, there are several ways to lift your spirits and combat the "Blue Monday" blues.

Various treatments are available for SAD, including cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT), antidepressants, and light therapy. The NHS advises making sure you are getting enough sleep, and adequate exposure to sunlight during the day. It recommends maximising natural light by keeping your work and home environments bright and airy, and positioning yourself near windows and doors whenever you are indoors.

Regular exercise is particularly important, especially when done outdoors and in daylight, as it can significantly improve your mood. Additionally, maintaining a healthy and balanced diet can help boost your immune system during the winter months, keeping you from falling ill.

Psychologist Marina Pacini suggests that aside from physical activities, there are mental and emotional strategies that can help alleviate feelings of sadness. She explains on the OpenUp mental health website: “New Year is often associated with many expectations. While meaningful resolutions can provide guidance, it’s important to focus on the process and daily progress, rather than just the final outcome.”

“The holidays are generally a joyful time we look forward to, but once they’re over, it can feel like a sudden shift back to normal,” she adds. In addition to maintaining a healthy lifestyle, she recommends making sure to socialise with friends and family, and most importantly, being kind to yourself.

Ms Pacini also suggests taking up new habits, such as keeping a diary or meditation, to help create moments of reflection and mindfulness. Remember: the journey is as important as the destination.

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/blue-monday-most-depressing-day-b1204772.html 

How to Start and Keep a Journal

From nytimes.com

Tips from writers, artists and a social worker that might make the practice less daunting 

It’s a familiar story: You buy a beautiful notebook, intent on starting a journal, only for it to sit untouched for years. While the benefits of journal-keeping are well established — it “can raise levels of optimism and life satisfaction,” says the psychology researcher Justine Richelle, 25, and strengthen creative writing skills (“The lines between what I write for myself and what I will ultimately write for publication are pretty blurred,” says the novelist Pico Iyer, 67) — that knowledge doesn’t necessarily make the blank page less intimidating. Here, a handful of long-time journal-keepers share advice that may inspire you to try again and stick with it.

Consider why you’re writing.

If you’re just starting out, what do you hope to gain? You might want to record memories, untangle your thoughts or lay the foundations for a new creative project. For the writer and actress Tavi Gevinson, 28, a journal “is a place to dump psychic garbage,” she says, and to leave “notes for my future self. It reminds me that there’ll be a future where I’ll feel differently.” Iyer, who’s kept a journal for almost 50 years, sees the practice as “looking at the sky within yourself.” He meticulously logs his days, capturing little details like a song playing in the background to “fix” memories. If one goal is boosting your mood, the social worker Amy Krentzman, 60, who’s developed a journaling method for people in recovery, suggests listing “all the good things that happened in the past day,” things you’re grateful for that “you normally take for granted,” as well as “good wishes for others.”

Don’t be too precious about how your journal looks.

                                                                                                                          Ilya Milstein

When the filmmaker Albert Moya, 35, needs a new diary, he grabs whatever’s nearby — hotel notebooks being a favourite because “they remind you where you were at that time,” he says. Iyer uses Southworth’s 24-pound, loose-leaf, unlined A4 paper, which he organizes in “endless folders.” Gevinson likes journals from Season Paper, Cambridge Imprint and Midori but encourages those new to journaling to “use a legal pad if it helps you feel less pressure.” You can also keep a digital journal: The journalist and T writer at large Aatish Taseer, 44, recommends Day One, an app he uses to colour-code his notes when he’s traveling.

Find a pen you like.

Krentzman suggests “experimenting with different kinds of pens and paper” until you land on a combination that “gives you some tactile enjoyment.” Iyer gravitates toward fine-tipped Pilot Razor Point markers. Gevinson uses .38-millimeter Pilot G2 and Muji ballpoints. Moya loves a hotel pen. When you find a model you like, buy it in bulk so you always have spares.

Find a time of day that works.

Mornings and evenings are often best. Gevinson journals while having coffee just after waking. Moya writes at his desk before or after a morning workout. When he’s traveling, Iyer finds time in the evenings. Krentzman recommends putting your phone away or switching it to airplane mode while you write.

                                                                                                                     Ilya Milstein

There’s no one way to write an entry.

If you’re at a loss, try beginning each entry the same way. “I always start with where I am and the time,” says Moya. From there, try stream-of-consciousness writing, jotting down feelings and thoughts as they arise, or answering open-ended questions like: What’s been on my mind lately? Or, What’s sparked my curiosity recently? If you’re looking for a more specific prompt, Gevinson recommends “the ‘Audre Lorde Questionnaire [to Oneself]’ or a tarot reading or the I Ching.” You can also just list interesting or funny moments from the day. Above all else, Moya says, try “to not judge yourself when you’re writing.”

It’s OK to miss days — or even years.

For almost a decade, Taseer stopped writing a journal. “I was just not drawn to it,” he says. He cautions those new to the practice to “not go about it like homework. Let the journal call you.” When Gevinson misses a day, she simply starts again the next. “The point is not to have a record of each day. In fact, you can use a journal to decide if you want to measure time by a day or week or month,” she says. “You can change your relationship to time.”

Try less expected approaches.

Recently Moya started writing notes that he calls “postcards” to himself, when he’s working on a film. Gevinson has tried many techniques, she says: collaging mementos, drawing comics, typing notes on a computer and even recording “audio diaries when I need to talk stuff out and don’t want to subject a friend to it.” After trips, the novelist Maggie Shipstead, 41, edits together videos and photos into short montages set to music. They feel like “chapter markers,” she says. “I think when you’re living your life, it can be hard to step back and sort of look at the arc of it,” and the videos “take me back to those moments of change and growth.”

https://www.nytimes.com/article/journaling-tips.html

Why keeping a journal helps chronicle the past and provide hope for the future

From dailybreeze.com

By Patricia Bunin

As the past threads to the present, the eye of the needle either grows larger to allow in new hope or smaller to keep out the misdeeds of times past. While “Goodbye, good riddance, old year” is a comfortable knee-jerk reaction to a tough year, I caution myself not to throw out the baby with the bathwater, as the saying reminds.

Even when the baby is throwing a temper tantrum, there remains the possibility of enlightenment.

I have kept journals for most of my life. Some were in formal diaries, like the locked ones I had when I was a teenager, with covers sporting replicas of faces smiling, a surreptitious warning not to write on its pages if one was unhappy. These provoked guilt about most of the things a teenage girl might want to write about.

Maybe that was the reason for the thin faux leather strap that snapped into a lock when the diary was closed and needed a key to reopen. A snip of the scissors would also have gained entry into the secrets within, but I convinced myself that no one would dare enter without permission. And just in case, the key was hidden in a small jewellery case in my dresser drawer.

                                                                              My dear diary. (Getty Images)

In later years, I kept my thoughts in spiral notebooks allowing me to rip out a written page and pretend that part of my life never existed. However, most of the time I would fold the discarded pages and tuck them into the pockets of the notebook. It was as though someone whispered, “Just because it is sad doesn’t make it bad.”

Eventually, I graduated to lined yellow pads and finally a reporter’s notebook with occasional notes on napkins in between. I kept more of my written thoughts as I developed an awareness of their possible value to me. While some of them became seeds of stories I wrote and published, many in this column, I discovered a more significant reason for respecting my thoughts in the time frame in which I recorded them.

They are a reminder of what is possible. Reading my own words about disappointment when a story was rejected made it all the sweeter when one was accepted. From disenchantment to surviving illness and loss, the journals became my blueprint from “I can’t do this” to “Maybe I can” to “I did it.” I’m still stuck on many “Maybe I cans,” but I have developed a strong reverence for possibility. 

So as I thread my needle for the new year, I need the eye to be large enough to accommodate my journals of mishaps and made betters, my reminders that hope still hangs in the air.

https://www.dailybreeze.com/2025/01/05/why-keeping-a-journal-helps-chronicle-the-past-and-provide-hope-for-the-future/ 

The Would-Be Diarist

From theamericanconservative.com

By Peter Tonguette

I have reached the point in life in which most of the Christmas gifts I get are ones I have gotten for myself. Consequently, I approach the task with a certain unsentimental efficiency. The question is less what I want than what I need: a new sweater, a better overcoat, a smarter wristwatch. To acquire these items at Christmastime adds a certain jolliness to what would otherwise be practical purchases.

This Christmas, however, I took the liberty of giving myself a Christmas gift that was less a reflection of a nagging need than an expression of a wish for myself for the coming year: that, after a lifetime of trying, I could turn myself into a writer who maintains a daily diary.

Among the little stack of presents waiting for me after church services Wednesday morning was a “ledger book” from the leading journal and stationary maker, Levenger. Bound in cloth, the book holds 200 sturdy ruled pages whose vast blankness cry out to be filled with their owner’s thoughts—and their owner now is me.

From Flannery O’Connor to Dawn Powell, many of my favourite writers kept diaries, though few can claim greater steadfastness in the practice than Herman Wouk. The author of The Caine Mutiny, Youngblood Hawke, and The Winds of War had long been one of my favourite modern American novelists, but he jumped to the front of the pack when he revealed, in a memoir published when he was 100, that he had been maintaining a diary for most of those years. 

“Until recently I kept a frank private diary, which ran to more than a hundred bound volumes,” Wouk wrote in Sailor and Fiddler: Reflections of a 100-Year-Old Author. “It will remain private. Call it my nature, or a pose, or what you will, the adjective often attached to my name has been ‘reclusive.’ Now it must stand.”

I remember savouring those words: one hundred bound volumes. That Wouk could document his daily joys and woes with such constancy—and with no expectation that they would ever be made public—was an inspiration for someone who has been, his entire life, a reluctant and often failed diary-keeper. (I should note that Wouk’s assertion that the diaries will “remain” private is not entirely accurate: The author, who died in 2019 at age 103, gave his diaries to the Library of Congress, though, according to the Finding Aid to the Wouk collection, access to them is restricted until 2039.)

As for myself, I could never muster the candour to write for myself and myself alone, so my infrequent and entirely unsuccessful attempts at diary-keeping have consisted of self-conscious, self-important entries obviously meant to be read by some future reader—a frankly hilarious notion for a little-known writer of arts criticism and chronicler of the passing political scene. 

Later, the reasons for my reticence shifted. As a professional writer, I found myself constitutionally incapable of putting pen to paper without the promise of a paycheck. I even find it difficult to write a piece on “spec”—that is, without the go-ahead from an editor at a fine publication such as The American Conservative and thus without the assurance of remuneration—so the idea that I would take the time away from my paying work to write for myself was anathema. 

Apart from elementary school journals that were assigned and graded by the teacher (and thus not real journals at all), the first diary I tried to keep was a notable failure. It, too, began with a Christmas present: When I was 13, my parents gave me a beautiful leather-bound diary book. I endeavoured to fill it, but for months, I filled it with quotations by favourite authors. The diary became not a repository for my own thoughts but a collection of creeds by others. I took most of the quotes from Jill Krementz’s photography book The Writer’s Desk—itself a gift that same Christmas, which meant I was essentially transcribing the wisdom from one book I owned to another book I owned. I still remember some of the quotes I copied into my diary, including this one by novelist William Styron, speaking of the labours of his trade: “I get a fine warm feeling when I’m doing well, but that pleasure is pretty much negated by the pain of getting started each day. Let’s face it, writing is hell.” Indeed.

Yet some diary-keeping instinct stayed with me. About 25 years ago, I began keeping a record of every movie I saw in a movie theatre. I’m sorry to report that this diary is not an actual diary but a mere Word document that has survived multiple computer crashes and software upgrades, but it still constitutes something of a guide through my life in motion pictures. The first movie I noted having seen was Terrence Malick’s The Thin Red Line, which I saw at a local multiplex on January 16, 1999. I saw Ernst Lubitsch’s The Shop Around the Corner on December 6, 2003, Alfred Hitchcock’s Saboteur on June 15, 2005, and Leo McCarey’s The Awful Truth on July 22, 2009—you get the idea. The most recent movie I saw was Clint Eastwood’s Juror #2 earlier this month. (December 2, to be exact.) Alas, even this ersatz diary was not even my idea: I began keeping the log after reading that the moviemaker Peter Bogdanovich (What’s Up, Doc?, Paper Moon) had accumulated a massive “card file” of every movie he saw as an adolescent and young man. Clearly I had a need to memorialize things, but how to memorialize my own life rather than the movies I saw or books I read?

My diary-keeping remained a notable failure until the last 12 months, when, after the death of my mother, I found myself jotting down thoughts, impressions, memories in whatever vessel happened to be near me at my desk: a daily calendar, a small notebook ostensibly used for story ideas. This habit convinced me that, maybe, I was finally ready to keep a diary for real.

If I can maintain the habit with anything like the faithfulness of Herman Wouk, I already know what I am giving myself next Christmas.

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/the-would-be-diarist/ 

Forget those resolutions – take 15 minutes to look BACK and it'll change your life

From dailymail.co.uk/pressreader.com

NOT long to go now. Soon all the shopping will be done, the presents wrapped, the food prepared and then, if you’re lucky, you might have a few minutes to sit down and relax over the next few weeks. If so – and I very much hope that this is the case – why not spend a bit of time looking back and thinking about what you’re grateful for?

People tend to think the end of the year is about looking forward: New Year’s resolutions, change, a fresh start. Why look back? I’m often surprised how many people say: ‘I’ll be pleased when the year is over’ – as though it’s something you should turn your back on and not think about again.

Of course, some will have had a tough year. There will have been setbacks, upsets and maybe even tragedies. But for most, there will have been good things, too. Even if someone has had a very difficult time with a bereavement, say, there will be some positive, heart-warming or life-affirming moments too – perhaps the way friends rallied around or a partner supported you. If we only focus on the future, determined to look forward and put difficult experiences behind us, we risk missing these little gems.

In consigning the whole year to the waste bin of life as an annus horribilis we don’t get to see the glimmers of goodness that were probably also there.

THE strength of our memories tends to be closely related to the strength of the feelings attached to them, particularly in the case of negative emotions. This means we remember things that provoked strong reactions much more vividly than others. It’s very normal to find a few upsetting events dominating our memory of a year, while the lesser, but enjoyable things, fade or are forgotten.

This is why I always recommend keeping a journal. We often forget all the moments of fun and joy we had, despite everything else that might have happened. I’m not talking about a Bridget Jones-style diary with endless entries covering all your thoughts and worries. It’s actually enough to have an old fashioned datebook or calendar with a record of the things you did, where you went, people you saw. If you don’t have a physical diary, maybe you keep notes on your social engagements in your phone calendar? If so, I highly recommend that, in the time between Christmas and New Year, you spend a few hours just flicking through it, remembering everything you did.

You’ll be surprised how many fun, interesting and enjoyable things you’ve done over the year, and simply forgotten. The reality is, if we don’t reflect, we don’t get to be grateful. Finding the good things in the rubble of life often doesn’t come easily. Sometimes you have to force yourself to spot them – and to say thank you.

Psychologists call it ‘gratitude therapy’ and it helps you focus on the positives in your life. It comes out of a branch of psychotherapy called ‘positive psychology’ which has become increasingly popular in recent years.

It’s quite a shift from traditional psychotherapeutic approaches which tend to focus on the problems that someone has in their life. Positive psychology, in contrast, makes the focus of the work about exploring what is going right in someone’s life and thinking about the things they can be grateful for.

It is an important weapon in the arsenal to tackle life’s difficulties. Countless studies have shown a robust association between high levels of gratitude and long-term mental wellbeing.

It is thought to work on several levels. By focusing on the positive, we reduce toxic emotions such as anger, frustration, envy and regret.

Research has shown that saying ‘thank you’ to the people in your life helps solidify friendships and form new relationships, meaning people have better social networks. This in turn helps to stave off loneliness and improve mood. It also helps to improve empathy and decreases interpersonal conflict.

Showing gratitude for someone who made an impact (however small) in your life over the year doesn’t have to involve getting them a lavish present. Often something as simple as a phone call to wish them a Happy Christmas or a Christmas card with a thoughtful message written in it is all that’s needed.

It shows you thought about them, that you remember and appreciate them. We all know how good it feels to be on the receiving end of that.

AND it’s not just something you can do in the brief bit of downtime at the end of the year. Advocates of gratitude therapy recommend people make a conscious decision to set aside a block of time a day – say, 15 minutes – during which you reflect on the positive things in your life. The key is to really think about everything you are grateful for, which is why it’s recommended that you actually write it down, rather than just cycling through a list in your mind. The act of putting pen to paper provides a physical, tangible focus.

It’s also very helpful if you find yourself having an overwhelming negative emotion or thought. Pull out your list and remind yourself that not everything in life is bad – even if it might feel like that at times. I hope you find many things to feel grateful about this season.

https://www.pressreader.com/uk/daily-mail/20241223/282127822086939