Depression can hit any of us at any time. If you work for yourself you can’t allow depression to get in the way. This is why self- treatment for depression can be an important tool in your business life.

First off, there’s no magic cure! Depression - or being low, down or however else you describe it - can hit you at any time with no apparent reason. The way back to a normal, energetic and happy life can also vary, depending on personalities and circumstances.

Here are some of the major techniques I teach my coaching clients to use. Among them you are likely to find effective solutions for you.

Firstly, Exercise! Yes I know everybody tells you this - it’s supposedly the answer for everything. What exercise does is to burn off excess adrenalin and stress hormones. “But surely self-employed people don’t get stressed!” I hear you cry. We love having every problem landing on our shoulders don’t we?

So how much exercise do you have to do? Although there’s no specific answer I can give you right now, a guideline would be around 20 minutes a day. This doesn’t have to be done at the gym, it can just be brisk walking. How you work out what’s right for you is how you feel. You may find you don’t need to do it every day, but do pay attention to what’s happening, and after a couple of weeks you’re likely to find the right amount that works best for you and fits in with your lifestyle.

Daily laughter - and I don’t mean when the Inland Revenue slaps you with a ridiculous bill! Laughter releases good hormones into your bloodstream. In fact smiling goes a long way towards it.

These good hormones make you feel good, relax you, and allow you to be happier. So if you have daily laughter, what you’ll find is that things get easier, you’re less stressed, you become more productive, and your energy levels rise.

Speak to yourself nicely! Yes we all talk to ourselves inside our heads. It’s only when we talk out loud and people start to look at us strangely that it becomes a problem!

If you’re normal, and odds are that you are (sorry about that) sometimes you’ll find yourself talking to yourself in less than charitable terms. If somebody else talked to you in the way you sometimes talk to yourself, you’d certainly get annoyed with them and you wouldn’t want that person around.

Take the time to change what you say to yourself. Instead of saying “ I’ve failed at that” try saying “I’ve learned how not to do that now so I can do it differently next time.” Instead of getting annoyed with yourself, you could talk to yourself about all the things you can do well.

Practice mindfulness. This is what we’re seeing happen more and more in the business world. Mindfulness is about paying attention to your own thinking. After all - you are not your thoughts. You can change your thoughts and by just observing them you have the choice to change what you’re thinking.

Mindfulness has been shown to be one of the most effective approaches for preventing the re-occurrence of bouts of depression. Just find somebody who can teach you how to do it in the right way for you.

Eradicate overwhelm. Some people can find themselves very depressed when they feel overwhelmed. In simple terms, to deal with overwhelm only do what you can do and get somebody else to do the rest - but first - make sure that the thing actually needs doing! It always amazes me how many tasks that seem so desperately urgent, turn out later to be irrelevant. It would be nice to think carefully about these tasks before they consume our energy.

Build a compelling future. If you take the time to build a compelling future for yourself, you’ll end up doing what you want to do, in a way you want to do it, and enjoying it. This will start to feed energy into your system. If you take the time to put the plan together, determining how you’re going to get from here to there, then this will give it a sense of reality for you.

Having a strong positive view of the future and knowing how you can get there can be one of the most powerful approaches to eradicating depression.

Good Nutrition can play an important part in self-treatment for depression. Numerous research studies have shown that things like fish oil, taken regularly, can be as effective as a mild anti-depressant. Because they’re not foreign chemicals in the body, they don’t have negative side-effects.

Another traditional self- treatment for depression is St John’s Wort - sometimes called the Sunshine Herb. Once again, numerous studies have shown that self-medication with St John’s Wort can be as effective as many of the milder anti-depressants. An important part of this strategy is self-medication, since when people feel depressed they can also feel loss of control. Controlling when supplements are taken can clearly put them back in control.

I appreciate that this is an incredibly brief article on some very powerful self-treatment techniques for depression. Hopefully it will act as a signpost to show you where you can look for further help.

[tags]Self-treatment for depression, treatment for depression, stress hormones, cure depression, self treatment, happy life, business life, adrenalin, lifestyle, energy levels, energy, Mindfulness, problem, guideline, stress, Depression, coaching, [/tags]