Three Quick Ways to Improve Your Mood

Feeling Down? Need a Quick Pick-Me-Up to Improve Your Mood? We’ve got you Covered.

Understandably, many people nowadays are feeling anxious and stressed, but if you’re sick of feeling down, there is something you can do about it. A recent study found that 89 per cent of people think that their happiness can be controlled— which means most people’s beliefs align with the latest research in positive psychology.

To back this up, researchers went one step further and assessed respondents’ subjective wellbeing level. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the people who believe they have control over their happiness were 32 per cent happier than those who didn’t think that happiness can be controlled. The average happiness rating given by participants who think happiness was controllable was 7.39, as opposed to 5.61.

As happiness and its benefits are something we could all use right now, here are some quick ways to circuit break a bad day.

3 Ways to Improve Your Mood

Here are 3 ways to improve your mood in less than 10-minutes.

1. Have Some fun

It’s time to channel your inner child, cut loose, and be silly.

As we get older, we get caught up in being productive and successful.  We become more self-conscious, and playing feels silly, unproductive and time-wasting. Play is delegated to something that’s only for kids.

However, play has many benefits, including improved stress management and wellbeing, and helping to improve your mood. One study found that people who engaged in leisure activities were 34 per cent less stressed and 18 per cent less sad than those who did not. Even more interestingly, the activity didn’t matter, as long as it was something the subject found pleasure in doing.

Here’s how

There are many ways you can bring play and silliness into your life. Here’s one that might work for you. Explain the science to your friends or family and ask them to join you in a silly dance-off. Put on some fun music (throw caution to the wind and make it loud too) and take turns doing dance moves. The people in the group have to guess which decade the dance move is from. Whoever guesses right goes next.

Here’s some inspiration (you could put these on pieces of paper and draw from a hat):

• 50s – Hand Jive, Cha Cha
• 60s – The Twist, The Swim, The Mash Potato
• 70s – YMCA, Funky Chicken, The Nutbush, Lawnmower, Sprinkler
• 80s – Moonwalk, Electric Slide, The Worm, Breakdancing, The Robot
• 90s – Running Man, Hammer Time, Macarena, Vogue
• 2000s – Single Ladies (Beyonce), Krump, The Dougie, Cha Cha Slide
• 2010s – Gangnam style, Harlem Shake, The Floss, The Stanky Leg

If you want to up to up the difficulty level, make people guess the name of the dance, not the decade.

2. Put a Pen in Your Mouth

Research from the University of South Australia shows that the act of smiling can trick your mind into being more positive. In the study, a smile was induced by participants holding a pen between their teeth, forcing their facial muscles to replicate the movement of a smile. The researchers discovered that the facial muscular activity led to positive emotions.

“When your muscles say you’re happy, you’re more likely to see the world around you in a positive way,” said Lead researcher and Human and Artificial Cognition expert, Dr. Fernando Marmolejo-Ramos.

“In our research we found that when you forcefully practice smiling, it stimulates the amygdala—the emotional center of the brain—which releases neurotransmitters to encourage an emotionally positive state. For mental health, this has interesting implications. If we can trick the brain into perceiving stimuli as ‘happy’, then we can potentially use this mechanism to help boost mental health,” said Marmolejo-Ramos.

Here’s How

Like a dog with a bone, put a pen or pencil between your teeth and then pull back your lips to show your top and bottom teeth. Hold this for 30 seconds. That’s it!

If you’re feeling like being social, do this with friends. It becomes even funnier, often making you truly smile, and of course, helping to improve your mood.

3. The 5-Minute Exercise Intervention

We all know that exercise is good for us physically, but it’s also really good for our brains, releasing feel-good chemicals and helping us to get rid of the stress chemicals. A recent study also showed that exercise helps fuel positive emotions, even during these uncertain times.

“The tie between time spent on these sorts of activities and positive states was particularly strong for people who felt more of the negatives states,” she continued. “So, the more stressed, anxious, lonely or depressed you are, the more it matters that you take the time to exercise and care for yourself,” said Barbara L. Frederickson, the Kenan Distinguished Professor in the UNC-Chapel Hill Department of Psychology and Neuroscience and Director of the PEP lab.

Here’s how

The point here is to get your heart beating faster, even if it’s just for a few minutes. So rather than trying to boil the ocean, start small – you’re also more likely to do an activity if it’s relatively quick and easy.

STEP 1: Set a timer for 5 minutes.

STEP 2: See how many times you can get through the below series of exercises.

• 10 jumping jacks
• 10 lunges (5 each leg)
• 20 calf-raises
• 10 squats
• 10 push-ups (you can do these on your knees, or against the wall)
• 5 knee-high jumps
• 30 seconds of rest

STEP 3: Congratulate yourself on getting in some exercise and boosting your mood!

If you’re feeling up for a bit more exercise (only 20 minutes), you can try The ‘No Excuses’ Beginners Exercise Plan.

Related reading: The Secret to Surviving Isolation

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