Tips to apply mindfulness during work for World Suicide Prevention Day
Friday, September 10 is World Suicide Prevention Day. If you’ve never heard of it before you may be wondering what it entails.
Well, read on and we’ll let you know, along with tips on how to boost mindfulness during your working day.
Before you do that though, it’s worth noting that more than 700,000 die through suicide every year according to figures from the World Health Organisation. It’s the fourth leading cause of death in 15-19-year-olds.
And it tends to hit the poorest members of society most:
@WHO: “Suicide does not just occur in high-income countries, but is a global phenomenon in all regions of the world. In fact, over 77% of global suicides occurred in low- and middle-income countries in 2019.”
Watch the news, but not relentlessly
It’s good to keep up-to-date with what’s happening in the world. But, by its very nature, news tends to be negative and really quite tragic at times. ‘Happy’ and ‘good’ news tend to be put at the end of a bulletin as a type of feature story.
So, give yourself a break every now and again and go and watch a comedy or read a light-hearted book that makes you laugh instead.
Get exercising – physically
Exercise is a brilliant way to increase happiness. That’s because running, jumping, skipping, swimming, stretching – it all releases endorphins (or ‘happiness chemicals’) in our brain. These chemicals increase our sense of pleasure and even decrease any physical pain we might be experiencing.
Not only that, but exercise can also have another kind of mental impact on us by making us feel positive which, in turn, can lead to higher feelings of self-esteem.
Keep up your favourite past times
You engage in past times not because you have to do them but because you want to. And like them. So, keep at them, regardless of how stressed or down you feel.
That means continue to paint, do jigsaw puzzles, cook, write – basically whatever makes you happy.
Sleep well
Ah, sleep – the panacea to all evil. Or at least that’s what it feels like when you can’t get it. Having a regular bedtime is important for getting into a good, healthy sleeping cycle. Waking up early and getting up – rather than staying in bed for another couple of hours and dozing off – is important too.
Is your bedroom a good temperature? Too hot or too cold and it can cause problems in dropping off. Having a hot bath beforehand is good for calming you down and putting you into a restful state before bed. So too is a hot drink.
Stick to a routine
Many of us have been working from home for more than a year now. That can be great in terms of avoiding the commute, but it often proves lonely and isolating too.
It can also be easy to fall in sloppy ways in terms of dress and time setting. But try not to fall into those traps. Instead, get up as you normally would when physically going into work, always take a set lunch break and try to communicate with the others via Zoom, Skype etc.