Beating the January Blues

For many years I suffered with the January Blues.  The hustle and bustle of December and the excitement leading up to Christmas, family time and the events associated around the holidays, all gave me reason to get up each morning in anticipation of the season.  However, once the family events were over, the blues would set in.  Knowing that the days would be filled with less excitement and the thought of going back to work and having to get back into the same old routine didn't help my state of mind.  Some years the sun rarely shone and grey skies prevailed. 

When I didn't have a creative outlet, it was very hard for me to cope.  I would sleep Sundays away, dreading having to go to work the next day.  Like a lot of people, Mondays were often my sick days.   Not physically sick, but emotionally sick. I would lay there trying to psych myself up and decide whether or not it was worth taking the day off or not, or if I should plug through and pretend everything was all right.

When I first began to express myself through art, I drew on loose pieces of paper. 

Looking back now, I can tell I was really unhappy and wanted someone else to acknowledge my depression.  Being a perfectionist, back then I would never admit that things were bothering me.  I didn't want to seem weak.  Perusing my pages, I can also tell that I had immense job dissatisfaction, but I didn't have the courage to change that.  I bounced around from one position to another, but still having to deal with the same things that bothered me each day.  Feeling powerless about my dad's illness bothered me far deeper than I realized.

Then eventually, years later,  I graduated to a visual journal.  My pages were a lot more simplified than they are now, but my reflections did help me to manage my emotions through the dark times of January.  I chose blue for my backgrounds and drew simple images to symbolically represent my state of mind.  It always baffled me and still does, that others didn't know or didn't bother to acknowledge they knew that I was depressed. 

 Yes, I still have certain days when I am in the dumps, but I now longer feel it on a daily basis.  I have realized that if I feel out of sorts, that that is my body and mind telling me that I need to create and get what ever is bothering me out of me and onto the paper. After I have done this, I feel a sense of relief and can often identify what is really bothering and what I need to move forward.  I have learned that I can conquer the January Blues instead of it conquering me.

If you would like to learn how to conquer your January blues, I would love to show you the processes I go through to do this.  You will be happier, healthier and feel more creative and able to face your days with a more positive mindset.