I’m having some personal issues causing some severe depression and anxiety. I’d like to get past this time as fast as possible, and my days are dragging on. I can’t sleep, which would be a good way to make time go fast. But I also can’t just play video games, I don’t have the motivation to play more than a few minutes and it also just makes me realize how alone I am with no friends or anyone I can connect with emotionally and I spiral into my anxiety and depression.
I can do stuff during the day, run, chores, etc. But as soon as I’m done, especially at night, I start freaking out and it seems like time stands still. Does anyone have any suggestions? Activities I can do that are mindless that will just kill time and get me through the night before I can just go to sleep?
I know this question is stupid but I’m looking for at least somewhat serious answers.
Get a job in building construction.
You work hard, you work together with people, you start your day early and you get tired in the evening.
Just fill your time by being the guy who replies “unfortunately this niche group of people I don’t belong to can’t use your advice” on every ask post reply. Some people really get a thrill out of it.
Like for instance if someone asks how they can stay hydrated and somebody replies water you could say “unfortunately some people don’t have access to clean water”, and then just let the upvotes roll in because it’s technically true. It’s going to make you feel worse in the short term because you’ll know what you’re doing, but you won’t recognize that right away or maybe ever so it’s probably a viable strategy for a month.
Unfortunately some people don’t have time to post that kind of bullshit on lemmy
Unfortunately some people don’t experience time as a near concept
Unfortunately time does not care about people
Time is the one true currency why do you want to waste it? Learn to program or run linux but donr have the goal of i gotta learn this have the goal of i wanna learn this so so i do xyz fun thing with it. I mean u could always get a mindless job and u would be earning money that why ur productively wasting time. Learn to cook good food. Go touch grass and walk hell just go have a shower and go stand in the sun. Work out doesnt need to be much. Let yourself get bored let yourself reflect and think escapism leads to hate leads to suffering leads to alcoholism leads to the dark side.
Make urself a checklist of thing to do every day. Not goals to achieve but things to do that will slowly work u towards those goals. Then aim to do more than yesterday dont stress it if u fail as long as u did soenthing.
As Jordan Peterson would say go clean up ur room and make your bed.
Learn to program
I’m a software engineer. I make really good money. I’m off work this week, but then next week, and also the weekends.
Go touch grass and walk
I run every day
Work out doesnt need to be much.
This actually is the problem for me. Running and working out actually help. But it only kills a couple hours, and then if I do more it’s not healthy and I’ll injure myself.
As Jordan Peterson would say go clean up ur room and make your bed.
Are you shitting me? You’re quoting jordan peterson?
Damn seems like u got most things covered great to hear. How about contributing to a foss project if u can handle doing that in ur work break.
Just cos he is wrong about some things doeant mean he’s wrong about all. I mean even Hitler had some good points (everyone deserves a job land and a family thats the dream he sold the people.
Is it burnout? Have you felt changes during vacations 3 weeks+? If you can afford it, maybe ask your employer for two or three months off unpaid, if you sell it as burnout prevention, it should also be in his interest.
Then get some sleep medication and do what your body tells you to.
I’ve told my manager that I’m having issues. I don’t actually want to take time off because work is a pretty decent way to pass the time. But I’m not in a mental space to focus at my usual level. So I think I’ve got that covered
OP doesn’t necessarily “want” to waste time. OP is going through some difficult things right now and looking for helpful advice just to get through the day, Yoda.
If you can’t sleep and are trying to kill time anyway, why not look into something like mindfulness meditation? It might help you keep some of those anxious thoughts in check to the point where you can actually focus on something to take your mind off of whatever is causing your issues.
I’m sure it’s not for everyone, but it helped me a lot when I was at my worst.
Also, you indicate that your anxiety and depression are due to some personal issues (which it sounds like will no longer be an issue in a month). If I’m understanding that correctly, that sucks for the time being but I’m glad to hear it has an expiration date. If those are feelings you deal with chronically, however, and you have the means to do so, I highly suggest trying to find professional help. The right meds can make an absolute world of difference, and talk therapy can help you straighten out how you approach those feelings.
Whatever route you take, I hope this passes for you soon and you start to feel so much better. Those feelings suck, but life can absolutely get better.
If those are feelings you deal with chronically, however, and you have the means to do so, I highly suggest trying to find professional help
It’s a combination of an expiration date as well as chronic. I started therapy recently and I’m on meds as well. We’ll see how that goes. So I just want to get this short period over with, because the combination is pretty unbearable…
Ah! Glad to hear that. Yeah, starting new meds can be rough for the first while. Especially if you’re experiencing side effects (which in my experience at least vastly diminished over time). Good luck, and I hope you’re able to start getting some better sleep. That’ll make a huge difference once possible.
I smoke weed and watch TV. I also take Zoloft every day and it works pretty well at minimizing my intrusive thoughts too (which mostly happen at night) so it’s like multi-pronged for me.
Idk, if you’ve been going through this for a while and nothing in this thread works, you could look into antidepressants; you don’t have to be on them forever. A lot of the common ones are somewhat affordable without insurance.
I had been on zoloft for a while but stopped a few years ago. I actually just started again very recently. We’ll see if that works.
Weed doesn’t help for me, it makes me more anxious. TV also helps for a little bit
The days are normally ok. I can find activities to do. It’s night time, when I’m supposed to be tired and going to sleep that it’s the hardest.
My suggestion is to spend maybe half an hour in the evening learninga new hobby/skill, then when you’re in bed go over what you learnt in that half hour in your mind to cement it. You’ll find that just running over the knowledge in your mind induces the “counting sheep” effect and will help you drift off to sleep.
If it doesn’t work, then at least you’ll learn a new skill much quicker!
Learn to crochet. It’s not hard to learn, aside from some people whose brains are wired a bit different, and it doesn’t cost much to get into. Eats up a lot of time for larger projects, and you can kinda watch tv or listen to radio/audiobooks while doing it.
I take melatonin, which helps a lot. But the issue is I just have trouble sleeping right now in general. I’d love to be able to sleep 14 hours a day all month. But I’m lucky if I get 6-7
I’m severely depressed and unmotivated as well. I watch a lot of TV. When I get sick of that, I make 3D wooden puzzles, like these dinosaurs. They take about 30-60 minutes each, and when you’re done, you’ve got a dinosaur! Rawr!
Having a due date for a project or work assignment that you procrastinate really makes time move way too quickly
Walks. Walking past trees and other natural objects helps the mind process thoughts and emotions, from what I heard. Maybe even not just natural objects.
It engages everything, I suppose. The body and the mind.
Supposedly helps you get over stuff.
I can’t vouch for it myself, but worth giving it a go if it does work. Couldn’t hurt. Good luck, friend!
I’ve gone through bouts of depression and I know motivation is hard to come by but I think it’s difficult to be depressed when you’re in the middle of exercising. I know the ask was to make time go by faster and as someone else said certain activities can make your brain take a break. I feel like walking, running, or biking outside is a fairly good way for your muscles to do the thinking but less hamster wheel than going to a gym or exercising at home.
Also walks will make your body a bit tired which will make it easier to fall asleep and sleep better.
Do therapy (individual or group) sessions. Meanwhile find rabbit holes (like self hosting if you are techo) but knowing that you need to work on the anxiety and depression . Obsessions well used, for our kind, is a excellent weapon . But could be a ruin .