Creating a Mental Health ‘Game Plan’ for the Second Half of the Year
Jake Newby
| 4 min read
Jake Newby is a brand journalist for Blue Cross Blue...
Key Takeaways
- Midyear is the perfect time to reset wellness goals, refocus priorities and strengthen habits that support mental health.
- Giving yourself grace and adjusting goals to fit life changes can improve motivation, resilience and long-term success.
- Small, realistic habit changes like meditation, social connection and screen-free time can reduce stress and boost well-being.
- Creating a fall and winter mental health toolkit helps maintain emotional wellness, healthy routines and social connections.
Remember those resolutions you set back in January? Maybe you planned to meditate every day, build a better work-life balance or stop doomscrolling before bed. Then life happened.
The good news is the halfway point of the year gives you an opportunity to reset, refocus and recommit to habits that support your mental well-being. Instead of beating yourself up over what didn't happen, focus on what you can do next.
Why it’s important to give yourself grace
One of the biggest mistakes people make with resolutions is treating them like end-all-be-all, pass-or-fail assignments. Life is nuanced, so progress matters more than perfection.
The person who set goals in January may not be the same person you are today. Maybe you've changed jobs, welcomed a new family member, suffered a loss or experienced a shift in priorities. Instead of dwelling on goals you’ve lost sight of, take a moment to reflect. Ask yourself questions like:
- What has gone well this year?
- What challenges got in the way?
- What goals still feel meaningful and attainable, if modified?
- What no longer fits your current reality?
Giving yourself permission to adjust your goals can help alleviate the pressure that often causes people to abandon them altogether.
Taking a mental health inventory before hitting reset
Take some time to think about your current stress levels, relationships, sleep habits and overall emotional well-being. Are you feeling energized or drained? Connected or isolated? Motivated or overwhelmed? It can be difficult to set meaningful goals without understanding where you are mentally and emotionally today.
Try writing down a few areas you'd like to strengthen this fall and winter. They don't need to be dramatic lifestyle overhauls. Small daily habit changes are realistic and often easier to maintain than ambitious plans that could become overwhelming.
Tips to adjust your goals
Instead of attempting to revive a resolution exactly as it was, tweak it by starting slow and ramping up each individual goal as the year goes on. Try choosing goals that are specific, realistic and achievable for your lifestyle right now. For example:
- If your goal was daily meditation, start with five minutes a day, three times a week.
- If you wanted to spend more time with friends, schedule a monthly coffee date or game night.
- If reducing stress was a priority, set aside screen-free time a few nights a week and use that time to read or journal.
- If you hoped to exercise more, plan a workout routine that is malleable enough to move indoors when the weather cools.
Creating a fall and winter mental health toolkit
The cold weather and short days can breed apathy, but you can get ahead of the winter by building a list of activities that support your mental well-being when stress increases or motivation decreases.
Your toolkit for the back half of the year might include:
- Dedicating 10 minutes a day to walking outside when the sun is out, for Vitamin D intake, or finding places to walk indoors like shopping malls or your place of work. Research has found getting at least 8,000 steps a day can lower risk of cardiovascular-related death.
- Prioritizing social wellness by seeking out positive social connections and working to build healthy interpersonal relationships. In addition to fostering existing friendships with phone calls, video calls or in-person get-togethers a few times a month, explore picking up a hobby you are interested in. Book clubs, knitting clubs, softball teams, run clubs, trivia teams, birdwatching clubs and volunteer groups are some examples of group activities. Spending time with other people, including friends or strangers, can help to fight off feelings of loneliness and symptoms of anxiety and depression, according to the National Institute of Health.
- Practicing self-care and positive self-talk to carve out time for yourself and reduce stress. Make sure to give yourself routine breaks from the day-to-day grind, especially when your social battery gets low after a long period of socializing. Taking a bath, doing a short yoga routine at home or just unwinding on the couch with a book or your favorite show are activities to consider.
- Eating a healthy diet, exercising regularly, hydrating often and maintaining a consistent sleep schedule. These pillars of good health aren’t just beneficial for your body, but for your mind, as well.
A mental health game plan should feel encouraging, not exhausting. Applaud yourself for working on self-improvement and celebrate the small victories along the way.
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Photo credit: Getty Images
