I'm a developer and I need some help with being the best I can be mentally, but I'm not sure where to get it.
By "mentally" what I mean is I feel anxious, absent minded or otherwise less effective than I feel like I can be (and have been in the past).
I'm generally a happy person, confident in my technical abilities but I feel really held back by my mental state sometimes. It's so hard to talk about mental health, because so much of it is qualitative and everyone's experience is different.
I'm not sure where to find help. Ideas I've had are going into therapy or finding some sort of mentor/sounding board. I'm looking for suggestions, because I thought there must be people out there in the community who have had similar experiences.
If anyone out there has any thoughts/recommendations/advice then I'd really appreciate it!
Top comments (2)
Hi Lewis,
First off you are not alone. A lot of people go through this. I myself have dealt with similar issues and still deal with these issues in different ways.
There are a lot of different ways to deal with this, but the secret is to find what works for you. My approach has been to study these things and find personal development books, seminars, coaches, etc, and test out the strategies for a month or two to see what works and what doesn't.
I'd recommend finding a mentor or coach. This can be a little tricky as there is a lot of subtle difference between the two and everyone has different approaches. The best thing is to find someone that tells a similar story to yours and ask them questions. I also have found the better coaches are those that have some experience in therapy whether it be in a traditional form, CBT, or some of the more modern approaches like RTI or NLP.
One of the biggest changes in my was discovering and practicing gratitude and acceptance. Gratitude helps with anxiety because it makes you present and happy about the things in our life now. This makes what could happen in the future seem unimportant.
Acceptance is the practice of being okay with where you are now and what you are feeling. If you are feeling anxious or forgetful in a moment that is okay. It's part of life, everyone feels this way, soon it will pass and you won't feel this way and that moment won't really matter.
This subject is very important to me and learning how to handle has been one of the biggest and best turning points in my life. If you have any questions or want to talk I'm happy to just reach out.
Oh boy! This is not unique to you, we all go through this feeling. It's common to all of us, that's what makes us HUMAN!
What we need to understand, that is this a "feeling", and feelings change moment to moment. We need to build awareness to separate our feelings from our actions. It tough, but worth it.
Some of the things that can help (and has helped me) are
But then, I stopped doing as life happened and failed again in awareness building. However, the point is not to fail and see ourselves as failure, rather bring ourselves back up again and keep moving forward!
Happy to chat personally if you need someone to listen!
Thanks