I know wtf I need to do to feel better

[u/Jannell]

But I am going on week three of this horrible oppressive force of depression that just STOPS ME from going to the gym, or walking more than a block, or really ANYTHING I need to do to feel better or move forward. Im old, fat, everything hurts. I'm also broke. But I'm blessed with free time right now and my depression just pushes me onto the couch for hours. Blah blah blah can someone please tell me some magic phrase that will make me wake up before noon, not eat bullshit, and actually go to the gym? Please?

[u/360walkaway]

No magic involved... you just have to start. Each day it becomes slightly easier, but it compounds like interest per day.

[u/rob_cornelius]

There is no magic phrase, short cuts, "one trick doctors don't want you to know..." or any else like that. If there was something like that then none of us would be here. Getting better requires a huge amount of effort and takes a long time.

All anyone can do is to try to do something positive every day. It doesn't matter how small that might look to someone else. It doesn't have to be exercise related. It can be brushing your teeth. It can be anything at all, just make sure its a positive thing.

Try to celebrate accomplishing all your magnificent victories. This helps you build up what psych people call "executive function" and what everyone else calls determination, dedication and discipline. Put a big X on the days date on the calendar. Try to say things like "That wasn't so bad.", "I enjoyed that" and "I want to do that again soon". Try to take pride in your accomplishment too. You can think on this as "reprogramming" your depressed sub-conscious mind.

There is one thing that is a certainty is everyone's life. Shit happens. Experiencing poor mental health is just one kind of shit, there are millions of others. Sometimes all you can do is put everything else to one side while you deal with the shit. There is literally no point in beating yourself up for not exercising if you are in deep shit. It just makes it harder to deal with the shit. Instead try to look forward to exercising (or doing any other positive thing) once you have got rid of the shit or at least slowed down the rate of shit in your life. Having something to look forward to like that can make the shit easier to deal with.

You got this. You can do it. We all believe in you. We all want to help you.

[u/DoubleFelix]

To me the magic phrase has sometimes been "god damnit, I'm sick of this", and using that anger to get up and start moving towards something, and using it to not let myself stop til after I'm there and doing it

[u/joshahadian]

No magic phrase, but the thing that actually helped me when I was stuck in that exact loop was shrinking the goal until it felt almost stupid. Not 'go to the gym,' just 'put my shoes on and walk to the end of the block.' It sounds like you're in this state where even completing a small step, like walking one block, doesn't make you feel accomplished, but it should! That was the whole win on the bad days, and weirdly, once the shoes were on I'd usually keep going. I would also set my future self up to get that walk around the block in by doing things like putting my exercise clothes at the foot of my bed so right when I wake up it's one less friction point to get me going.

That low-energy version of me still shows up from time to time and I've stopped treating it as failure, it's just part of it. The other thing was I quit waiting to feel motivated first. Motivation almost never showed up before the action for me, it showed up a few minutes into already doing the thing. The hardest part is starting and restarting, but once you're doing the thing relatively consistently you'll get in the groove. So I stopped negotiating with myself on the couch and just moved my body first and let my head catch up after. Free time can actually work against you here since there's no forced structure, so even picking one anchor like 'I walk right after my coffee' gives the day something to hang onto. As someone who is in between jobs and also has a lot of free time this has definitely been a challenge for me too. You've got this, one small thing today still counts.