Happy For The Holidays
The winter season can bring its fair share of gloomy days and holiday stress and sometimes those blues are hard to shake. It might seem strange at first to think that caring for your image can help perk you up, but research is showing that there is a distinct biological response to what you put on your body.
Try these five tricks and see how your mood changes for the better:
Put On the Tunes
Bad moods rarely stick around when subjected to a barrage of cheerful music. If you haven’t yet heard of Songza, a streaming app, I highly recommend it. “Walking On Sunshine” is one of the very best bad mood kickers.
Get Cleaned Up
When you’re in a bad mood, sometimes all you want to do is run a comb through your hair and toss on some clothes and get out the door. When a bad mood is present, spend a bit more time in the shower, noticing the hot water and connect with your body while you’re soaping up. Enjoy the sensations and scents of the morning ‘clean-up’.
Shave or Makeup
In a bad mood, it can be tempting to skip the extra step of shaving or putting on makeup. You might be surprised how taking a few minutes to at least trim the beard or shave your neck or put on some mascara and lip gloss will help lift your spirits. It’s hard to stay in a bad mood when you’ve got a tidy face.
Get Dressed
This may seem self-evident, but there is getting dressed and then there is ‘getting dressed’. The former is purely functional, pulling whatever is in the closet out and throwing it on, wrinkled, torn or otherwise carelessly tossed together. The latter, a carefully chosen ensemble, helps you feel well put together on those days when it feels like a bad mood is about to take over.
Try a Smile
Even if you’re in a bad mood, you can change your physiological response by smiling for a minute. Your face will tell your brain that there’s something good going on and will help it reset. Plus, there’s always the added benefit of making someone else smile too, which is one of the best antidotes to the blues.
Here’s wishing you a happy, healthy holiday season, where you’ll be a bad mood butt kicker in no time flat, using these tricks. Merry Christmas!
