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This is day 23 of 31 Days of Finding Joy in Depression. Yesterday, I shared about diet and depression. Today, I'm talking about exercise and depression.
There is a link between exercise and depression. It can be a vicious cycle. The less you move, the more depressed you feel. The more tired you are, the less you want you exercise. This leads to feeling even more depressed. But the opposite is true too. When you step out and move, you'll feel better and your energy level will go up which in the end will help lift your mood.
This is probably the hardest thing for me in managing my depression. I don't like to sweat. There. I said it. I hate exercise. Completely hate it. But I have found a few things that do help me when I press through and do them. One is yoga and the other is playing with the Wii.
I like yoga because it is generally easy on my knees. I have really bad knees – a couple of dislocations and a surgery over the years. I cannot do high impact anything. The stretching, strength building, and breathing of yoga seems to be very good for me. And yoga doesn't have to be all Eastern spiritual or inward focused. Focus on the true God instead.
The other thing I enjoy is playing on our Wii. We have Wii Fit and the Wii board. There are so many different type of activities. If you really get into it and play hard, it can really make a difference and you don't even realize that you're exercising.
What is your favorite way to exercise? How does exercise affect your depression?
If you deal with depression, please comment and share your journey too. If you're a blogger, you can use the button and code below to share your story and link back on your blog. Feel free to leave links to your posts in the comments area.
I'm linking up with The Nester and others who are writing 31 posts this month on various topics. I'm not a doctor or a counselor and this is not intended to be medical advice. This is simply the story of my experience with depression.
