What’s Buoying Me

About a year ago, one of the podcasts I listen to sometimes titled their episode “What’s Buoying You?” and I’ve thought about buoys ever since. The hosts recorded on a hard day and acknowledged the rough waters of the day, but also made a point to list their buoys: basically the things lifting them up or keeping them afloat. I added the buoy metaphor to my mental health toolkit and think about it often. My buoys mean even more to me now that life has thrown me some pretty rough waters recently. The election outcome along with a lot of personal challenges are emotionally exhausting me. Here are things I use as buoys to help keep myself afloat on hard days. This exercise was very therapeutic and I think it can be adapted and utilized in my future career as a child life specialist. I hope you find some of them helpful or are inspired to think of your own buoys!

TV Shows

Movies

Activities

“Words” refers to motivational quotes, photos, or posts I come across that I resonate with. Sometimes I struggle to articulate my feelings so I love when I find someone who managed to summarize exactly what I feel, too. I put some examples in the collage at the top of this post and the link to my wordy Pinterest board here.

Listening To

Self-Care

“Creating ” refers to any kind of creative outlet. For me, that’s a lot of small artistic crafts like air dry clay, beadwork, and painting to name a few. I’ve spent a lot of time making scrapbooks and handwriting cards recently.
“Maintaining routine” is a nicer way of saying “forcing myself to go through the motions of daily life and take care of myself.” I also think of it as parenting myself – if I skip a class, or skip brushing my teeth, I know my chances of skipping again are much higher. After those first few skips (or skipped workouts, skipped meal prep, stop talking to my friends, etc. the examples are endless) I know I face a slippery slope that almost always leads to a depressive period. For my wellbeing, I need to continue taking care of myself even especially when it feels hard.