How to get your zest for life back: 29 simple steps

We all have periods when our mood is permanently bad, we don’t want anything, our taste for life has disappeared, and the days seem gray and insipid. Remember: this is not an objective reality, but just your subjective perception. And this is temporary.

Here is a list of ideas that will help restore your good mood, at least temporarily.

Apathy. What kind of illness

How to deal with apathy and what is meant by this concept? There is an opinion among doctors that apathy is the body’s way of protecting itself from overload. It may be associated with unstable functioning of the human nervous system, a negative emotional background, which is accompanied by general fatigue.

A person closes off from external stimuli. Thus, it allows the body to restore strength and improve the functioning of body systems.

In a state of apathy, a person does not experience any emotions about one thing or another. He is absolutely indifferent to everything that happens. Nothing makes him happy, but nothing makes him sad either. A person doesn’t want to think about anything. He cannot pull himself together and tune in to a positive mood. How to deal with apathy? He doesn't know the answer to this question for sure.

When a person is in a cheerful mood, he plans for tomorrow, waits for good news, and thinks about what to wear. And in a state of apathy, he does not want to make plans for the future. For example, he does not think about the upcoming vacation or about any other pleasant events and pastimes. What made a person happy a certain time ago does not bring pleasant emotions in a state of apathy. They are also not interested in activities that brought them pleasure in the past. Films that evoked emotion cease to be of interest.

I don’t want to listen to my favorite songs, attend educational institutions and engage in work. In the case when close relatives begin to tell a person in a state of apathy that he needs to get out of this state, the reaction can be aggressive and inadequate.

Blues. How to return the taste for life?

Many people associate autumn with depression. Why are we periodically overcome by sadness and melancholy, how to distinguish the feeling of sadness from depression, and what happens to the human body when it is in a depressed state? Tula psychiatrist Elena Belyntseva told us about this.

Elena Belyntseva

When nothing makes you happy

Depression can develop at any age. The likelihood of its occurrence increases in adolescence, during pregnancy, after childbirth, and during menopause.

A depressed state, often with anxiety, appears immediately after waking up. Nothing makes a person happy, he doesn’t see the point in anything and doesn’t want anything, he loses his appetite. Forcing yourself to just get out of bed is a whole problem. The thoughts of a person in this state are usually pessimistic: “Nobody needs me,” “There is nothing good,” “There is emptiness all around.” All these are manifestations of so-called depression.

There is no such thing as “depression” in the international classification of diseases.

This is the “folk” name for a wide range of nervous system problems. In psychiatry, a distinction is made between “depressive disorder” - a disease that occurs for a number of internal (genetic, immune) reasons, and “depressive syndrome” - a complex of symptoms that occurs in a host of diseases: from schizophrenia and epilepsy to neuroses and overwork.

Why do we feel sad more often in the fall?

Depression can strike a person regardless of the time of year. However, the peculiarities of our geographical location leave their mark on our well-being. Autumn is the time of withering. All living things “fall asleep.” The amount of sunlight that stimulates the nervous system decreases. The body perceives all these factors as a signal of decreased activity, which is the basis for the development of depression.

Depression or bad mood?

Normally, a bad mood occurs when someone has offended us, something has happened, or we feel bad, that is, when the reasons for feeling sad are obvious. The grievances are gradually forgotten or the person adapts to them. After this, the mood usually improves.

But if there are no visible reasons for melancholy and sadness and this condition continues for weeks, then these are already symptoms of depressive syndrome.

About hidden depression

Masked (or latent) depression is manifested mainly by somatic (that is, related to the body. - Author's note) problems: pain in various parts of the body, dizziness, fluctuations in blood pressure, skin rashes and itching, bloating, irritable bowel syndrome, cramps bladder, menstrual cycle disorders in women and potency disorders in men. From the nervous system, signs of hidden depression may include: anxiety and panic attacks, alcohol abuse, obsessive thoughts and actions.

You can't control everything

Do not confuse the concept of “responsibility” with the desire to control everything. If we consider the ability to take on a reasonable amount of obligations and a sober understanding of one’s capabilities as responsibility, then such a person will not face loss of energy in a stressful situation and depression.

If we consider more responsible people who are prone to excessive self-examination and strict self-discipline, perfectionists who go to an unrealistic goal at all costs, then depression will be an inevitable consequence of stress when illusions are destroyed.

At the molecular level

The cause of depression is considered to be a disruption in the transmission of serotonin from one neuron to another. Serotonin is the hormone of joy; if it is lacking, everything seems gloomy and overall tone decreases.

There are many different reasons that cause disturbances in serotonin metabolism: genetic predisposition, hormonal diseases, overwork, prolonged exposure to unfavorable conditions, constant stress, etc.

When is it time to see a doctor?

When you have been getting up in the morning in a bad mood for a week, you ask yourself the question, what, strictly speaking, is bad, and do not find an answer.

At this stage, the problem can be solved quickly and easily through the use of special treatment techniques and a review of the daily routine. When treatment is delayed, problems begin to grow like a snowball.

In advanced cases, people get out of depression for a long time and with the help of pills.

If you begin to notice that a loved one constantly has a sad expression on his face and a lot of pessimism that was previously unusual for him has appeared in his statements, the best thing you can do is to draw his attention to these changes. It is important to do this without criticism and offer your help in finding a therapist.

Country of Soviets

What should you eat to be happy?

Walnuts help get rid of the autumn blues. They contain methionine, an amino acid that is involved in the synthesis of melatonin (“sleep hormone” that regulates biorhythms). They also contain magnesium, a natural sedative. Magnesium is also found in dark chocolate, bananas, green vegetables, lentils and whole grains. The amino acid taurine helps preserve it in cells for a long time. We can get it from dairy products, red meat, crustaceans and fish.

The problem of men. How does negligence manifest itself in representatives of the stronger sex? What to do?

It is believed that apathy occurs less frequently in men than in women. Actually this is not true. Women are more emotional than men. As for experiences, here men are also susceptible to depression and apathy. They have plenty of reasons to be in a bad mood. Firstly, if a man is married, then he is responsible for supporting his family. Secondly, failures at work or in business can seriously affect men's health. Relationships with the opposite sex cause very serious emotional experiences. Men are very vulnerable, not all of them are self-confident, etc. In addition, they almost always keep their emotions under control. That is why they cannot afford to relax and cry. In this regard, emotional experiences accumulate, and this may not end very well for the guy. It is worth saying that the life expectancy of men is shorter than that of women. It often happens that guys do not share their experiences with others, but keep everything to themselves. This situation is harmful to their health.

Men, especially in our country, are not used to sharing their problems with anyone. It’s easier for them to put on a mask of well-being and behave as if nothing had happened. In this regard, it is easier for women. They can share their experiences with a friend, even cry. Also, a woman can afford emotional release at home. She can simply blame her partner for all her misfortunes, cry, and she will feel better. And a man who is not used to sharing his problems hoards everything within himself. This state of affairs can lead to deep depression, which will lead to apathy and despondency.

You can recognize male depression in his aggressive behavior, consumption of drinks that contain alcohol, and drugs. In addition, a guy in this state has no mood at all, complete apathy sets in. When a man is intoxicated, he can allow himself to disconnect from problems for a while. In this situation, the main thing is to remember that alcohol or other drugs will not solve anything, and may only worsen the problems.

Men should know that depression can be cured like any other disease. You shouldn’t be ashamed of this, because you need to use available means to get out of this state.

Path of Satisfaction

At the age of 5, we could dance in public places to the music we heard and we didn’t care what others thought of us. But over time, as we grew older, we lost the ability to be spontaneous and not constantly rely on other people’s opinions. Children know that everyone loves them, that they are beautiful, smart - that they are the best! Adults need constant approval from strangers to feel confident. They need social proof of their talents. This is where all the problems come from.

First of all, we, as adults, must learn to trust ourselves again. Our relationship with ourselves is no different from our relationship with someone else. You also need to constantly work on them.

The second problem is that we constantly judge ourselves. We compare ourselves to ideal models in all areas. We want to have an ideal body. We want to achieve certain successes both in personal development and in our business. We want to travel the world, study languages, draw, write books. And with all this, we also want to be ideal parents.

Do you think that all of the above, ideally executed, can fit into one simple person? I think not. And Leo thinks so too

The path to a life we will be truly satisfied with lies in self-acceptance. We must let go of all these ideals, stop judging ourselves and learn to trust ourselves.

How to deal with apathy on your own

It is easier to get rid of apathy when there is awareness of this need. And it is this awareness that most often is a sign of the ability to cope with the problem on your own.

The problem of apathy is one of those that can be eliminated by artificially aggravating it. If apathy has already set in, you can plunge into it headlong, do nothing and want nothing as much as possible, lie on the couch and feel sad, complain about life and feel sorry for yourself. In healthy people, such doing nothing will sooner or later cause a feeling of the absurdity of the situation, the fear of “missing out” on life and a burning desire to actively act.

Sometimes such a stay “at the bottom” is the only free time for introspection. A person who works as usual, thanks to apathy, gets the opportunity to become a philosopher and think about his life, understand himself, decide on desires and plans for the future. This is also the time to express accumulated negative emotions: cry to your heart’s content, scream, hit a safe object, and so on.

But most importantly, plunging into apathy is an opportunity to find its cause, because finding and eliminating the cause of the problem is the best tactic to get rid of it.

Since a person spends most of the daylight hours at work and it is working in the “without sleep and rest” mode that is the main cause of apathy, you will need:

normalize the work schedule;
abandon the “Stakhanovite” operating mode;
have a full rest after work;
take quality rest breaks while working (read a book, do a warm-up, take a walk in the fresh air);
start the working day with the most difficult tasks;
do not do several things at once;
give up perfectionism at work;
resolve existing conflicts and disagreements;
communicate with positive colleagues and like-minded people;
create coziness and comfort directly in the workplace;
seek and create sources of positive emotions at work;
quit your job if you hate it, having previously found another one you like.

To effectively combat apathy, you need to make a number of important life changes:

change your social circle if it consists of pessimists, those who like to complain about fate, shift responsibility, spread panic, and others;
surround yourself with people who will support, believe, love and are generally optimistic;
add novelty and extreme sports to your life (from going to a museum to skydiving), they will excite you and stimulate the production of adrenaline and happiness hormones;
even if there is not the slightest desire to set goals and achieve them, this needs to be done; it is better to choose one of those not too significant goals that you could not achieve earlier (for example, learn to roller skate);
pamper yourself with something you have long dreamed of (shopping, traveling, meeting with friends);
carry out a general cleaning of the house, throw away everything old, unnecessary, associated with something negative, make the space around you bright and clean;
make all the necessary fundamental changes in your personal life.

What to do if there is a loss of interest in life?

Put yourself first

This is not about egocentrism. The world doesn't revolve around you. But your life is for you. And in your life it is important to give yourself a main place. This means that you feel and are aware of your needs and desires. And do something to ensure that your needs are met.

You don't wait for your husband, wife, dad, mom, children to give you time and resources to implement and achieve your goals. You look for opportunities yourself. For example, with an effort of will, you free up time for your favorite activity or relaxation.

Look for something that will inspire you, ignite you

It may be a simple desire, small, but no less significant for you. Or a hint will come from outside - someone’s example. And it will interest you.

Every day do something new that you haven't done before. And then loss of interest in life will not threaten you. Don't put off implementing your idea until later. This “later” may never happen. If you have wanted, dreamed, planned something for a long time, but still haven’t gotten around to it, do now what is achievable and realistic.

Take a rest

If you want a “seal” vacation from the category of “doing nothing” - allow yourself this.

Now many people talk about the need to get involved in something, strive for something, travel, lead a healthy lifestyle, play sports, eat right, be an activist, etc. Are all people like this? Is this philosophy close to everyone?

If you are not interested in traveling, but want a simple all-inclusive holiday, in the country or in idleness at home, do what you feel is right for you. I don’t want to run to the gym after work, and on the weekend get all 150 new experiences, including skydiving - forget it. If you want to sit at home with a book, do it.

It is important to learn to rest. It's not about looking for a variety of leisure activities. It’s about learning to relax the mind, the brain, and stop the thought process. Any relaxation techniques or bodily practices are suitable for this.

For example, the following exercise. Lie on your back in star pose. Take a few deep breaths in and out. Each entry is deeper and slower. Now your attention moves to your feet: you listen to the sensations in your toes, feet, and ankle joints. Attention rises higher: shins, knees, hips, lower abdomen, belly, chest, shoulders, arms. Flows to the buttocks, rises along the back, neck, back of the head, crown, forehead, face.
With your attention, you seem to touch every part of the body, saying: “I hear you, thank you for your service.” From the “touch” the muscles relax and tension goes away.
When you have heard each part of the body individually, you pay attention to the entire body and send it a wave of gratitude. Take a few deep breaths in and out again. The exercise is best done before bed. While doing this, you may suddenly fall asleep. This is fine.

This way you will learn to relax. The flow of thought will pause for a time, giving the mind a rest so that it can recuperate and be more efficient the next day.

Reconsider your responsibilities

Of course, it is impossible to live without obligations. We are social creatures. We cannot live outside of society, outside of people. Only Robinsons can actively live on a desert island and find their Fridays there. And then, mind you, not alone, but with a woman.

That is why we have obligations to someone, and someone to us. But obligations are a matter of choice, voluntary. What about parents and children? - you ask. We must take care of elderly parents or grandparents! Yes. This is one of the obligations. Only you need to fulfill them not at the cost of your life, but to the best of your ability.

Is it possible not to care, to relieve yourself of these obligations, I didn’t ask to give birth? Can. You decide for yourself what is best for you. Each choice has its own price, with which you must internally agree.

Sometimes, in order for good changes to happen in your life, it is necessary to reduce communication with your parents or interrupt it, maybe for a while. This happens when parents treat children as their property, as an investment in their old age: “you will look after me in my old age.”

And sometimes the person himself needs to reconsider his relationship with his parents and learn not only to receive, but also to give something in return.

Obligations are what I voluntarily take upon myself, I am voluntarily ready to perform certain functions in relation to other people. And I do this to the best of my ability and ability.

Find your place in the world

For example, through purpose. Remember who you wanted to be as a child, what you liked to do, what games you liked. This will be a hint for you. Children intuitively know what their purpose is, and they realize it in games.

Learn to enjoy little things, laugh, smile

To do this, it is important to cope with the blocking of feelings and consciously include your feelings from each action.

Regain your strength

This means you need to find where the failure occurred and fix it: return contact with your life or remove the intertwining of destinies.

I want you to understand: losing interest in life is not a death sentence. While you are alive, a lot can change. You can regain interest in life, fill yourself with strength and energy, and become a little happier. Something you can easily do yourself. In some cases, you will need the help of a specialist. And if you need help, I am ready to provide it to you.

How to bring joy back into your life

First you need to find out what reasons provoked the appearance of anhedonia. Treatment will depend on this.

If the lack of positive emotions is caused by fatigue, then the best solution would be to reconsider the number of your responsibilities. Some household chores can be entrusted to household members. The daily routine should include mandatory time for rest. At least 20-30 minutes dedicated only to yourself.

How to find joy in life if you are used to remembering only the negative? You should start carefully monitoring your words and thoughts, stop complaining

Train yourself to look for the positives in any event and focus on them.

It is easier to survive a difficult life situation by communicating with other people. Don't isolate yourself. Go visit friends or make an appointment with a psychologist, psychotherapist or group gestalt therapy session.

Finding Joy in Life: General Recommendations

A happiness bank is a great way to remember joyful moments. Get a special box (jar, casket). As soon as something good happens, write it down on a piece of paper and put it in your piggy bank. The next time the blues set in, re-read the notes (or at least look at the number of them).

Eat more foods that improve your mood: dark chocolate, nuts or fatty fish, bananas, hot peppers. And it is better to avoid alcohol, coffee and sweets, because they give the opposite result.

Try positive affirmations and meditations for happiness. Start and end your day with a smile to yourself. At first it will seem stupid, but the result will not be long in coming.

Create artificial stress. Sign up for a rock climbing or parkour class, or go on your entire vacation away from civilization (for example, to a remote village or yoga camp). Any extreme and unusual activity for you is suitable.

Play sports. It’s not for nothing that they say: “A healthy mind in a healthy body!” This will help improve your physical well-being, raise your self-esteem, and break up your established routine.

What to do if you can't manage your symptoms at home? It is better to consult a doctor immediately.

Learning to live positively

This is a cliché expression, and besides, the fashion for positivity has given rise to many people with fake smiles. Your task is to get a dose of jokes every day and find something funny and cheerful in everything that happens. This skill in itself will help drive away negative thoughts. You can adjust your worldview with the help of music. We remove everything sad and melancholy from the playlist and player, looking for something active to replace it, something that you want to live and feel.

We are looking for friends, experimenting with communication

This is very difficult if you like to spend your free time at home on your favorite sofa. But know that a cheerful company will pull anyone out of apathy, and if you have common interests, then life will bloom with bright colors. You can perceive every new person on your path as a discovery.

Letting go of the oppression of the past

If you have lost interest in life after a series of unpleasant events in life, you just need to hammer the past with iron nails. How to do it?

First of all, analyze past events and think about what lessons you can learn from them. Now you can calmly say goodbye to your past and move on. Understand that change is normal, because you can’t get stuck in the past.

It is quite possible to get rid of fears from the past: they are now irrelevant. The only moment when you can stir up the past is in the evening of your day. At this time, it is important to determine why this day was lived, to note all your achievements, to remember what good you have done. Well, let’s praise ourselves for all this!

But not over everything at once - it’s easy to push yourself that way. If you understand that your character lacks a certain quality, first decide whether you need this quality, or whether it is social pressure and cliches. If necessary, we set goals and develop slowly. The main thing here is not to kill yourself in a month.

Fall in love

This is always a source of positive emotions and necessary hormones. Moreover, by sharing the interests of the one you love, you can find a new interest for your life. If there is no suitable object to fall in love with, fall in love with your soulmate again. Or you can fall in love with yourself! If you radiate love, then it will return to you. What we give to people comes back to us. This is the mirror.

Find a new dream

Or a goal. Let her inspire you. Now put it into practice. This way the apathy will go away on its own. If such a goal or dream is not found, remember a dream that was put on the back burner in the past and forgotten, or you never got around to it. When childhood dreams come true, adult life becomes much better.

What to do if you're tired of everything: 7 ways

Dramatically change your hobbies

Hobbies can be changed and there will be no harm, and the experience will expand. Therefore, if before you only embroidered or painted, take up extreme sports or music, for example. Or take courses that are unusual for you. You can also change your work schedule and style, your style of communication with your family or friends. But again, not in a month, but slowly and reliably.

Take antidepressants

Don't be afraid of these "fun" pills. Sometimes only they are able to bring us out of suspended animation. But to prevent anything bad from happening, let them be selected by a doctor, and not by you, a friend, or a popular magazine. And try not to overdose.

If pills are not your thing, just eat dark chocolate. There are also antidepressants here. Bananas will also work.

Get a dog

A universal antidepressant, if that. First of all, you won't be alone anymore. Secondly, a cheerful dog will expand your social circle and new interests will enter your life: while the dog is small, you need to take care of it no less than a child. And finally, a dog means walks in the fresh air, every day. And such activity is a great way to overcome apathy.

Main signs of apathy

The most important thing is not to confuse whether you have apathy, banal fatigue or “critical days”. (By the way, men also have them, but not physiologically, like women, but rather of a moral nature). But also once a month. Watch yourself - there are bursts of irritation or uncontrollable aggression, everything is nervous, the children scream, the wife talks a lot, and the domestic kitten stomps like an elephant? These are your “critical days”. After a few days, this mood usually goes away, and life gets better. This is not apathy.

But if you feel:

Boredom;
Indifference;
Indifference to everything;
You do everything “automatically”;
Laziness;
Sadness;
The desire to always be alone;
Decreased appetite;
Decline in energy.

And this is all over the course of more than one week, then we can already say that you have been visited by sadness and melancholy Apathy.

The purpose of life is to enjoy it, but what if it doesn’t exist?

As a result, many of those who have not yet gotten along with the new speeds are faced with such a strange state in themselves when they feel something akin to apathy and lack of pleasure from life. That is, ask such a person what he wants, and he will fall into a sad stupor. Because he understands that he doesn’t want anything at all.

Meanwhile, this is a rather dangerous state, because our desires turn the wheel of life itself. It is they who make the rotor of energies rotate, aimed at obtaining energy and experience here. The absence of desires signals that the Soul has nothing more to do here in its earthly incarnation. And it’s time for her to return to the Light and the Source.

This is exactly the state experienced by a very elderly person who has lived a long life and is ready to leave for the subtle world; the colors fade, desires fade away, the body and Soul are preparing for the transition. But in our reality, a huge number of middle-aged people, and even even young ones, face this feeling. And, yes, in cases of advanced depression, lack of energy and a banal desire to live, the Soul chooses a combination of circumstances through which it goes to the subtle plane. Since there is no more development for her here.

But so as not to needlessly frighten anyone, let’s say that the examples given are truly critical cases. In all other situations, the process is completely reversible. The main thing is to realize why everything doesn’t get bogged down. Because cause and effect, as you have already learned, operate at much higher speeds these days.

Psychological techniques for overcoming apathy

The apathetic state has many nuances. There is no one recipe for overcoming everyone. To find out how to overcome apathy, you should choose a method for yourself. What may help one will not help another. The general methodology includes the steps below.

Eliminating the cause of indifference and sadness

It is recommended to change either the situation itself, which caused sadness and indifference, or change the attitude towards this problem. The reasons may be overwork at work, a conflict situation in the family, lethargy due to a busy daily routine without rest.

Short or long rest

Most often, the fight against apathy should consist of the correct ability to rest. Rebooting allows you to avoid fatigue. Walking, music, drawing, and reading are suitable for relaxation.

Choose yourself

How to cope with apathy if rest does not help, and positive techniques only irritate? It's worth trying to learn to live for yourself. Choose time in the day to live your own life. This will help cope with the feeling of duty and living for others. It is the loss of oneself that is often the cause of apathy.

How to stop blocking feelings

There are 2 options for advice from psychologists on how to regain interest in life and stop blocking feelings.

First: you need to try to look inside yourself, to understand what emotions you want to hide from others and yourself. Next, you need to accept them completely, feel them, experience them and simply let them go.

This is best done in childhood. A child can freely, without hesitation, cry if someone has offended him, and immediately forget about everything and start playing, doing his favorite thing. This way children easily let go of negative emotions.

It is much more difficult for an adult. He needs to find a place where no one will see him. Calm down and understand what emotions bother him most. When he has dealt with this, he needs to accept them, feel them completely, and in this way he can reset the negative emotions. Negative feelings will no longer be blocked, and it will become much easier.

The second option: a person needs to seek help from a psychotherapist.

Taste for life - reasons for decline

The reasons for the decline in taste for life are:

physiological problems and weak body tone
work without rest
negative experiences and impressions
routine and monotony of activities, lack of impressions that go beyond the usual life
fixation on one's problems and inability to solve them

Physiological problems: Certain diseases or defects in the body impair the functioning of the nervous system. The nervous system is depressed or does not function properly, which leads to increased fatigue, poor sleep, inability to exercise without a pronounced negative reaction from the body (nausea, dizziness, rapid exhaustion, too long recovery). General fatigue, combined with weak body tone, leads to general apathy, depressive moods and, as a result, a complete loss of taste for life. Physiological problems can range from minor subluxations in the spine, which are generally unknown, to serious diseases. Experience shows that after recovery, people immediately regain interest in life and begin to live very actively and positively. One story is known when, after laser eye correction, a person regained his vision and, along with his vision, his taste for life returned.

Work without rest causes the accumulation of stress and fatigue, which are the cause of lack of taste. In this case, everything is quite obvious - it’s enough to take a comprehensive rest and change your field of activity.

Several crises in life that are difficult to cope with, and a person loses his taste for life. This is a common phenomenon, however, it is not chronic if you do not start this phenomenon. The most reliable cure after a negative experience is time; you can speed up the process many times over if you find a good social circle, experience positive emotions, diversify your life, balance work and rest, etc. That is, you won’t be able to get rid of depression suddenly, but if you work with it, you can reduce both its manifestations and the time it takes to completely eliminate it.

Routine and monotony of activity also negatively affects the taste for life. In this case, there is nothing to worry about, it’s enough just to diversify your life, experience new impressions, try something new. Sometimes the consequences of a routine can be removed in one or two days, but to prevent this problem from returning, you should reconsider your attitude towards life.

Excessive self-flagellation, fixation on one's problems or an overly painful perception of events leads to a constant attempt to feel sorry for oneself, to create a comfortable cocoon of security around oneself, where there will be no problems. This behavior can occur due to exhaustion and negative experiences. One way or another, excessive concentration only on oneself leads to selfishness, and selfishness will manifest itself as an attempt to find someone to blame for all troubles externally, and not internally. Thus, it will be impossible to change life, but only to constantly look for the culprit. You should take responsibility for your life and understand that no one suffers more from your troubles than you do, and solving your problems first of all will make you better, not anyone else.

We also recommend this article: Willpower - the ability to change fate. How to develop and strengthen?

What actions should you take?

First of all, you just need to start doing the previously planned things and not think that everything is bad. At the initial stage, you can do them mechanically. It’s okay, over time the right mood will come and it won’t seem like everything is bad. You can write down on a piece of paper all the things that need to be solved or implemented, and do them one after another.

It’s better not to think too much about how you will do it, or about possible difficulties, etc. It will be good if a large number of tasks can be accommodated in a small time period. This way, you will not have the opportunity to be depressed about anything. Active activity will bring a person out of such a depressive state, he will forget what apathy towards life is, learn to appreciate every moment and enjoy it. The main thing is to force yourself to start.

Three gunas - reflection of taste

There are three energies of the material world: tamas, rajas and sattva.

Tamas is ignorance, oblivion and means lack of taste for life. Rajas is passion and denotes an excessive zest for life. Sattva is a virtue and denotes a healthy taste for life.

Our goal is a healthy taste for life. However, it should be understood that lack of taste has reasons and to get rid of them, active activity is required, for which rajas is responsible. That is, in order to go from lack of taste to healthy taste, we need excessive taste for a certain period of time. It's like restoring atrophied muscles.

The transition from no taste to healthy taste occurs through excessive taste. And excessive taste, on average, is better than lack of taste, since with active activity a person has the opportunity to progress, learn, acquire knowledge, understanding and experience, and on this platform move to sattva. But an inert lifestyle does not allow you to do this. So we need rajas.

Rajas is achieved by strong desires, but what to do if there are no desires? To restore desires, it is enough to limit yourself in something. For example, if a person finds food tasteless, just fast for a while and any food will acquire taste. This also applies to other areas of life - if communication does not bring you pleasure, you can pause it for a while to restore the taste. The main source of lack of taste and desires is momentary, cheap pleasures. That is, such pleasures that are not limited by anything and a person does not have to pay for them by labor and overcoming obstacles. This could be entertainment: social. networks, games, movies, TV series, etc. Having limited himself to such pastimes, a person will immediately encounter boredom, which he usually quenches in these amusements. But if you refuse them, then it becomes clear why you don’t want to do anything, because watching a movie is easier than working out, and playing games is easier than reading a book.

Thus, the main tool for restoring taste will be:

entertainment restrictions
restoration of desires
getting new impressions
activity and life changes

This should be approached with all seriousness in order to get a truly worthwhile result.

Rely only on yourself

In general, ideally, it’s good to have a boyfriend or girlfriend who will be a kind of “trigger”, a “spring” that forces you to always do something and change your life picture. But, unfortunately, in our lives, friends disappear at the first sign of failure, and only sincerely loving people can bother with the “eternal whiner”. Therefore, you should not rely heavily on those whom we consider our friends - they have their own lives, and you will have to save yours yourself. Like Munchausen, who pulled himself out of the swamp by his hair, you will pull yourself out of the gloomy swamp, centimeter by centimeter. Don’t count on the fact that this can be done in just 5-7 days. Those who promise to save you from this scourge within such a period of time are simply charlatans. There is a time for everything - it may take several months to completely banish apathy from your mind. It is also possible, and don’t let this scare you, that there are breakdowns, when day after day you try, take actions, try to become interested in something - but there seems to be no result. And you lie down on the sofa again, mindlessly looking at the ceiling, and you are too lazy to get up to drink water or “don’t care” about everything that happens outside your apartment.

This is a normal, natural process. Mope around for a couple of days, and then grab yourself by the hair again and continue to pull your body and mind out of the quagmire.

There are two options for how others treat you: pity and envy. If you want everyone to feel sorry for you, you don’t have to read any further, continue to feel sorry for yourself, the unfortunate one. Everyone else - let's start the battle.

How to maintain and develop a taste for life and why it is important

Let's say you managed to regain your taste for life - you want to achieve something, you look forward to the start of a new day, life is perceived as bright, promising and interesting. But there is another danger - exhaustion from excessive taste, which can return a person to a state of apathy. How does this happen? For example, physical exercise gives a person a taste. He works out but feels like his body is getting tired, but he pushes himself to the limit, resulting in incredible exhaustion that is ignored due to the excessive taste that has recently arisen. The taste will sooner or later subside as exhaustion increases. The exhaustion will remain, but the taste will disappear. There will be no reason to continue training and the person will return to a state of apathy, to which fatigue will also be added. Therefore, it is important to feel the moment of exhaustion and allow yourself to rest. Rest will not be about returning to entertainment, but about diversifying your activities. If we return to the example with training, then rest can be reading books, walking, socializing, new hobbies, studying something, perhaps playing musical instruments. Thus, a person opens up the opportunity to use his full potential without forcing his body and psyche, but evenly distributing the load.

This is especially important, since cases of a return to apathy due to excessive workload are a fairly common phenomenon not only in material, but also in spiritual life. You should take the burden according to your strength and take it step by step, then everything will work out. At some stage along the way, a healthy taste for life will arise, when the correct ability to combine rest and activity has been developed.

What needs to be done to regain the desire to live

How to regain interest in life? The advice of psychologists boils down to the fact that you need to learn to accept the world around you as it is, and treat yourself in the same way, perceive yourself as real in this world and begin to respect. Be grateful for all the events that happen in your life.

When a person has lost interest in life, what to do? Everything is very simple, in fact, life responds to what a person does in it, and all events do not happen by chance. To start living and enjoying what is happening, you just need to be a person with a capital H, believe in yourself and not commit immoral acts.

In order for the desire to live to appear, a person must be completely satisfied with himself and everything that he does. Of course, it is difficult to imagine a person who will be satisfied with everything that happens, but who is not successful. But many people believe that success is money. Everything is much simpler, a successful person is one who realizes himself and loves his type of activity. There are people who do not have much wealth, but consider themselves successful and enjoy life.

Success does not mean having an expensive house, car, yacht. All these are just little things in life compared to when a person was able to realize himself. A successful person always returns home with great joy and is glad to meet people close to him. Such people know what their meaning in life is, they have clearly defined goals that they strive for.

If you have lost interest in life, what is the simplest thing you can do? Even some of the world's leading psychologists advise not to lose your sense of humor in any, even the most difficult situation. And sometimes you can laugh at yourself.

How to regain interest in life. Channels of information perception

Fulfillment, joy and interest in life directly depend on how a person’s channels of perception work.

We offer a small test that will allow you to understand how your information perception channels work.

Answer quickly, without thinking too much.

1. Name 15 flowers that you saw during the day today. 2. Write 7 feelings that immediately come to mind. 3. Write 5 melodies that you heard during the day, the quietest and loudest sound. 4. Can you tell the time without looking at your watch? 5. Is it easy for you to navigate in an unfamiliar place?

If you completed all the tasks with ease, then your channels for perceiving information are open and working. If difficulties arise somewhere, then it’s worth turning your attention there.

Life becomes insipid because we close ourselves off from the world, we stop hearing, seeing, noticing and feeling. In this way, a person hides from the pain that he encounters in his life.

Remember how often you say the phrases: I don’t want to see this, I don’t want to hear this, I don’t want to feel this anymore, I don’t want to relive this, etc.

Every time we say these phrases, we

launch a destructive program,
close our feelings
we stop perceiving the world as it is.

Our body perceives our thoughts as an ORDER to action , whether we remember it later or not, the program continues to work.

Causes of apathy

Apathy

– a symptom that may indicate diseases of a somatic, neurological, mental level. Before starting treatment for an abnormal condition, the following causes should be excluded:

schizophrenia;
depressive disorders;
diseases of the central nervous system of organic etiology;
dementia of various origins;
AIDS;
oncological lesions of the brain;
alcoholism and drug addiction;
endocrine dysfunction.

Quite often, the causes of apathy are the use of certain medications, including: benzodiazepine tranquilizers, sleeping pills, tricyclic antidepressants, antibiotics, oral contraceptives. Therefore, if you experience fatigue, drowsiness, weakness and indifference while taking any medications, you should consult a doctor to change medications.

Among the psychological causes of apathy, the palm is held by the psychoanalytic concept, according to which apathy is a protective mechanism of the psyche, designed to neutralize intense personal experiences. According to adherents of this teaching, apathy helps to temporarily reduce the importance of the desires and needs of the individual, which allows you to change your worldview, thereby eliminating internal conflict.

Another group of psychologists believes that the cause of apathy is a consequence of excessive personal experiences, and its task is to reduce the intensity of manifestations of the emotional sphere. Since the process of experiencing emotions is associated with a significant expenditure of mental energy, there comes a moment for any person when the body’s resources are simply not enough for emotional reactions. Apathy is a kind of “switch” of the sphere of feelings to work in energy-saving mode.

Another opinion is that apathy is a way to prevent a nervous breakdown, restraining responsible and purposeful people from excessive labor feats. Often, sudden insensitivity occurs in initiative and enterprising subjects who dare in the professional field 24 hours a day. Due to the development of indifference to what is happening, the workaholic’s body receives the necessary rest.

In some cases, it is quite difficult to establish the causes of apathy, since the culprits of a person’s vital lethargy are hidden in the deep parts of the psyche - in the subconscious. By immersing the person in a hypnotic trance, it is possible to establish that the reasons for the current cooling to life are mental traumas of the past. That is, in the personal history there was some kind of psychotraumatic situation that caused the individual severe suffering. By creating apathy, the subconscious tries to protect the individual from new mental anguish.

Anastasia

03/06/2019 at 16:35

More people should read this article. The writing is a bit complicated in places, but it's worth it. This one, and this one https://testometrika.com/blog/why-i-don-t-want-anything/ won’t hurt either. And then those who only think that they have apathy, and then it magically disappears, then they blow the minds of those who really suffer from it...

There are people who inadequately evaluate their appearance and do not recognize the characteristics of their individuality. They are extremely sensitive to even minor flaws in appearance and invent the existence of imaginary defects. Excessive concern with appearance occupies all the thoughts of such a person and takes up a lot of energy and time for a stupid struggle to achieve fictitious ideals of beauty

Excessive intrusive attention to external

Often many people are faced with indifference to any matters. This is the norm until apathy sets in towards everything. This condition is considered pathological and requires treatment from a psychologist. In these cases, it is necessary to find out: why the apathy occurred, what to do if you don’t want anything, how to deal with the problem? Only a specialist can answer these questions. After all, apathy is a psychological syndrome. If left untreated, complications may develop. The most common of these is depression. And it is a serious illness that requires hospital treatment.

Hobby

As soon as it becomes even a little easier, find something to do. Try engraving a small picture, putting together a puzzle, doing cross stitch, planting a papaya tree, getting a rabbit. What would you do if you had the opportunity and extra time? You got it. Start collecting your herbarium.

To avoid getting bored alone, register on a website dedicated to your hobby. Here you will find like-minded people, get a lot of advice and learn a lot of new things. The benefits of passion: cyclical thoughts are broken, new relationships appear, the usual view of things changes.

Where to begin

With movement. Force yourself to move by any means and strength. It’s the same as jumping around in a room to music, doing general cleaning every day, or walking the streets. The main thing is to move. Fresh air is preferable, of course, but if you don’t feel firm in your condition yet, move inside the house. There is a plus from this: clean space – clean thoughts. In a couple of days there will be nothing to do in the apartment, and you will still have to go outside.

But there is no need to walk mindlessly. Count the number of trees on the right side of the alley. Then on the left. Determine by ear how many birds are singing in the trees. Write a story about the first person you meet, trying to determine by his appearance what he does, how he lives, character traits, etc. This exercise also has its advantages - it switches thoughts from your state, develops observation skills and develops logic.

How to restore and develop channels of perception

Good news: the ability to vividly perceive life, yourself and the world can be restored.

To do this, it is enough to open what you have closed inside yourself. Re-learn to see, hear, feel and sense, trust yourself and the world.

You can start with simple exercises.

Visual exercises (vision)

1. Choose any subject. 2. Concentrate visually on this subject. 3. Consider all the details, asking yourself questions:

What shape is the object (round, oval, angular, etc.)?
What color is the item, are there any shades?
Is it thick or thin?
Are there other features?

Repeat the exercise with other objects. Train yourself to look at the things around you in detail.

Auditory exercises (hearing)

1. Choose any place you wish (for example, a park). 2. Focus on your ears. 3. Take in all the details. Close your eyes and ask yourself these questions:

What sounds do I hear?
Are they loud or quiet?
Where are the sounds coming from?
Are the sounds long or short?
Are there other features?

Repeat the exercise first in the same place and explore other features of the sounds.

Psychologist's comment:

The question of how to get rid of apathy is not as simple as it might seem. Often such a phenomenon as apathy is treated as something ordinary and natural: well, a person doesn’t want anything, what’s wrong with that? Meanwhile, such a feeling is not inherent in a healthy person: he always wants something, unless, of course, he took a break to think about what is happening to him in order to enter some new stage of life.

Apathy is a condition in which there is a significant decrease in motivation for productive activities, a decrease in the ability to work, neglect of one’s appearance and other signs. This condition may be a sign of a serious illness, such as depression. And depression is a very insidious disease that can significantly reduce a person’s quality of life, and sometimes even leads to suicide.

Oksana wrote about the need to see a doctor at the very end of her story; I would like to remind you of the importance of contacting a specialist at the very beginning - even before dealing with apathy. How do you know when it's time to go to the doctor? There are two points by which this can be determined

The first point is time. If “apathy” lasts a couple of days, and then gradually fades away, then there may be no need to do anything special about it. If this condition continues for more than 2 weeks, then this is a serious cause for concern.

How do you know when it's time to go to the doctor? There are two points by which this can be determined. The first point is time. If “apathy” lasts a couple of days, and then gradually fades away, then there may be no need to do anything special about it. If this condition continues for more than 2 weeks, then this is a serious cause for concern.

The second point is the severity of apathy: if it manifests itself mildly, the person’s usual lifestyle does not suffer particularly, then, apparently, everything is not so bad. But if the apathetic manifestations are very strong, then it’s time to sound the alarm. Very strong - this is when a person cannot bring himself to wake up and get up in the morning, cannot go to work, has practically stopped eating and drinking, taking a shower, etc. In these cases, you cannot wait for weeks and you need to urgently consult a doctor.

What should be done in such a case? Seek help from a psychotherapist or (if you don’t have one) a psychiatrist. Find on the Internet the neuropsychiatric dispensary that serves your place of residence, call them and make an appointment. This doctor will prescribe medications that will help the body regain lost vitality and joy of life, and the question of how to get rid of apathy will be resolved automatically almost certainly.

Does a psychologist work with apathy?

But what should we do for those whose apathy is very mildly expressed, but has existed for a long time and pretty much poisons life? In these cases, it may be helpful to use some of the tips listed above. But sometimes it is much more useful and productive - even before fighting apathy - to try to understand why it arose and what reasons are behind its appearance.

Having figured this out, it will be much easier and simpler to understand how to deal with apathy. Nothing happens in the body for nothing, and if a person suddenly develops indifference to everything, then it is likely that this happens not only for “medical” reasons, but also for psychological ones - as a defensive reaction to something.

For what, for example? One of the reasons that can cause a feeling of indifference is a serious disagreement with or with a loved one.

Similar feelings can arise when you are seriously dissatisfied with your job or, in general, with the way of life you lead, when it may be missing something very important to you, and this can provoke the psyche into the appearance of total indifference. In this case, it is all the more important to understand what your body wants to tell you through this signal, and then, perhaps, it will become clear what needs to be changed in yourself so that feelings and desires return again

It means “dispassion, indifference”, originally meant freedom from passions, a detached worldview. In the modern understanding, apathy is an unnatural state of a person, which can become a serious psychological problem, and sometimes indicate mental illness - depression, . A person detaches himself from reality, becomes indifferent, ceases to react emotionally to surrounding events, to take part in life, willpower is absent or very weakly expressed.

Stop agreeing

Many of us take jobs we hate, buy useless things, and put up with bad attitudes. And life ceases to be enjoyable.

We worry about little things imposed on us by someone from the outside. We are convinced that absolutely everything can be achieved with the snap of a finger. Have you met at least one person who really succeeded?

Set your priorities. Decide what is most important to you at the moment.

Let go of the shackles and focus on what matters most.

What you agree to will take up your free time, attention and money. Only you can decide what it will be. Don't go wrong with your choice.

What to do if laziness wins

Laziness is not a serious disorder that requires immediate intervention from specialists. You can cope with it only with a great desire to defeat yourself. It is this inability to fight with oneself that turns a simply lazy person into a pathological lazy person. Therefore, the fight against laziness requires a very special approach:

Divide any complex task into several parts, this does not give you the opportunity to be afraid of difficulties and refuse to complete the task.
Use a system of rewards and punishments for your actions. If you complete difficult tasks, go shopping and buy yourself something you have long wanted, but are out of reach. If you are lazy, then the punishment should also be tangible for you.
Do not think about the planned task for a long time. The more a lazy person thinks about a task, the lower the likelihood that he will start doing it.
Make it a habit to learn something new every day. According to the Chinese method, to overcome laziness, you need to do something new for only five minutes a day. As a result, you will achieve results without unnecessary stress and will be happy with your acquired skills.

How to awaken interest in life

Available means

To escape from routine, it is quite possible to make do with “improvised means”. Try to devote more time to your favorite hobby, sign up for classes at a fitness club, start taking foreign language courses, a diving club, and so on. Try something new. It is best to give preference to group classes. A new atmosphere and social circle will help you shake yourself up and get rid of the blues. In addition, you can slightly change your home environment. Paint the walls a different color, complement the interior with bright accessories, replace the old gray bedspread with a new one in bright colors. Some women find it helpful to change their wardrobe, image, and clothing style. Just try to add small changes to your life. Don't let a gloomy mood bring you down. Music therapy will be an excellent help in regaining interest in life. Make a new playlist. Include only catchy, dynamic melodies, which, upon hearing, immediately make you want to start dancing

Avoid melancholic and sad tracks. It is important to try to receive a certain dose of positive emotions every day. Dedicate at least 15-20 minutes a day to reading jokes, anecdotes, laugh heartily

This will not only create a charge of positivity, but also relieve you of apathy and help you look at the world with different eyes.

How to regain interest in life and joy

People are used to turning everything off. It is not uncommon to hear the phrase “turn off your mind”, “stop looking”, “don’t listen”, “forget”, “cross it out of your life”.

That's how simple it is to close yourself off from the world. Life becomes insipid, boring, uninteresting, feelings become dull and a feeling is created that something is missing.

In search of sensations, women become addicted to TV series, men to computer games and gambling. All this gives only a temporary effect.

We, teachers of the “Eyes of the Soul” school, affirm that a person should have ALL channels of perception equally developed . This is important in order to:

find a common language with other people;
remember easily and quickly;
easy to navigate in space;
receive tips from your intuition;
live life richly and brightly.

To open the channels of information perception, the “Immersion in the Memory of the Soul” course will help you.

Vision is a visual channel of perception.

Thanks to vision, people have the ability to see, distinguish a large number of shades, and notice everything that happens around them. As people age, their vision deteriorates, but not because they lose the ability to see. Scientists conducted many experiments and were able to prove that it can be 100% even in old age.

Visual perception of the surrounding reality depends on how ready a person is to notice and accept everything that surrounds him. Any offense, manifestation of anger and irritation “closes people’s eyes.” Diseases associated with vision loss or deterioration occur because people do not like everything they see in their lives. In children, such diseases arise because they do not want to see what is happening in their families.

Taste for life - definition and problems

Taste for life is the ability to positively perceive impressions and actively act based on desires.
This is a psychological background that allows you to actively act, perceiving positive phenomena brighter than negative ones. A weak taste for life is characterized by apathy, boredom, laziness, a feeling of loneliness and isolation from the world. Too strong a taste for life will be expressed as: excessive greed, lust, adventurism, all-consuming desires, impulsiveness. And although too strong a taste for life makes it more likely to achieve the highest peaks in various areas of life, for most people this does not make sense, since a reasonable person understands that the essence of pleasure in life lies in happiness, and not in the pleasures that arise from excessive achievements. Thus, the subject of our search and achievement becomes a healthy taste for life. Lack of taste for life leads to a negative or neutral perception of the vast majority of events and people, which does not have the best effect on work efficiency, mood and relationships. With a negative perception of life comes apathy, boredom, laziness, which does not provide the opportunity to truly develop, change and improve life in different areas, because “I don’t want to”, “it’s normal as it is”, “nothing will change”, etc. Thus, having a taste for life is better than not having it, as it becomes possible to progress in different areas of life, including relationships.

Problems with the taste for life are that either there is no taste, or there is too much of it, which encourages overly active and, often, chaotic action, or the concept of the taste of life itself is distorted. To put it in very simple examples, a taste for life is when it’s good just like that and you want to achieve something, which makes it even better. When the desire to achieve something becomes a dominant factor that poisons life, and desires acquire intrusive motives, this is an excess of taste. If there are no desires at all and it’s not good to live just like that, there is no taste.

If we talk about the absence of desires as something highly spiritual, then it is worth understanding what “lack of desires” means. This means the absence of material desires, which prompt a person to act for selfish purposes, thereby turning away from the spiritual path. At the same time, the complete absence of both material and spiritual desires leads to the decline of both spiritual practice and material progress.