Many people struggling with depression or other mental health problems have the experience of low energy, fatigue, and a lack of that spark that can help get us moving. This experience can be extremely disheartening. Getting out of the pit of depression often involves getting moving, being more active, seeing people, and doing things that you find meaningful. Even if you know this and feel motivated to do these things, a low energy level can feel like a huge roadblock. Energy can also haunt us on the other end of the spectrum. Sometimes, we feel the type of energy we’d rather be without, such as anxiety before speaking in front of people, restlessness, anger, rage, and so on. Our energy also can get us in trouble. During manic episodes, people often feel keyed up, energetic, and ready and able to do many things. The problem is that they sometimes end up doing all sorts of things that seem like a good idea at the time but have disastrous consequences later on. I don’t experience mania, but I often have felt more keyed up, nervous energy than I want to after having too much coffee in the afternoon, before giving a talk I haven’t given before, prior to important meetings, or before exams (fortunately, I am usually the one giving exams these days, but I do get tested and evaluated in other ways). Some people think of emotions in terms of energy. There are high energy emotions, like anxiety, fear, agitation, anger, and others. There also are lower energy emotions, like sadness.
What can we do when our energy level isn’t cooperating with our goals? Well, there are many options. If I feel more nervous energy than I want to, I can use emotion regulation or self-soothing strategies to dampen this experience a bit. Breathing and relaxation strategies are especially helpful. I could also make the experience more bearable by changing the way I think about it. I could appraise anxious feelings before a talk as my body’s way of preparing me to do a good job, rather than an annoyance. In an excellent Ted Talk (https://www.ted.com/talks/kelly_mcgonigal_how_to_make_stress_your_friend?language=en), Dr. Kelly McGonigal describes how re-appraising stress as your body’s way to help you prepare and cope can have important psychological and physiological benefits. I could also use anxious energy to amp up my enthusiasm and perform even better than I would if I were completely calm. If your energy level if lower than you’d like it to be, changing your behaviour is often an effective first step. Getting moving physically, exposing yourself to daylight, exercising, seeing people, or even having a glass of water can help to boost your energy level. If you’re depressed, the boost likely will be short-lived, but over time, with practice, the research findings suggest that your fatigued, depressed brain will catch up to your behaviour.
Others have suggested that, when we feel a lot of energy about a particular situation, it could be useful to do a little self-reflection, asking yourself what this energy is all about (Lynch, in press). A friend and colleague of mine, Dr. Thomas Lynch, has suggested that attending to the things we feel energy about might give us important information about ourselves. He recommends that we engage in “self-inquiry,” which involves trying to understand where the energy is coming from. If, for example, you felt some energy about someone saying disparaging things about you in a meeting, it could be helpful to ask what that might be all about. Is it because this situation threatens your competence? Is it because you’re concerned about others’ thoughts about you? Perhaps you’re perceiving some kind of threat to your job or career. Understanding where the energy is coming from can help us. To be honest, I really don’t know what “energy” is when it comes to our psychological experience on a day-to-day basis. It’s not as if there’s some kind of shimmering, sparky fluid running throughout our bodies and brains. Energy is probably just a word or idea we use to describe physical sensations caused by many external and internal factors. But, I do believe that understanding what’s up (or down) with our energy can help point us in useful directions. ~ Alexander L. Chapman, Ph.D., R.Psych.