If you are looking to get rich quick, it is a terrible idea to become a writer. People do buy books, but often it takes many interactions with a new author before they will purchase one, even then the profit on that book will only be a few dollars at best.

Given enough time, life will cause us to suffer in one way or another. We will all become injured or sick at some stage, sometimes quite seriously.

Some of us will suffer significant setbacks, both personally and financially. A large percentage of the population lives with disabilities, mental illness and issues carried over from their past.

Before you can properly address a problem, you first need to accept that the problem exists.

This is true for all aspects of life, but in my experience, particularly true for addressing the impact of past trauma, and dealing with mental afflictions…

It is easy to get caught up in the emotion of the moment and then to overstate its importance.

Take being cut off in traffic as an example. The feelings of anger and self-righteousness can linger for hours. For some people, a minor incident can even lead to outbursts of yelling, hitting, swearing, anger, and even physical conflict…

When the symptoms of a mental affliction begin to arise, it is important to take action to address the problem as soon as possible. This way the severity, duration and impact of the affliction will be minimised. Unfortunately given the nature of mental illness, it is often very difficult, if not impossible to even realise that action is needed, or to develop the motivation to do so….

Multi-tasking simply doesn’t work. Not for you, not for me, not for anyone.

Although it may feel like you can do more than one thing at a time, you actually can’t – at least not well. In reality you are doing two things poorly, and often taking longer to do them compared to if you did them one after another…

You are allowed to relax.

It is okay to look after yourself, and you should be occasionally spoiling yourself. Rest, recover and heal. Self-care is a vital component to ‘Defeating Depression’ as well as preventing all forms of mental affliction. Yet self-care is often overlooked, discounted or put so low on the priority list that it never gets done.

I know I am guilty of this…

Reading is a healthy form of escapism. If you find a good book, or better yet an author that you connect with, you will have a tool to escape your current situation and draw you into a new one. This allows you to put aside your current woes, stressors and issues, to instead immerse yourself into a new world. True, this world may have challenges of its own, but from the vantage point of the reader, you get to safely experience another life…