I felt utterly unmotivated to play with play-doh with my 4 year old or anything else for that matter. I was angry with myself for being so down and not my usual upbeat self. I was freaking out that today week 6 of our stay at home “experiment” started and that it might go on like this for so much longer. I was longing for some me-time and a nice relaxing vacation – a break from all of this! While I was contemplating what I could do I realized most of the play-doh had magically relocated itself to the floor!! NO!!! Then I reminded myself that I needed to revert to my “pick-me-up list”. 

The Pick-me-up List is something that I came up with on one of those days where I just felt down and energy drained. The idea is to make a list of all the things that can pick you up and immediately have a positive effect on your mood, motivation and energy. My list currently has 18 items on it that can be used in different situations. The more variety of activities that you have on your list, the more likely you will find something on it that appeals to you when you are feeling down. Keep the list somewhere where you can easily access it anytime.

I realized that #1 on my list “nice hot cup of tea” seemed not to have worked, #2 “meditation” would not be suitable, nor were #3-8, so I went to my number #9 “running” which should do the trick. Together with my 4 year old on his bike, a scarf as a face mask and some chalk to draw some clues for a scavenger hunt (as motivation for my son) I went outside and felt immediately better!  I also added #19 "go for a run and doing a scavenger hunt at the same time" to my pick-me-up list.