Outsmarting the Melancholy Feels

I can’t tell if I’m lazy or depressed. I’m rarely motivated to do the things I want to do and I’d rather be a loaf on my couch and rewatch youtube videos all day. 
I want to improve myself metally, physically, emotionally. But I also don’t. Because I’m not in the mood. I’m too tired. I’ll do it tomorrow. Whether it’s pure laziness or semi-frequent-despair, I can’t let me ruin myself. That won’t make anything better. That will just make me feel more worthless and defeated and incapable of living well. 
So, I have to trick myself into doing better even when I don’t feel like it.
I’ve said this before, but small acts go a long way. If your brain is just as easy to hijack by using that same brain like myself, the following could be of use to you.
Feel-productive-tactic part one: lists. I make lists for everything. What I need to do that day, what I need to do that night, the chores I have, the food I need to buy. Making lists for everything means that you then have all the more to cross off thus giving yourself a sense of accomplishment. The more specific, the more numerous, the more productive. It’s a simple thing that can make you feel like you’ve done a hard day's work by executing mundane tasks like taking out the garbage or doing laundry. At the end of the day, even if you’ve essentially done nothing, if you have a ridiculous enough list, you’ll always have completed something. Start with miniscule things like getting out of bed or brushing your teeth and work your way up to more complex and difficult tasks. Having something to cross off allows you to be happy for yourself even just for a second. And every second of that is worthwhile.
Feel-productive-tactic part two: face masks. I do mean sheet and peel-off masks when I say this, but doing a face mask is such an easy way to treat and take care of yourself. All you have to do is sit there once it’s on. This is great given you can loaf on the couch and still be doing something positive for your body. It’s a grand way to do a lot by not doing a lot which can give you that sense of productivity.
Feel-productive-task part three: get a plant. I recently adopted five new plants. I already possessed three. Most are succulents, a couple cactuses, and a pothos. All very easy to take care of. Having a plant gives you something to watch over. It forces you to be mildly responsible, if you get a low maintenance plant, for something other than yourself. It also keeps you from being utterly alone. I live by myself, but I’m not the only living thing here. It’s a little piece of nature neatly stored within a room and nature makes us humans happy. So throw a growing thing on a bookshelf or a coffee table and indulge in that potted happiness. 
Feel-productive-tactic part four: chores. These fall under a separate category to “lists” because of their greater necessity. Doing laundry, grocery shopping, watering the plant you just bought, vacuuming the one rug you have. The fundamentals of appearing put together. Even if you can’t decide whether you’re depressed or lazy, carrying out chores is oftentimes too much work. I refuse to empty out my tiny recycle bin until I have a mound of whatever tumbling from it solely because it’s too much effort to take the elevator down, walk to the disposal area just outside the front door, unlock the gate, and sort my containers out. It generally takes about five or so minutes but that’s five or so minutes too much. Yet the feeling I get when I finally do empty it is a wonderful sense of “I did it”. Seeing it sit empty under my sink and knowing that I don’t have to worry about it for another week or so is wonderful. The same goes for washing my dishes after letting them pile up for three days or clearing the shedded hairs from the wall of my bathtub. Chores require more work, but the payoff is unexpectedly satisfying.
Feel-productive-tactic part five: lists part two. Bucket lists are all well and good but something that I enjoy doing is making a long ass list of wants and goals and tossing in absolute ridiculousness. It’s quite interesting to go back and read them because more than once, I’ve accomplished something I completely forgot about. These lists aren’t as much for  tasks, which is why they differ from the lists part one. They are what we dream about doing both far into the future and possibly in the next few years or months. The dreams are what keep them interesting though as they stand as a reminder of what you wanted throughout your life. Amongst my list of life goals I have travelling to different places with different groups of friends and family, buying my land and building my cabin, getting certain tattoos, and growing a pair of wings. Some are a lot easier to accomplish than others but giving yourself something to look forward to, even if it’s damn near impossible or fantastical, makes bettering yourself all the more worthwhile. It cements a future despite that future being far from concrete. It shows what makes you happy and fulfilled and motivated. It’s made up of the things you cross off last, but feel the most triumphant when you do. So make a stupid list of wonderful things you want to do and see and watch as you find yourself checking off more and more things as time goes on. And even though the list will never fully be completed, it will grow evermore with the desires that keep you moving forward and that is a wonderful way to feel productive.
So here you are, armed with the knowledge of what I do to feel like a functioning human. Perchance you will deem this helpful. Mayhaps not. I reckon someone will though, at least a portion of it, which suffices me all the same. 
This day and age has made it hard for a lot of us to want to exist. It’s hard too, to try and not grasp at succeeding in everything all at once. We have to take one step at a time. One day at a time. One thing at a time. It’s such an overwhelming world that shoves perfection of life down our throats and makes us feel insignificant or weak or unable. For those of us that struggle just to wake up, these small feelings of productivity, these small accomplishments are essential. Just because we don’t thwart a burglary or fight in a war and instead have to muster up the strength to pour cereal into a bowl for breakfast or shower for the first time in days, does not make our actions any less impressive. People won’t always understand the will it takes to live at the most basic level, but I am here to remind you that there are people that do. We are alone together, the many of us that try to survive being human.