EPISODE FOUR

Please note this is a verbatim transcription from the original audio and therefore there may be some minor grammatical errors.

Dougie Jackson
The latest episode of the tickety boo podcast will play after this message.

Andy Griffiths

Without mental health, the end of the day we get one shot at life. And anything we want to achieve requires a level of physical and mental well being.

Dougie Jackson
My name is Dougie Jackson. As always, I’m in conversation with therapist Andy Griffiths. And very shortly, he’ll be guiding us through the second episode of our two part special devoted to exercise, diet, mindset, sleep and routine. Now, before we take off the last remaining items on that good mental health checklist, let’s briefly remind ourselves of two very important basics. Number one, personal responsibility.

Andy Griffiths
For anybody right now listening to this, that struggling, we have to take personal responsibility for our mental health. Nobody else can do it for us. There isn’t a magic pill, there isn’t a wand that can be waved, we have to go enough. And we have to start doing things to make changes. And that’s going to take a bit of effort, we can get help. But bottom line, we need to take responsibility.

Dougie Jackson
And basic number two motivation.

Andy Griffiths
We can’t bottle motivation. Motivation is not something you have more than I do. How does motivation turn up? We start by doing something. The weird thing is, I go out running a couple of times a week. Do I feel motivated to do it? No, I just do it because I know it’s good for my mental health. Weirdly, when I start doing it, motivation starts to turn up. But if you wait for motivation, you will procrastinate. Motivation turns up when you take action. So action leads to motivation. Waking up today and saying I’m no longer happy living my life like this, I want it to change will create motivation.

Dougie Jackson
So we’ve decided to take responsibility for our own mental well being. And we’re going to motivate ourselves into action. Let’s now recap on our discussion topics last time around here on tickety boo.

Andy Griffiths
Exercise it gets our brain firing off feel good chemicals. If your diet is not right. And nothing is it’s not simple. You know, nutrition is a key factor in improving your overall health. Without the correct mindset, everything is just harder,

Dougie Jackson
picking up where we left off. Let’s look at the importance of sleep. When it comes to successfully dealing with anxiety or depression.

Andy Griffiths
Somebody who’s struggling with mental health is going to bed with a lot on their mind. When we go to sleep. our subconscious unconscious mind is trying to resolve emotions and thoughts from the previous days, people that ruminate and catastrophise I’ve got a lot of data spinning around I call them anxiety loops, these cognitive loops of thought feelings, emotions kind of running around in the head. And our minds are trying to resolve that. But you want to get to sleep

Dougie Jackson
and when sleep is eluding you, you begin to worry about it. So it eludes you even more. And down that rabbit hole you go.

Andy Griffiths
And when we’ve done it for quite a long time, it almost becomes a habit a negative behaviour pattern of there’s this expectation that I will not get to sleep or or not a good night’s sleep. So a few things that you can do is one, choose a time in the evening when that’s the wind down towards sleep. If you if you plan to go to sleep at 10:30 don’t be you know, doing your work or running around 100 mile an hour till 10 o’clock at night, you know, agree a point in the evening that’s going to be the wind down. What we’re doing is we’re setting up indicators to the brain. We’re now getting ready for sleep mode. Yeah, so I’m not doing anything that’s too mentally taxing. I’ll create a quick list of things I need to do tomorrow. So a brain dump. I’ve offloaded things. Yes, I’m not going to bed without my mind and electronic devices, get them away from you.

Dougie Jackson
Almost all electronic devices emit some level of radiation which will have an adverse effect on the quality of your sleep. The only answer ban those devices from the bedroom.

Andy Griffiths
Laptops, smartphones on the run up to bedtime with that blue light affect the brains sleep pattern. So if you are using electronic devices, make sure you’ve got the blue filter enabled, because that will help. And there are apps that you can download to help do that. Turn notifications off on your phone a couple of hours before you go to bed, you know, you think about it half nine, you’re getting yourself into that sleep mode and ping, you know, a WhatsApp or an email comes in from a family member or a colleague. And it starts this process of thought of that tomorrow, you’re going to have to deal with something so your brains already running it through. So move your phone away from your bed. Yeah, how many people charge their mobile phone up on the bedside table next to them get it out of the room or on the other side of the room, move your phone charger, and keep your bedroom fairly cool. The lower the temperature, easier sleep is, turn the thermostat down in the bedroom. So it’s just a bit cooler the rest of the house because that will aid sleep.

Dougie Jackson
And as you head towards bedtime. It’s also important to wind down from your day

Andy Griffiths
I talk to some of my clients now the strategy and nine o’clock they go upstairs to get out of the work clothes, got the house go on maybe their PJs, indication to the brain sleep cycle. This is the start of it.

Dougie Jackson
Okay, what if you do all of that you fall asleep quickly and easily. But then you’ll wake up at 3am? What do you do in that situation? What’s the best strategy there, stay in bed or get up?

Andy Griffiths
What I would say to you is if you are struggling with sleep right now, the worst thing you can do is lie in your bed and try and wrestle yourself to go to sleep. What I’ve noticed is if I’m struggling to get to sleep, I get up, I’ll go downstairs and I’ll normally try and do something a bit boring. Because I’ll say to the brain, we’ve got two choices, we can either go to sleep, or we can do this boring thing. I’ve been known in the early hours of the morning to be sat there looking at a spreadsheet for my tax return and the brains gone really. So I want the incentive asleep to be more inspiring than I’ve gone downstairs and stuck on a box set that I really like. Again, everyone is slightly different. So you’ve got to find what works for you. Be consistent with it. Don’t just do it one day a week, you know, because let’s be honest, if your sleeps not right, nothing is a good night’s sleep can fix a lot of stuff.

Dougie Jackson
And on to the final topic in a two part tickety boo special the importance of routine. without routine

Andy Griffiths
Without routine we have chaos. And we seen that in the world when our routine was removed from us on certain things that have been going on. But we’re creatures of habit, and a sound routine will have a significant impact on your mental health. Having no routine is more draining, and more physically taxing and emotionally taxing than you could ever imagine. It creates stress, it affects our sleep. We have bad diets, we don’t have time to prepare good healthy food. We don’t look after our physical health and our time management is hellish. The truth is a good daily schedule is a blueprint for good mental health.

Dougie Jackson
So exercise, diet, mindset, sleep, and routine, the big five all are equally important when it comes to keeping you in tip top condition. Ignore them at your peril.

Andy Griffiths
Here’s the reality. Without doing all of these things, and having some kind of balance, you’re not going to have purpose in your life, you’re going to procrastinate, you’re going to lack motivation, and you’re not going to manage your time properly, you’re going to eat badly, you’re gonna feel like crap. And the only person who can do something about it is you I can shine a light on it and go, this is the stuff you need to be looking at. But I can’t do it for you. And for a large portion of my life. I was waiting for somebody to come along and sort that stuff out for me, and guess what. Nobody did. So you may be sitting there listening to this going, diet, exercise sleep routine, how can these help my mental health, you’d be surprised of the impact they will have on your life right now. Taking some form of action is the only answer in this situation.

Dougie Jackson
But there is further help at hand. if you head over to

Andy Griffiths
If you head over to the tickety boo podcast website, on the free stuff pages, we have the seven ways to live a happier life PDF that you can download, I go into a lot more detail in each area.

Dougie Jackson
And that’s it for this episode. Next time on tickety boo.

Andy Griffiths
And as you focus on that point on your hand, just take a nice deep breath all the way in. And then all the way out. And again, just take another nice deep breath all the way in and all the way out. And as you breathe out, just allow those eyes to close down. That’s right.

Dougie Jackson
If you have any questions, suggestions, stories or helpful information, or if you have a media request, please contact us by email on [email protected]