20 Mental Health Mantras to Keep Top-of-Mind This Holiday Season

This time of year is no stranger to anxiety, stress, and depression, with a dizzying array of demands—cooking meals, shopping, baking, cleaning, and entertaining. Not to mention the added stress of COVID. You may be worrying about your and your loved ones’ health, or you may also feel stressed, sad, or anxious because your holiday plans look different than they have in the past.

Research on disasters and epidemics shows that in the immediate wake of a traumatic experience, large numbers of affected people report distress, including new or worsening symptoms of depression, anxiety, and insomnia, and other mental health conditions such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or major depressive disorder.

Mental Health Mantras & More

To work through these feelings, mental health experts suggest focusing on self-empowering activities like journaling, moving the body, practicing mindfulness, and even using divination tools such as mantras and oracle or tarot cards.

[Read: “Oracle Cards for Beginners.”]

One tool that can help you through anxiety and depression brought on by the holiday frenzy is the daily repetition of mantras—specific words or affirmations that can be used to aid in meditation.

Intentional Mantras for Holiday Stress

Science is now proving that thoughts and feelings have power over us. And in today’s collective world, feelings of anger, frustration, sadness, and blame are commonplace. It’s important to recognize that they will naturally come and go. By choosing your thoughts with positive affirmations and deliberately focusing on the solution vs. the problem, you are taking charge of your life with intention, as they help you master your feelings and slowly reframe this experience.

Try any or all of these mantras to help you stay balanced through the holiday season:

• I take it one day at a time.
• I let go of what I can’t change and change what I can’t accept.
• What people say or think about me has nothing to do with me. It is a reflection of them.
• Anxiety isn’t trying to block me but free me from a situation that no longer feels aligned.
• I am not off track, behind, or to blame. I did nothing wrong. All is in right order.
• I forgive myself and others.
• I forgive myself and my past. I am protected and always provided for.
• I am doing the best I can. And I am enough. For today, I have done enough.
• There are no mistakes, only growth.
• I embrace the space between where I was and who I might become.
• I free myself from fear. Every choice I make is inspired from love.
• I am willing to live my life in healthier, more aligned ways.
• I embrace my feelings. They are safe to process.
• I am always being nudged into a new awareness of self.
• Things fall apart because better things are falling into place.
• I am growing and becoming more of who I am supposed to be.
• I let go of all that no longer serves me.
• It is safe to express myself in the world.
• I don’t need to try to fit the world. I can be me and let the world fit to me.
• My needs matter, and I deserve to be happy and healthy.