There are some micro-habits that fuel depression. Emma discusses them in this post. Read on to learn more about them.
A lot of people who end up with Major Depressive Disorder have no idea why they feel the way they do. Some have experienced trauma or a huge stressor, but a surprising amount of them say something like, “Everything in my life is fine. I have no reason to be depressed. But I just don’t feel happy anymore.”
Here’s my theory: depression happens when tiny, habitual behaviors—which we often don’t notice ourselves doing—add up over time and become overwhelming.
In this post we’ll look at 13 of these micro-habits that can pile up to flip the depression switch. I’ll also discuss how to intentionally turn those thoughts and behaviors around so your nervous system is more resilient and you can move forward feeling more alive and motivated.
The Depression Switch: When Overwhelm Becomes Shutdown
Researchers have explored the brain’s “giving up” circuit, which flips from “This is hard, but I’m going to keep trying” to “This is pointless. I’m going to give up.” When life feels too overwhelming, the nervous system reinforces shutdown and hopelessness.
This is actually great news because if we can manage just a few of these tiny habits, we can remove some of the weight fueling our depression, allowing your brain and body’s natural resilience to kick back in. So let’s take a look at the micro habits that add up over time to cause depression.
12 Micro-Habits That Fuel Depression
#1 Discounting the Positive
Depression isn’t just about feeling sad. It’s actually not being able to feel much happiness.
Where does this come from? Usually someone who’s depressed has been hurt so many times that it’s easier to stop hoping for good things to happen. The mindset becomes, “Better to expect the worst than to hope and be let down.” Over time, this warps into downplaying anything good that happens. Here’s what this can look like:
- Dismissing wins: “Sure, I got out of bed and went to work, but anyone can do that.”
- Rejecting compliments: “Oh, they’re just being nice.”
- Discounting positives: “I got a raise, but with inflation, it doesn’t matter.”
- Downplaying beauty: “What a pretty sunset. It’s probably just pollution.”
Dismissing the positive is an attempt to prevent hurt, to numb, to avoid any feeling rather than feeling both joy and sadness. I think a lot of people who develop depression are the beautiful, sensitive souls, who feel every emotion so deeply that they subconsciously start to numb themselves because they don’t know what to do with the pain of the world.
By constantly rejecting positivity, we train our brain to ignore the good and focus only on the negative. You’re trying to protect yourself from hurt, but you end up fueling the hurt in the long run.
#2 Self-Punishment
How do you treat yourself when you make a mistake? Do you say things like,
- “I’m such an idiot!”
- “I’m such a loser.”
- “What’s the matter with me?”
Berating ourselves for not being perfect can happen so quickly that it’s almost a reflex. Maybe you even think that it’s helpful, that if you yell at yourself enough then you’ll be motivated to be better. Usually this backfires.
Many believe self-criticism motivates improvement, but research shows it actually fuels shame and inaction. The problem is, when you experience pain (making a mistake), and you respond in a way that fuels more pain (self-punishment), you leave no space for healing and compassion.
#3 Blaming Yourself for Having Emotions
Another really common way that we accidentally fuel depression is how we respond to our feelings. People with depression often have a subconscious habit of blaming themselves for having emotions. Internally, this might sound like…
- “I feel guilty for being depressed.”
- “I’m weak for having anxiety.”
- “I should just get over this.”
These judgy thoughts pile extra negativity on normal emotions, making them harder to process in a healthy way. If you do this over and over, eventually it’s going to add up and your little shut-down circuit is going to flip the switch to depression.
#4 Withdrawing from Life
Depression often brings a habit of withdrawing from life. You switch from connection to withdrawal. The brain thinks, “If I just avoid difficult situations, I won’t get hurt.” Over time, this avoidance fuels loneliness and isolation. It might look like…
- Avoiding opportunities: “Why enter an art competition if I might not win?”
- Canceling plans: “They wouldn’t want to see me when I’m feeling down.”
- Not reaching out: “If they cared, they’d message me first.”
If you repeat this pattern over and over, you get stuck in a cycle of withdrawing and feeling worse, and then you feel bad, so you withdraw more. It’s a tiny habit that fuels a cycle that’s hard to get out of.
#5 Numbing Behaviors
Bottling up emotions is our parent’s generational coping skill. Maybe they said things like, “No one wants to hear it.” “Put on your big girl panties.” I heard one guy describe this as just shoving your emotions into a mental trash can, and then carrying that around.
Instead of dealing with emotions, many numb themselves with distractions. Do you do any of these?
- If you’re feeling stressed, do you eat something to feel better?
- If you’re feeling tired, hurt, or overwhelmed, do you distract yourself with your phone?
- Do you procrastinate dealing with stressful problems, or maybe avoid them altogether?
- If you feel like you’re never good enough, do you become a workaholic to suppress those feelings?
People with depression often get trapped in a cycle of trying to not feel bad, or trying to feel happy. Research shows this has much poorer outcomes than learning to work through problems.
When we were kids, and didn’t have the skills to solve a problem, our parents may have responded to our emotions by distracting us with a show, or giving us a snack, which are essentially numbing behaviors. But now that we’re adults, we can learn the skills to face our problems and practice solving them instead of avoiding them.
#6 Rumination
The reverse of numbing behaviors is rumination. This is where you overthink the past. It can look like mentally replaying your mistakes, dwelling on injustices, or spiraling about what could have been. All these fuel depression.
The brain mistakes rumination for problem-solving, and that’s why it keeps going back to these thoughts, but doing so keeps you stuck.
#7 Self-Neglect
This next one is super common, and I think Tim Ferris describes it well:
“For me, low mood [or] depression is not a first cause. It typically [starts with] some type of anxious rumination, worrying about something. [Then] I compromise my sleep because I have onset insomnia.Then I consume too much caffeine, which further compromises my sleep. And then, after three or four days, the low mood/depressive symptoms show up. So anything that compromises sleep I try to avoid.”
If you’re not familiar with Tim Ferriss, he’s a bestselling author of multiple books, host of a super popular podcast, and a multi-millionaire. And, he also struggles with low mood or depression at times. He makes a really good point about the importance of taking care of our basic needs.
Failing to take care of basics like sleep, healthy eating, and stress management worsens depression. Many people don’t notice their stress levels until they hit a breaking point. I interviewed an ER doc last year, and she said that often, when someone comes in having a panic attack, they think they’re having a heart attack. When she asks if they’re stressed out, they say no. But then she asks them about their lives and they reveal mountains of stress that they didn’t even recognize until they say it all out loud. The school pressure, work demands, relationship problems, unresolved trauma, money problems—it all piles up. We are pretty good at suppressing and not noticing these things, but they do catch up to you over time and this can fuel depression. So it’s important to take care of your basic needs like sleep and exercise to offset what chronic stress does to your body and mind.
#8 Waiting for Motivation
It’s easy to see how not taking action until you feel motivated will only backfire. For example:
- “I’ll wait until I feel like it before getting out of bed.”
- “I’ll wait until I’m happy to leave the house or see friends”
This is an easy trap to get stuck in. It’s so important to remember to act first, because motivation follows action, not the other way around. Behavioral activation, one of the most effective treatments for depression, works by encouraging small steps even when you don’t feel like it.
#9 Emotional Reasoning
Another micro habit that fuels depression is believing that your feelings mean something. This is called emotional reasoning, and it can sound like the following”
- “If I feel sad, my life must be pointless.”
- “If I feel anxious, I must be awkward.”
- “If I feel lonely, I must be unlovable.”
Let me state this strongly: feelings aren’t facts. Learning to separate emotions from reality is key to shifting out of depressive thinking.
#10 All-or-Nothing Thinking
Depression thrives on black-and-white thinking.
- “If I can’t get through a full workout, why bother at all?”
- “If I messed up at work, I should just quit.”
- “If one person rejects me, no one loves me.”
Recognizing and challenging these thoughts can help break the cycle. Usually, any small action is better than a perfect action. So if you don’t have time for a full workout, put on your sneakers and go for a short walk around the block.
Subconscious Mindsets that Feed Depression
The last two on my list are both about your mindset. Mindset is your reflexive thought pattern when adversity strikes. These are other toxic thinking patterns that fuel depression, but when you’re thinking them, you don’t notice that you’re doing it. It just feels like reality.
#11 Victim mindset
What do you do if you get fired from your job, or you get in a fight with your spouse? Do you get stuck thinking, “Life is so unfair! I can’t do anything about it. Poor me!”? That’s a victim mindset.
Now, there’s a difference between having been victimized and having a victim mindset. A victim mindset always comes up when you’re asked to make a change or take some positive action. “I can’t make that change because…” is very different from, “This thing happened to me.”
#12 Fixed mindset
A fixed mindset will keep you stuck in the belief that being depressed is just part of who you are, part of your personality. You believe that the feelings you’re experiencing are permanent and there’s nothing you can do about it.
But you can replace this belief with a growth mindset. You can instead ask yourself, “What skills could I learn to make things better? I haven’t figured out how to overcome my depression yet, but I bet there’s something out there that will help me.”
The Good News: These Habits Can Be Unlearned
These micro-habits can be emotionally and mentally heavy! When several of these little habits are part of your life they stack up and can flip your switch to giving up, and then fuel depression. BUT, when you can recognize these habits, you can change them.
Each of these habits are tiny, they’re micro-responses to the experiences we have in life.
- When you make a mistake, how are you going to handle that? Will you catastrophize and think it’s pointless to keep trying? Or will you be gentle with yourself and try again?
- Or what if you feel really lonely? Will you judge yourself as broken and withdraw from people? Or will you look for opportunities to remember the good times with friends and reach out to them?
- If you’re feeling unmotivated, will you just wait for that to pass? Or will you take some action before you feel like it?
These micro-habits make the difference between depression and resilience. When you are able to see them, to know what they are, and you start chipping away at them one at a time, the balance of your nervous system can literally shift from being overwhelmed, shut down and numbed, to feeling on top of life, more alive and motivated. Just pick one area to work on, and little by little your life can improve in big ways.
A Small Step Toward Healing
Do you see yourself holding on to any of these micro-habits? I encourage you to identify one thing from this list that you want to work on. You can also take a look at my Change Your Brain Course, where I teach tiny, research-backed daily habits to improve mental health.
The Change Your Brain Course is also included in the membership subscriptions. Click the picture below to learn more about them.
