How many rocks make a pile?

Not one or two, but at some point, after we keep adding rocks, we realize that we’ve got a pile of them.

Similarly, sometimes we don’t realize that little things in our lives are adding up and up until we suddenly wake up one day to find them piled on top of us. 

And we can’t breathe.

In that kind of situation, you may feel like you’re completely overwhelmed and exhausted. You might be able to identify changes in your life that you’d like to make, but they’re just too big and insurmountable to manage.

Luckily, psychology has some insights for you.

It turns out that, just as little things can add up to make a big pile of pressure, they can also work the other way.

By breaking those big changes into smaller and more manageable chunks, you gain realistic targets that you can actually achieve.

Ready to make some small changes, little by little? 

Here are five little things that can make a big difference in your life according to psychology that you can start on right now.

1) Practicing gratitude

When things aren’t going great in your life, it can be pretty hard to find anything to be grateful about.

But according to psychological studies, that’s precisely when it would help the most. They’ve found a clear connection between gratitude and well-being.

“Gratitude is the appreciation of what is valuable and meaningful to oneself and represents a general state of thankfulness and/or appreciation.”

This is what psychologists mean when they talk about gratitude. So, what does it mean to “practice gratitude”?

For some people, the idea of practicing a feeling or a state of being doesn’t make much sense. If you normally feel really appreciative of the positive things you have in your life, you might say you’re living or experiencing gratitude.

Practicing gratitude is a process of intentionally drawing your attention to things that you can feel happy and thankful about. 

Psychologists have defined gratitude exercises or interventions to help people learn to focus on gratitude in their lives. These include things like writing thank you letters, journaling about things you feel thankful for, or even simply writing a list of three things daily that you feel grateful about.

They’ve found that these simple actions take focus away from negativity and turn it toward positive things. It may even reduce materialistic strivings, reduce anxiety, and even improve your sleep quality.

Those are all things to feel thankful for!

2) Spending time in nature

Getting outside a lot?

If you’re not what would generally be called “the outdoor type,” you might want to still make at least a bit of an effort to get out into nature.

According to one study, people who spend at least 120 minutes (that’s two hours, Bubba!) a week in nature report better health and great well-being.

But what is nature, exactly?

Does your backyard count?

It could, if you actually have enough trees, plants, rocks, and other natural things you can interact with back there. In general, though, we’re talking about forests, parks, beaches, lakeshores, mountain environments, or anywhere else that has a largely natural landscape and few human-made structures.

The important thing is actually interacting with these environments using your senses and observing and paying attention to them. Playing games on your phone in the woods doesn’t really count and neither does jet skiing near the beach.

Studies show that the more people spend in nature up to 300 hours a week, the better health and well-being they report. After 300 hours, there seems to be little extra gain.

Of course, people have known about nature’s healing power since ancient times. The Greek father of modern medicine, Hippocrates, believed nature could heal disease, and in Japan, “forest bathing” (shinrin-yoku) has been used for stress relief for centuries. 

If you live in the heart of the concrete jungle, the good news is that the effects of getting into nature are greater for people who live in completely green-deprived spaces.

So, if you need to relax and feel better about life, getting away into nature for just a couple hours a week can make a really big difference.

3) Taking care of yourself

It shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone that taking care of yourself can make you feel happier and healthier.

Then why is it such a struggle to do this in our daily lives!?

While technological advancements promised us that they’d make our lives easier and more relaxed, it seems like the opposite is true. Now communication is lightning fast, and we carry the wealth of the world’s knowledge at our fingertips, we seem to be busier and more stressed than ever.

There are so many distractions around that we also have trouble finding time to focus on ourselves.

But psychologists say that we should really try to do it anyway.

Self-care can improve our health and psychological wellness. It can help reduce stress, anxiety, and even symptoms of depression. 

What is self-care?

Any activity that makes you actively think about yourself and perform activities that make you feel better. These can be things like yoga, meditation, exercising, journaling, and mindful breathing. Even a dedicated skincare routine can be a form of self-care – you take time to focus on you and make yourself feel better, in this case, physically.

From a scientific point of view, it seems that these self-care activities relax your central nervous system, and the effect is that your physical and mental stress can be greatly reduced.

Sounds good, right?

Take some time for you today – you won’t regret it!

4) Sleeping 

If you sleep eight hours every night, you’ll spend a third of your life in a strange state that seems like a combination of hypnosis and paralysis.

However weird it might seem, this state of sleep is one of the most important things you can do each day to keep yourself happy and healthy.

So why do so few of us make sure we get enough sleep on a regular basis?

According to research by the CDC, “34.1% of children, 74.6% of high school students, and 32.5% of adults fail to get a sufficient duration of sleep on a regular basis”. That’s not great, especially the teens!

The recommendation you normally hear is 7-9 hours for adults and more for teens and kids every night. But with all those flashing screens, bright lights, and loud sounds attacking us from every direction, it’s no wonder we struggle to get our Z’s.

At the same time, not getting that important sleep is linked with a “wide range of disorders, including hypertension, obesity, and type-2 diabetes, impaired immune functioning, cardiovascular disease and arrhythmias, mood disorders, neurodegeneration and dementia, and even loneliness.”

Can you change your habits so you can get a few more winks every night?

Yes, and while there are lots of ways to do it, try to just start one at a time.

Try turning off all screens an hour before you need to get to sleep. Remove lights and distractions from the bedroom – make it for sleeping only. Try light stretching or mindful breathing exercises to help you physically relax before bedtime.

Set yourself a target – even adding 30 minutes of extra sleep each day could make a huge difference over the long term.

5) Spending time with people you care about

Do want to give your life a boost?

According to psychology, spending quality time with people you really care about is one of the simplest ways to improve things in your life. 

These can be friends, family, your boo – whatever. But the effects can be really significant.

Spending time with people can obviously decrease loneliness. 

But that’s not even scratching the surface.

One study into family relationships suggests that “Those receiving support from their family members may feel a greater sense of self-worth, and this enhanced self-esteem may be a psychological resource, encouraging optimism, positive affect, and better mental health.”

That’s a great start!

Co-parents also gain a lot of benefits by sharing time together. While this might be a real challenge as they need to balance childcare and work, it seems to be worth it. That shared time helps them connect and reduce stress.

While you might be inclined to take alone time when you feel tired or stressed out, even serious introverts benefit from spending quality time with others.

Conclusion

These five little things can make a big difference in your life, according to psychology.

Not one of them is extreme or wild. They don’t require massive changes to your life or your self-concept.

Instead, these tiny little changes just require you to think a bit more about what’s really good for you. Once you do, you’ll realize that it’s way easier than you thought to make real, measurable changes to improve the quality of your life!