Lockdown: 5 ways to take care of your mind and body while you're cooped up at home

Instead of my usual GreenWatch eco column, I wanted to do something to help you deal with being cooped up at home.

So I’m sharing some simple things that you can do today to take care of yourself, based on the things that I have learned to do to protect my own mental health. Don’t wait until you start to crack – start taking care of yourself now and you’ll be in better shape for the weeks ahead.

You don't have to do all of these things at once. This is not about trying to be perfect. Just pick one that appeals to you and give it a go this week. Take a moment to notice how you feel afterwards. If it feels good, maybe you’ll want to add another one next week.

Get moving

Exercise not only helps us stay healthy, it also reduces stress hormones and boosts your mood. If you can go out, then try a brisk walk or jog, ideally in the morning, since morning sunlight helps to regulate your body clock. Thanks to the internet, there are a host of ways to keep fit at home. Here are some of the ones we’ve spotted over the past week...

* Free online fitness videos from the Body Coach Joe Wicks. The kids and I did PE with Joe at 9am every day last week, along with an astonishing 800,000-plus other households all over the world. It’s fun and an upbeat way to start the day – it certainly helped with the home schooling. Find it on his YouTube channel along with workouts for seniors and HIIT sessions for the grown-ups – https://m.youtube.com/user/thebodycoach1/videos.

* For simple strengthening moves to do at home, Dr Chatterjee’s five-minute kitchen workout is a good place to start – https://drchatterjee.com/5min-kitchen-workout/.

* Fun, follow-along dance classes with Strictly Come Dancing winner Oti Mabuse and her husband Marius, live from their sitting room. Kids classes are live at 11.30am each day, adult classes at 7.30pm, but you can watch them at any time on YouTube – https://www.youtube.com/user/mosetsanagape.

* If you are old enough to remember Mr Motivator (and his colourful unitards) from the 1990s, well, he’s back, as part of BBC’s snappily named HealthCheck UK Live every day at 10am.

Try yoga

It has so many benefits, stretching out tense muscles, calming your mind and moving emotions through your body. And no, you don’t have to be super-bendy.

Try the wonderful, free online classes offered by Adriene Mishler (and her dog Benji) at Yoga with Adriene. Her warm, relaxed, inclusive style has attracted more than six million followers and there are over 500 free video classes to choose from.

You could start with the 10-minute yoga for self-care – https://yogawithadriene.com/10-minute-yoga-for-self-care/ – or the 20 minutes' yoga for complete beginners – https://yogawithadriene.com/yoga-complete-beginners/.

Social media

Notice how checking social media and watching or hearing the news makes you feel. When it upsets you or makes you feel bad, turn it off. You aren't going to miss anything crucial and you will almost certainly feel better for taking a break.

If you feel it’s important to stay in touch with what’s going on, then choose to check in at set times each day, maybe twice, and turn it off for the rest of the day.

Get mindful

Simple meditation is an effective way to reduce anxiety and stress and to create some distance between you and the stories in your head. You don’t have to empty your mind (that ain’t never going to happen). Instead, it’s about noticing your thoughts and letting them go, over and over again. I find there’s some peace in that, just stopping and accepting whatever is here.

I finally developed a regular (ish) meditation practice with the help of the Calm App, which offers daily 10-minute meditations. They now have a wide range of resources available for free online.

Check out ‘Let’s meet this moment together’ – https://www.calm.com/blog/take-a-deep-breath – which includes meditations for fear and panic, meditations to help you get to sleep (and to go back to sleep if you wake in the night), gentle stretching routines, breathing exercises, sleep stories for grown-ups and mindfulness for children.

If all this sounds a bit daunting, or you really struggle to find the time to sit still for even 10 minutes (I hear you), then you could try 3-4-5 breathing – breathe in as you count 3, hold for a count of 4, breathe out for 5. Or just look out of the window, watch the trees and the clouds in the sky and breathe deep into your belly. Even that can be enough to calm your brain.

Be kind to yourself

Most important of all, be kind to yourself. Uncertainty and stress can make us do stuff we're not so proud of – overeating, drinking, snapping at the kids or your partner... you get the picture. Beating yourself up never helps.

Wrap yourself up in a big hug and talk to yourself the way you'd talk to your best friend. You are doing great. And being kind to yourself allows you to be kind to others. For more ideas on self compassion, try the free exercises at self-compassion.org.

I hope these ideas help you feel good through these challenging times.

Stay home, stay safe.