8 Simple Ways to Take Care of Mental Health for Animal Justice Advocates

Animal advocates, like you and me, started taking action for change because we noticed the cruelty and wrongdoings that non-human animals are facing. That’s why it’s very common for us to fixate on the issues we need to solve, which over time can leave us feeling tired, demotivated, or with burnout. We’d like to break it to you that it could happen to the best of us. So if you’re currently feeling down right now, you’re not alone.

Today, we’d like to send you a big warm hug, along with 8 simple ways to take care of your mental health as an animal advocate. Feel free to browse this post from a comfortable place, put on some soft relaxing music in the background, and grab your favourite drink 🍵

1. What seem to be the problems?

List them down one by one. This will help you gain better perspectives and self-awareness over the situation. You could use these prompt questions:

How am I feeling?
Who or what causes me to feel this way?
What are my thoughts about this situation?
What does feeling like this make me want to do?
Have I experienced these feelings before? If yes, how did I handle it?
What are some ways that could potentially help me get out of this? What solutions haven’t I tried yet?
Why did I start advocating for animals? How important is it to me, to animals, and to the world?

2. Set clear boundaries for the long-term.

Even for an amazing advocate like yourself, there will always be some things outside of your control. Being aware of what you can’t change helps setting your expectations and allows you to focus on the areas that you actually can do something about. Taking notes of what kind of situations you struggled with could help you handle it better in the future.

For example, I like sharing information about veganism to strangers on social media platforms. But I draw a line in engaging with trolls. As soon as they start being hateful and attacking me personally, I would disengage and not go back to read that conversation again.

3. Take a break.

You are not in this alone. While you’re resting, there are countless other advocates who are active right now in the movement. When you regain your energy and hop back on, others might need a break as well. We’ve got each other’s back :) Use this break as an opportunity to go back to your favourite hobbies or try new things.

4. Concentrate on meeting your basic needs.

Taking care of yourself must come first, like sleeping enough hours, exercising, taking a shower, eating healthy food, or cleaning the house. It’s possible that while you were super invested in the advocacy work, you forgot to take care of the person who made the advocacy possible – yourself!

Don’t forget to give yourself a compliment, a soft pat on the back, and reward yourself from time to time.

5. Seek your social support group.

Reach out to fellow advocates, or anyone in your life who also cares about the cause, offline or online. They are likely to have shared experience and might be able to give you the advice you’ve been looking for.

6. Talk to someone you trust.

They might not understand our cause or might not be vegan, but if you trust them, they could be a great person to support you emotionally. This could be your friends, family members, teachers, partners, or even your companion animals! 🐾

7. Looking back to your victories.

Whether big or small, they are all meaningful!🎊 Look back on what you’ve achieved, or what you feel great about, then list down all those victories, as many as possible. For example:

“I have low energy today, but I managed to send one email!”

“The campaign that my team spent months on went according to plan.”

“Someone came up to me and thanked me for sharing material about veganism with them. Now they’ve been on their plant-based journey for 2 months!”

“When I made a presentation in front of my class about animal rights, I felt so confident and proud that I overcame my fear of public speaking.”

8. Seek professional help.

Talk to a psychologist or a psychiatrist if the option is accessible to you. You don’t have to deal with everything alone, especially in taking care of your mental health. It might be rare to find a psychologist or a psychiatrist who has the same ideas when it comes to non-human animals, but their work ethic is to listen to clients without bias or judgement, so they could still be great listeners and give you great mental tools that work for your situation. However, if you don’t feel comfortable opening up to the first one you try, there’s nothing wrong with changing therapists and trying others until you find the perfect match (it’s almost like dating!)

It’s worth ending this article with a reminder that even though you cannot force anyone to change, people do have the potential to change. For most of us, there were days in our past when we didn’t care about non-human animals as much as we do now. But with time and learning, we’ve arrived at this point. Don’t you think that the same process could happen at different levels in our society?

We see you and we believe in you💚

What you do matters and we really appreciate your hard work to make this world a better place for non-human animals 🌎🌱

This article was translated and adapted (with permission) from a mental health guide for animal advocates written in Thai by Nanphanita Sukhitkunphruetthiphon (they/them). They are a Thai counselling psychologist and a journalist. They have been actively advocating for different social issues over the years, including for animal justice issues.