Recent years have shown a increase in mental health apps offering a wealth of resources from de-stressors, and sleeping aids to meditation guides. Therapeutic techniques are quickly becoming more accessible, portable and cost-effective and we want to give you a heads up on some of our favourites.
If you're looking to de-stress, improve your breathing and increase your wellbeing, read below our lowdown of Innermost's top 8 mental health apps...
1. Calm
Voted Apple’s ‘App of the Year’ in 2017, Calm is designed to reduce anxiety, improve sleep and help you feel happier. The app is made up of four key areas; meditation, breathing, sleep and relaxation and overall aims to bring a sense of joy, clarity and clam into your life.
2. Buddhify
Buddhify is a meditation app designed to fit into a busy modern lifestyle. Whether you’re on your morning commute, scrolling through your phone, trying to fall asleep or simply feeling overwhelmed, this app has the meditation session tailored to every situation. With over 80 tracks, you are bound to find something suited to your needs.
3. Breathe2Relax
Breathe2Relax is a portable stress management tool which provides detailed information on the effects of stress on the body. It’s made up of instructions and practice exercises to help users learn the stress management skill called diaphragmatic breathing to help bring a sense of calm and relaxation to day-to-day life.
4. 7 Cups
If you’re feeling lonely, stressed, sad or worried, 7 cups may be the app for you. With more than 160,000 licensed therapists and trained listeners, 7 cups provides anonymous online therapy and emotional support for issues ranging from bullying, panic attacks, eating disorders, relationship breaks and more.
5. SuperBetter
SuperBetter is an app that applies mental health in a gameful way. It brings the same psychological strengths you naturally display when you play games, such as optimism, creativity, courage and determination to your real life. By providing you with challenges, quests, boosts and even villains, this app is a fun way of keeping happy and forming better habits.
6. Remente
Remente allows you to tag your mood with feelings to quickly develop a deeper understanding of yourself and your emotions. It does this by first assessing how happy you are with life, then identifying the areas you want to improve and finally helping to set manageable tasks. If you’re looking for an app to help track your mood, then Remente may just be the one for you.
7. Sleepio
Sleepio uses a program of cognitive behavioural therapy that helps to lower stress levels and improve REM sleep, restoring your emotional balance for the next day. Researchers closely studied 164 insomniacs who used the app and found that its use drastically slashed their time taken to fall asleep.
8. Moodscope
Created by psychologists at King’s College London, Moodscope measures how happy you are with mood-adjective playing cards, letting you spot patterns and possible triggers for grumpiness.
Summary
Whilst a lot of people claim that the dominance of technology is a huge influence in mental health issues due to increased pressures, overwhelming screen time, harmful online communities and a host of other issues, one of the positives that has come from technology is the introduction of self-help apps to assist in the management of mental health issues.
Here at Innermost we regularly set time aside to engage with these apps to ensure we are feeling calm, collected and at peace, as we've noticed just how much of a difference taking some time out for yourself can be for your overall wellbeing and even your performance.
If you're really struggling to relax, we recommend you check out The Relax Capsules. Formulated with natural stress-busting ingredients such as Ashwaganda, Lion's Mane Mushroom and Valerian Root, this nootropic sets out to help you switch off from the struggles of daily life and improve your quality of your overall health. We all know all our health is linked, so it's important to take care of everything; your mind included.
References
- Anthes, E. (2016) Mental health: There’s an app for that. Nature 532, 20–23. Click here.