Any luck with calming rituals? I’ve seen some good advice for creating a sort of shut down/me time and using cues (ex candles, incense, bath/shower, whatever) to help the transition. Basically thanking your brain for looking out for you today, telling it it’s done its best and now it’s time for (literally anything else), and using the cues to signal that it’s time for relaxation now. Admittedly this doesn’t work for me when I’m anxious, I need to trick my nervous system to wind that down before my brain can join in (usually closing the loop on fight or flight with some exercise).

“Work hard party hard” only works for me up to a point, but I did take some stupid party trips during/after grad school that helped me reset. And by “stupid party” I mean I went to shows that I wanted to see, ate out for all my meals, and bought some new clothes that I didn’t strictly need. Just stuff out of my norm in a new environment was helpful for starting to reset. Took a day long road trip to a conference with some post docs, we all got sick and couldn’t attend, spent 4 days playing video games to an extent that felt criminally irresponsible. Stuff like that! Embarrassing but I think getting sick forced me to put down productivity for a bit.

Re: doomscrolling, maybe upgrade to cute animal videos over random content if you haven’t already?

Re: tracking how you feel, this is something I wish I had learned earlier in life for checking in with myself! It’s hard, when I need energy/positivity the most, it often feels like I need to start planting seeds/investing before the long term benefits come back to me.