I promised you earlier in the year that Zen & M’s would tackle mental health as well as fitness and nutrition. Well, today I feel in serious need of a mental health day.

After a solid three days of school after coming back from vacation, I was and still am exhausted. And, on top of this lethargy, I have a 12-page research paper due at the end of the week, a mock trial scrimmage in Boston and this strange, unfamiliar urge to eat everything in sight.

There is only one cure I have found so far in my life to mental suffering of this degree, and this week, I would like to share it with my readers: cute pictures of baby animals.

One of my friends swears by this site, Calming Manatee, whenever she finds herself stressed and overwhelmed. How can one not feel better after these fat and amiable marine mammals offer you reassurance for all of your life’s problems?

For me, I usually just look up cute animals on Pinterest. You are certainly welcome to check out my page, but I felt it would be inappropriate to link the tool of my procrastination to a school-sponsored website. So, I found some new websites that will now be members of my bookmarks toolbar.

Just for you guys, I did some research and came across a blog named Cute Overload. The name does not lie — I have rarely stumbled across such concentrated cuteness. In fact, when I scrolled down the blog far enough to see a baby “pig in a blanket,” I wasn’t even sure if this edition of Zen & M’s would ever be finished. There were too many more animals to see!

But, if you REALLY want to reevaluate your current definition of cute, you need to google “red panda.” Anyone who knows me also knows that I have an (unhealthy?) obsession with these adorable, bamboo-eating munchies. For my birthday, my parents adopted one for me through the Red Panda Network. If you play around on the organization’s site, you can find some photo galleries of red pandas in their natural habitat. Or, you can come talk to me and I’ll send you all of the red panda pictures I’ve collected over the last year.

This concludes our mental health post this week, although I do recognize my crazy obsession with cuteness may have contradicted my goal.