Question: “Tips for dealing with recurring depression and reasons to live?”
Depression happens for many internal reasons, it doesn’t just spontaneously happen. Depression occurs when we allow certain life situations to take over us and then our brains start having a techno-house party and moves some chemicals around to create this imbalance that creates depression, anxiety, and other mental stuff.
There are dozens of studies out there now that show that meditation and mindfulness can really help with depression and anxiety. An important lesson to know is that we are not our thoughts. Ronald Siegel, an Assistant Professor of Psychology at Harvard Medical School defines mindfulness as “awareness of the present experience with acceptance.”
That’s a pretty accurate and awesome definition, I think. But then we might say, “I’m aware, I’m present, I’m accepting,” but we’re really not. We’re not aware, we’re starting at our computer screens. We’re not present, we’re worrying about the future. We’re not accepting, we’re cussing out people or drivers on the road.
Being mindful is taking the world around us in and being aware of it, but we’re not doing that. We’re listening to the stories we tell ourselves about the world and how we want it to be, instead of actually paying attention to life around us.
We all take our thoughts way too seriously. We have this crazy notion that our thoughts actually mean something. We think we are our thoughts and our thoughts are us. That’s why we sorry so much and experience negative emotions – because we take our thoughts about the world more seriously than the world itself. These thoughts range from thinking someone loves/hates us, no one caring about us, to thinking you’re the hottest piece of meat on campus – none of which may or may not be true unless we’re truly being aware of the world around us.
Why are you depressed? Why are you wanting to take your life? Life is absolutely beautiful, but you have to choose to see it as it is. Our world is full of anger, greed, chaos and destruction, but it is also filled with gorgeous mountains, forests, gardens, oceans and people – things that are only on this planet. We might not have the most fabulous of life, I mean does anyone really anyway – but at least we are alive, are well and have the capability and choice to change our lives to make it better. “I can’t” is not a valid excuse if you think you don’t have the means to do something.
If you want to go to college but can’t afford it, get a job and work your way to it or apply for scholarships, grants or loans. If you have time, you can visit cashcrazy.co.uk for the loan application. Even if you have bad credit or you have no title as long as you pay on time, lenders will welcome you. There is a means and a way for everything, it’s our job to be diligent to find the way. If we give up on our first or second try, the world didn’t give up on us, we gave up on us – and that’s not going to make us stronger. If you want to get over depression, face your fears and your feelings, conquer them and move on.
Be mindful of your thoughts. Ask yourself, “is this real or am I just making it up?” If someone angers you, don’t get angry back, instead laugh at them and remind yourself that the words they say are not who/what you are. If I called you ugly, does that actually, literally, physically make you ugly?! No! So why would it matter what I said, just acknowledge it, laugh it out, and move on. When we become mindful of our thoughts, we can then meditate on them to dig deeper into the real core causes of our feelings. We don’t just randomly become depressed. There was something that triggered our depression that we allowed to happen inside ourselves, and now we have to find what that was and eliminate it.
Smile and be well!