Five powerful ways to make depression work for you

[C C]

http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/20...k-for-you/

EXCERPT: Yes, depression feels bad. But below that is an important message you need to hear. When you feel depressed, all you want to do is get rid of the heavy feelings. You want to feel energetic and hopeful again. Of course, you do! Wanting that is entirely natural. But “symptom relief” alone does not always lead to renewed excitement and authentic happiness.

As a culture, we’re fixated on getting rid of depression and discomfort via simplified answers — take a pill, change your diet, eat more protein (or less protein), socialize more, exercise. Those steps are good and important things to try, but they only help get rid of bad feelings temporarily.

What if your depressive symptoms are a message from your inner self to your everyday self? What if that heavy unhappiness is telling you that something in your life actually needs facing (and maybe even changing)? Maybe your depression is a hard shell covering delicate inner yearnings that want to come alive. Depression is the hated messenger, but the message is to lean in and discover what’s truly going on before shooing away your unhappiness.

Here’s how to do exactly that...

[Magical Realist]

The one thing that disappears when I start getting depressed is my usual interest in my life. A loss of that carefree anticipation and curiosity for whatever is coming up next. It's as if nothing happening in my day involves me anymore. "What's the pointness" takes over in even the smallest most routine of things: doing the dishes, grocery shopping, showering, etc. That's a hard message to bear, that you are a bored spectator to your own irrelevant life. A sense of being disconnected or alienated from one's own situation, the implication being that I'm isolating too much. So I go to a movie, or attend a mindfulness meetup, or walk in the park, or listen to CDs, or call my relatives, or take a road trip. I invest time in my life, in being with others, and enliven it with new value and intrigue..This is all in ADDITION to the surge of energy I get from Effexor, probably the main thing in my life that makes me motivated to keep engaging in the world and exploring it for new possibilities.