Depression: Got a description of it? (or a story?)

Hey Brian.  I have already mentioned a few times my bout with depression activated by my older brother's suicide 17 years ago (due to his severe battle with depression from 15 years old to 40).  Mine felt like sitting outside the principal's office with a sense of inescapable dread and deep dark self-loathing.  I went so deep at one point that I lost track of time, sort of a dark night of soul thing for a while.

I romantically clung to the image of jumping off a tall building and turning out the lights that way.  A book that really helped me alot is The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle. The book is sort of a Q&A format where the questions coming from his readers are answered by him.  The process of reading the questions and answers brings one quite naturally to the understanding of becoming the dispassionate observer via stripping the "tape loop" of all empowering e-motion (energy in motion via heartfelt and determined conscious intent).

Mix that e-motion powered tape loop with the notion that I am without remedy, or I am a victim because some outside force is doing this to me, and I have one "hell" of a self-inflicted delusional illusory problem.  Creates one hell of a dynamic in the human experience, but ever only has the e-motional power I consciously assign to it, even when I have convinced myself that all of this is somehow happening to me against my will.

All of those illusory tape loop notions have no power to inflict pain unless I assign e-motional content to it all.  That is why The Power of Now book is so helpful in such a simple way.  I observe the tape loop, am tempted to go about it tape loop business as usual, but slowly but surely discover, or rediscover the sovereign power and control I have to assign emotional content, or not, and act out my rage and/or self-loathing, or not.  Seems like overcoming a flood at first, but begins to create new habits that replace the old ones.

The book that helped me some 17 years ago is A Course in Miracles, but I am reluctant to suggest it because it is not for everybody, but it helped me to realize some very simple things, like, I am not a physical body.  That was a big one since we all identify so heavily with our physical earth suits.  The Power of Now book gets it done fast and simple, like a lawyer helping you understand why you are going to win your case hands down, with 100% clarity and understanding.

Meditation and breathing exercises, along with a more healthy diet, less sugar and processed stuff, and ratio of more live vegetables and less animal flesh and dairy.  Another thing that has been a real rejuvenator for me this past year is an outdoor sauna box I built about 10 years ago, and finally finished up last August.  One cannot know or even vaguely appreciate all of the hidden benefits of a daily sauna (175F to 190F), what it does for the way you feel, your skin, the way it breathes, the way you breath all day after doing breathing exercises in the heat, the way you can twist your lower back and get it to crack in that heat, etc....  If a sauna is not possible, then exercising or yoga to break a sweat every day is very beneficial.  If nothing else, you will be amazed how a disciplined daily regimen of controlled breathing exercises controls how you feel, thereby foregoing the typical cyclical personal tape loop session.

I still get these tape loop moody moments, but far less frequency and far less intensity, with much more clarity of focus for simple conscious control during those times.  And I also try not to go too far in a "manic high" direction because that takes alot of unbalanced energy that can easily trigger the down side depression/dread tape loop session.  As always, all things in moderation....

I look back at my Father and he was a somewhat depressed moody brooding rage-aholic that was finding his way through e-motional life as a young man.  It really took its toll on the 3 older boys.  His most defining characteristic, along with being far too defensive and thin skinned, was taking himself faaarrrr tooooo seriously.  I am fairly sure that is what Curt, my older brother, could not resolve, was the imprint received from dad about taking yourself way too seriously.  It runs like a thread through the whole family like a comic tragedy.

But these are not stories about "victims"...  They are stories about adventures in Consciousness and Emotion.  Understanding this important fact helps me to reclaim my place in the Cosmos as an Inviolate and Unassailable Sovereign Agent in this amazing expanding/contracting One-ness that all of this is.

I too have thought about the very real possibility that I will not make this coming harvest, for I doubt very seriously that I am anywhere close to 51% activation point, but I no longer care or worry about it.  If I, this aspect of the One, have to do more time in 3rd density Consciousness, for another 25,000 years, 75,000 years, or 75 million years, so be it.  The moment of Now that "I" finally choose to really "get it" down deep with such blissful liberating resolve will simply be that particular powerful moment of Now and will be fundamentally no different than someone else's powerful moment of Now Aha! that was achieved eons ago by that particular aspect of the One.

This is not a contest or a race, for we are truly ALL in this together...  It is an amazing adventure in Light and Shadow with very few boundaries, if any, and is a very beautiful magnificent Thing in which it is completely and utterly impossible for you or anyone to be "left behind" like the scare tactics of Judeo-Christian theology or other religions would have one believe and controlled by.  I mention that as a personal understanding and belief.  If I be wrong about it, so be it, but I don't think/feel I am (wrong about it)....

We are to Now abandon the "saviorship messiah model" in favor of our true authentic inviolate Selves, rediscovering what never ever went away, even when we entered the abyss of layer after layer of such intensely distorted illusion and delusion by choice and design.  We cannot make ourselves be not what we eternally are.  We can only make ourselves e-motionally and dynamically feel like we are lost or disconnected, the very intense illusory dynamic of this 3rd density level of Conscious-ness.  Let me end this with a quote from "Hidden Hand"...

"Humanity, though utterly unconscious of the fact, has a significant part to play in this. You (as a collective consciousness of the planet) are choosing the Negative Polarization by default, by the quality of your thoughts and actions. Thought is creative energy, focused. You get exactly what you put out"

"Why do you think the Media is so important to us? You have (as a society), in your hypnotized comatose state, given your Free Will consent to the state your planet is in today. You saturate your minds with the unhealthy dishes served up for you on your televisions that you are addicted to, violence, pornography, greed, hatred, selfishness, incessant 'bad news', fear and 'terror'. When was the last time you stopped, to think of something beautiful and pure? The planet is the way it is, because of your collective thoughts about it."

I haven't been on the forum in awhile. You know the old saying, "Absence make the heart grow fonder." It's really sweet being here reading the words of those doing doing the Dance of Consciousnes. When i read the following quote I cut and pasted from your post I felt certain you had been reading my journals.

"look back at my Father and he was a somewhat depressed moody brooding rage-aholic that was finding his way through e-motional life as a young man.  It really took its toll on the 3 older boys.  But these are not stories about "victims"...  They are stories about adventures in Consciousness and Emotion.  Understanding this important fact helps me to reclaim my place in the Cosmos as an Inviolate and Unassailable Sovereign Agent in this amazing expanding/contracting One-ness that all of this is."

Brian, one of the many blessings in my life was to work with the Global Relationship Centers. They were weekends of deep soul searching guided by very adept button pushers. The profound realization, the quantum leap in my healing was the realization that "my pain" didn't make me special. Those "loops" for me where times that I longed for death. Over time the time i spent in the loops diminsished from years to months to days to weeks and now nothing more than an occassional moment. My journey took me through Vipasana meditation (the breath work that Brian mentioned) Yoga, Sufism, Native American Elders. For me the Adeventures in Consciousness would have been simply plodding along a muddy path were it not for my guides and teachers that truly emodied the Spirit of Guidance.

Hi Brian,

Thanks for your post.  I have been helped many times by hearing other people’s stories.  They helped me to feel not-so-alone in my struggles.   And hearing how someone else got through it gave me strength to make my way through it too.

This is the way I have experienced depression in my life.   It feels as if there is a pressure from the outside of me, that starts to press inward.   Such as Anger feels like an internal pressure and it presses outward – threatening explosion…. Depression presses inward…. Threatening implosion.   Almost like life becomes too heavy and threatens to crush me.

In my younger years I was not able to distinguish the downward spiraling into the depressed state.  It would almost seem as if I just “woke up there” one day.    One day I began to notice a very prominent warning flag that I could count on to let me know I was sliding into that pit again.   My personal warning flag was the strong feeling that no one really liked me… they were just being nice to me, or tolerating me.   ( I knew why they didn’t like me – my goodness…. I didn’t like me…. Why would anyone else?)    After noticing that everyone was just “being nice” to me, my mind would go into that “tape/ loop” that you talked of.   I would bring up all the reasons – in my mind – why I was such a poor example of a friend… co-worker…..wife……mother…. daughter…. sister….. or just plain human being.   Adding to the pile of those thoughts were the additional weights of all my failures, missed opportunities…and my lack of ambition or fortitude …. Which resulted in me being in the lousy spot – “the pile of shit” - that I was sitting in.    

Deep into the depressed state, I would experience an irrational way of thinking.  Within this state I felt as if I had never truly been happy at any point in my life…. And never would be.   I would think of happy memories that I had and looking at them through the filters of depression could see that I was just faking that happiness.  That I was just smiling and “acting” happy on the outside…. But that my inside had always felt the same….. Sad and Depressed.    Looking through the filters of depression, attempts to help me, by those who loved and cared for me, were extremely painful.  They felt accusatory, judgmental, and disapproving….Their words pointing at my deficiencies and inability to cope with day to day life.   Obviously everyone else was getting along fine…. What the hell was my problem?   I felt as if I had no protective skin on my body and the kindest and gentlest of words would feel like they were rubbing sandpaper against me.    My only recourse seemed to be to isolate and withdraw from life.   

In the past few years I have noticed relief from the deeper states of depression and it would only be a guess as to what actually helped.  Antidepressants never worked for me.  Being hypersensitive to pharmaceuticals… they only added more problems to the mix.   Therapy was helpful at times, but was also painful during the darkest of the depressed state.   Some books on depression helped, but many left me more depressed and hopeless about ever becoming “normal”.  

A couple of years ago I ran across a new healing modality called EFT.  Emotion Freedom Technique.    (It can be found through an internet search)    I found that it helped me process – or clear – some of the emotions within those “tapes” or “loops” of thinking that play over and over.   It was something that I could do for myself, in the comfort of my home… in the pit of my depression…. And it helped every time I remembered to use it.    If I had to make a list of things that have helped … I would put this at the top of it.   It also allowed me to take the next step of – Inviting my depression in and accepting it.

The biggest emotion of my depression would be sorrow, grief, or sadness.   A little while ago (one or two years)  I opened up and embraced my sorrow – or allowed it to be an accepted part of me.   When I would feel sorrow (or depression) welling up within me… I would make the time for the experience.   I would sit with it…. Experience it… Cry my eyes out for as long as it took.  Being present to it began to show me all the memories I had attached to my sorrow and grief.   I could see the “old home movies” that played within the emotion.   As I sat with sadness…. I could see the memories play out… one after the other…. Of all the times I had felt sad.    My whole life I have tried to push away the depression… the sorrow… the misery.   Most all of my attempts were to try and change it…. Make it better…. Fix it.     Well, when I got to the point where I invited it in…. and allowed myself to express my deep sorrow…I think it was a release of the “resistance” I had – to having depression.   It’s kind of like a difficult friend that I’ve never quite been able to get rid of – but a friend, nonetheless.   There are definitely gems to be found scattered within the depths of depression.

Currently, I find that I am not having to experience the depths or lengths of depression that I did in previous years.   And there is a good possibility that there is a perfectly good reason that this thread was woven into the tapestry of my life, but I’m not quite high enough on the mountain top to realize what that would be...just yet.

Perhaps it is simply the grace of God that has helped me through.  When I got so tired of struggling to try and make the world turn out the way I wanted it to – When my disillusionment with life bloomed and all desire drained from me for anything more in this life – including living my life….Perhaps that is when I was helped the most.   I remember sitting at my kitchen table one night, silent, emotionless tears streaming down my face, looking at the stars and knowing that there was nothing more I desired in the outside world.   I wondered how long I would have to “go through the motions” before being allowed to leave here. 

I still wonder…. And still go through the motions here and there.    But I do know that I have also had some pretty happy and joyous times here too.  I’m still ready to leave… but am also grateful and anxiously awaiting to see what is coming in the very near future.

Thanks for your open sharing out here on this forum Brian.  Your openness and honesty touch my heart deeply. 

With Love,

  Mary

Hi, this is a great question!  Interesting to see the similarities and differences. 

I wanted to jump in and write tonight - before the week kicked in to full gear, but I'm not sure I have a good handle on what happens on the way to depression.  I definitely resonate with the loop-tape of false self talk.  I know that when I have depression stop by my house, I stop doing the things that bring me joy - like I don't deserve to feel joy.  I start moving through life as an empty shell, instead of experiencing things fully. 

Embarrassingly, I've found that lately, when I don't have an outlet for my anger, it will immediately turn inward in a hyper-intense bout with depression, that has sparked self-inflicted wounds.  I've told no one else of this, but it makes me a bit afraid of what might happen if I let it out instead of send it inward. I can only really describe that as a tornado that suddenly rises up and heads straight to my solar plexis, and out into my body.  When it hits, the only thing that helps it subside is physical pain.  (Tough subject... hope you guys aren't judging this.)  On the bright side, I am pretty sure I won't try to kill myself again - now it's just wounding.  Maybe I'm on some sort of 30 year plan to get out of it completely.  (Sorry, ya gotta laugh at some point)

My mom was a life long sufferer of mild/moderate, chronic depression.  It wasn't even noticable, really, but her spark was often dimmed.  Her mom suffered (enjoyed?) the last 40 years of her life with Alzheimer's disease - or as we used to know it... Crazy Lady Syndrome.  I believe she was happily oblivious to her mental state, but I think perhaps my mother lived in fear that that is the way she would end up, too.  My mom often played her own loop-tape out loud - telling us what a poor cook she was, and how other women in the neighborhood had cleaner houses, and holier lives.  We all knew it was nonsense, but she believed it, just as I believe my own tape when it's playing. 

I try my best to separate myself out from the depression.  I try to remember that I'm not depressed, but that there's a thing called depression that visits me.  Then it leaves.  I think that gives me a bit of solice in knowing that's not what I'm all about. 

I often have noticed that folks who are Lightworkers, Seekers, Journeyers, or whatever way you want to say it, seem to have struggled at least at some point with depression.  It may be a chicken or the egg sort of question, but I like to think that we've been chosen to face this dark night to help us wake up, or find empathy and compassion, or to make God laugh or something.  :)  I guess it's like Fred's recent post on dancing with the shadows - some are called to do that work, and they must be strong to be able to do it.  Not for the faint-hearted, this depression thing.  

I love you all.  I know that we've each been through difficulties that are so hard to express.  We long to be known and understood.  None of us are ever alone.  When we are playing those tapes, we need to put them on pause for long enough to remember that we each have a team right behind us - ready to support, and love, and pray for us.  We all share a Divine Breath.  Even if we feel like the rest of the world can't hear us, we should know that it's safe and supportive in the G-Spot.  (ok, the use of the term G-Spot made me giggle a little, even though I'm totally serious.)

Anyway... sending you all big fat hugs, and hoping that your night is a good one. 

Much love and light, and laughter through tears,

Kathy

There are no words of comfort that I can bring to you

There are no songs of release I can sing to you

There is only sweat Peace that I can wish for you

Sent on the wings of Love

Where the Light is the Brightest, the dark is the darkest.

Congrats Brian!!!!!!!

Nice!

I like that option.  I'm sure I'll be giving that a try the next time the issue arises.  :) 

This was all great conversation, Brian.  Thank you for your courage to talk about it openly.  It's often a subject that requires hushed voices at best, and perhaps silence or denial, at worst. 

Much love and light,

Kathy