We have to accept and live with it just as we have learned to live with the fickle weather. What is important is to soar above the depression and treat it as a challenge to hurdle. If we don’t conquer our depression, it can lead to depleted energy, a dwindling zest for life, severe melancholy, loss of hope, and even suicide.
What is one to do when major depression attacks?
Positive self-talk is one of the most effective natural anti-depressants. We can help ourselves conquer depression by giving pep talks to ourselves in our minds. We can actually program our minds to react positively to any situation in life.
Here are some things you can say to yourself when feeling down:
• "I am special." In all of creation, you are unique. God must have a special plan for you because He gave you the privilege of life. Your being special in God’s eyes makes you important. Realizing this is of great help if you are losing confidence in yourself.
• "I am lucky." You don’t believe it? Blindfold yourself and try going around for an entire day without the benefit of eyesight. You will realize just how blessed and lucky you are! Meditate on the fact that while others are dying, you are totally healthy and alive.
• "It will get better." Life is all about cycles and impermanence. Our experiences and emotions undergo incessant change. If you are really down, then, there is nowhere to go but up.
• "Tomorrow will be another day." It certainly will be, so be reminded that each new dawn brings renewed hope. Someday you will look back at your present situation and laugh at why you were depressed in the first place.
• "It is a beautiful world." All you have to do is to look around you and notice the grandeur and miracles that slip our consciousness daily. Find reasons to be grateful for, and compose a little prayer of appreciation and thanksgiving.
• Change your environs even temporarily. Being in the same place for a long time can bore and cloud the mind. A change of scene is a welcome respite. Take a walk, see a movie, go on a mini-vacation. Or if you can afford it, travel!
• Do something fun. What is fun for you – engaging in sports, painting, singing, dancing, being with friends or shopping till you drop? When you do something you truly enjoy, you forget your problems, negativism, and even your body aches.
• Be with positive, encouraging, and supportive people. Stay away from negative, selfish people who put you down. One of my favorite beauty tips that I give in my beauty seminar is this: If someone is making you feel ugly and unappreciated, leave him/her! Yes, go away and regain your beauty, self-esteem, and self-worth.
• Pamper yourself. Get a massage, a beauty treatment, surround yourself with aromatherapy scents, and stretch out in a bed of luxurious satin sheets. Treat yourself to all the luscious pleasures that you can afford, including glorious food.
• Listen to a collection of your favorite feel-good music. Music soothes, relaxes, uplifts, energizes, and brings back good vibes and fond memories.
• Join a group with a cause. Fight for animal rights, social justice, against environmental pollution, illegal logging, etc. Standing up for something and being with others who share the same passion could be fun.
A parable is told of a farmer who owned an old mule. The mule fell into the farmer’s well. The farmer heard the mule braying, or whatever mules do when they fall into wells.
After carefully assessing the situation, the farmer sympathized with the mule, but decided that neither the mule nor the well was worth the trouble of saving.
Instead, he called his neighbors together and told them what had happened, and enlisted them to help haul dirt to bury the old mule in the well and put him out of his misery.
Initially, the old mule was hysterical. But as the farmer and his neighbors continued shoveling and the dirt hit his back, a thought struck him. It suddenly dawned on him that every time a shovel-load of dirt landed on his back, he should shake it off and step up! This he did, blow after blow.
"Shake it off and step up...shake it off and step up...shake it off and step up!" he repeated to encourage himself. No matter how painful the blows or distressing the situation seemed, the old mule fought panic and just kept right on shaking it off and stepping up.
It wasn’t long before the old mule, battered and exhausted, stepped triumphantly over the wall of that well! What seemed like something that would bury him actually blessed him, all because of the manner in which he handled his adversity.
In life, if we face our problems and respond to them positively, and refuse to give in to panic, bitterness or self-pity, the adversities that come along to bury us usually have within them the potential to benefit and bless us! – Author Unknown