John: I especially appreciated your comment about your finally realizing you had to change what's inside of you. I've arrived at that conclusion about a thousand or so times and, believe me when I tell you, nothing works better than practice. I'm also depressed, or suffer from depression, and it's usually when I've forgotten what I should practice and what I've learned on this long journey that gets me in trouble. I know I can't learn or understand a concept only once and expect it to stay with me for the rest of my life- I'm human and I fall, make mistakes and even sometimes take for granted the good times that often go unnoticed. My worst times are when I keep to myself, an act which I believe does not make me unique - but here we go again - I must believe there is some value to my being if I am to recover - Again, I am human and like you have learned the value of changing myself instead of changing the world. Cease to change cease to exist. Such an easy concept to understand yet a bit difficult to apply. There is little comfort in the unknown but the excitement for self improvement is worth the risk of discovery. My inner self, as your's, knows quite well when things are right - and I believe practice, practice, practice is not only a path to well being, but also a highway to happiness.
Hi, gloucester -
I think you've gotten to the heart of the matter - practice is everything. Intellectual understanding is so easy but so often simply forgotten without changing behavior. Long walks, yoga sessions, extended meditations are all deeply restorative for me, yet it's so easy to skip them while imagining there isn't enough time. Yet what is a more valuable use of time than improving the health that makes everything else possible?
I've managed to get beyond practice with a few simple tools that can now come into play like a reflex action. They've saved from me many times from backsliding.
Thanks so much for your comments -- John
I normally hang out over at MyRACentral, but this post really resonated with me.
So much of what you described is similar to the feelings I've had after entering into... Well, I don't like using the word remission, because it makes me nervous to say it out loud, but getting accustomed to trusting that it's very unlikely my rheumatoid arthritis will come back with a vengeance any minute now has been difficult. It's a completely different mindset and it's only recently, after theoretically having my disease well-managed for five years (again, if I get too detailed, it feels like I'm jinxing things), that I've come to believe that it may last. That I don't just have my life on loan. That sense of stability is mind blowing, awe-inspiring and really, really cool.
we may come to it from different angles, but it turns out that freedom from illness is similar. It's a good place to be.
Hi, Lene -
I'm so glad to hear that you've able to deal effectively with RA symptoms. I know that worry about jinxing recovery by dwelling on it. Strangely, though, communicating about my experience with depression has also been a major part of the healing process.
That's a great insight about the similarity in the sense of freedom from chronic and severe illnesses of all types. There must be a shared sense of release and freedom for anyone whose life has been distorted for years by one of these conditions.
Glad you found your way here - I'll visit soon at the RA site.
John
Hi John
When I read this I was thinking that recovery must mean so many things to different people. Is it the mere absence of sadness? Is it feeling happy? Is it feeling good about oneself? Is it having more energy? There are so many components to self which are impacted by depression...mood is just one element. Your physical self is affected. The way you think is affected. Your relationships are affected. The way you see yourself is affected. So recovery for me would be...some sort of magical balance between all these selves. Just because one feels better in mood does not make the job appear, the relationships to fix themselves...the life challenges to disappear. Mood is just one piece of the whole.
I think for me...recovery would be a greater emotional and physical energy to adapt to life's circumstances.
Very interesting post and I am looking forward to hearing more of what others have to say on this.
John, I too have to make myself pause for a moment before I automatically say "no" to socializing with family and others. I was used to saying "no" for so long and actively seeking ways to avoid people because I simply didn't feel like connecting with anyone. There is a man who lives in an apartment upstairs from me who wants to just go for a walk or out to breakfast with me some Saturday. I know we have a lot in common, just from the little we've spoken to each other. But still, I have that throwback thought, "What if he finds out that I have a depression problem or mental illness background?" Then I wonder if I really do have those problems anymore, they are so well controlled by medication and lifestyle changes. It is like I am expecting to step into quicksand instead of onto solid ground. Like I just got my house in order and I'm expecting an earthquake to shake it apart again. I'm still a little trembly in these areas. It takes a willingness to have a little faith in myself to "get going" again.
But I do have the impression that this is something real, which is so important. I feel the depression has been whipped and I can move on.
gloucester -
Just to answer your question about who's talking to whom. If you press the Add Comment button at the top of the comments, you would be responding to the post's writer-me in this case. If you press the reply button after a comment, you're responding to that person's comment, not to the original post.
The replies to comments are also indented to show visually who they're responding to.
Hope I haven't confused you more! This is the way most blogs work.
John
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Hi, John. I liked what you wrote here because I think it points out how living is a process. I think we're all "recovering" at any given point from something in that we grow and learn from our successes and mistakes, joy and pain. I guess for myself, I haven't given a whole lot of thought to what recovery would look like; it's been more a matter of knowing I'm better when I feel it, which has been happening along the way. If I look back ten years, yes, I can see how I've gotten better. It's hard to realize, sometimes, when we're in the thick of it. I spent so many years in a job I liked, but where the environment was so toxic, it nearly did me in. I look back and wonder how I could have stood it, but it was probably a matter of being in survival mode, turning off my feelings and sinking to a place where no one could get to me. And I'd had plenty of practice in doing that when I was younger.
Life is always going to have its good times and bad times and our task is to be emotionally flexible enough to take the ride. I, too, think that it's impossible to be 100% in the present since we are human, but if we can get there even now and then, it helps put things in perspective. I've been so blessed to have had numerous opportunities to learn some hard life lessons through people who have either actively helped me or who have shown me by example what life can be like when you respect and believe in yourself and try to live in a non-judgmental way. Those opportunities have also come through times of grief, anger and fear - all of which need to be dealt with and let go when they are finished.
Thanks again for writing about this - it's given me much to think about as I've been asking myself this question recently.
Hello Judy:
Nicely worded. And I agree: We are only human.
Thanks, Judy - You're thoughts are inspiring. I too have lived with destructive work environments - a couple of which, alas, I helped create. The stress of the last ten years of my work life was so great and constant that I wonder how I could have survived it. There is no question in my mind that all that pressure and stress greatly worsened the already serious depression.
But every extreme experience has forced me to look carefully at some aspect of my life that I've tried to ignore - at great cost. Trying to handle everything alone doesn't work and finding others to help and learn from is a real blessing.
John