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DON'T FORGET YOU CAN ALSO FIND JARED ON FACEBOOK
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LINKS WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYIN THE DEPRESSION TOOL KIT contents/disclaimer Be open to good advice but when other discount you believe in yourself and the value God has placed on you. previous next contents top We like one size fits all diagnosis's, explanations and solutions. Real life is seldom like that. You are a collage of life events, genetics and choices all of which are glued into a frame called you. All these snapshots define what's good and bad about you. And your collection of images is different from anyone else. Remember also that you have some discretion which pictures you keep in the frame. So what do you say about love as regarding depression? Love is a risk, whether concerning romantic love, or brotherly love or humanity. You can be hurt and disappointed. This doesn't help depression. But the alternative is to be isolated and empty. This is guaranteed to complicate depression. So take the risk. Love applied wisely can fill you up and may be the best medicine for your disorder. So very sad. If not for your own sake, for theirs, SURVIVE. https://youtu.be/rf-s-vybblM The placebo effect: Many people receive benefit from a certain “medical treatment” only because they perceive it as beneficial. There is actually no medical reason why it should work. I tend to be very skeptical and as such it's difficult to experience a positive placebo experience. Arguably my doubts could even undermine the effectiveness of a real medicine or treatment. I think it's entirely plausible to have a reverse or negative placebo effect. Our belief (or faith, if you will) in dire circumstance beyond the scope of real helps will diminish the efficacy of anything that might actually help. With depression our attitudes become very pessimistic and as such we must battle with conscious choices not to give them reign. Our best medicine and supplement to all our treatment becomes our determination not to be overcome. previous next contents top If you're weirder than me, you're pretty strange. At least that's how I will perceive you. But see, that's the thing: I've been on the planet long enough to arrive at the conclusion that everyone is weird somewhere, somehow. Weird is only weird relative to what the individual sees as normal. Normal is really undefinable so the baseline actually becomes typical instead. So what is typical, non-threatening, comfortable and familiar relative to the individual's perception is what equals normal for them. So if I find myself strange the first thing I need to answer is, is this a harmless (maybe even desirable) quirk or a character flaw? If the former than I should celebrate my uniqueness. If the latter I should work on it. But if you find me weird then I should stop making it my problem. previous next contents top Life requires inertia. Sometime events, emotional disruption, physical issues, etc. can bring life to a halting stop. When that happens it can be difficult to get back on track. When you struggle with depression you're gonna have to push uphill before you get that downhill burst. If you can't out run it, then you'll have to run over it until you get there. Forward motion is essential to wellness. previous next contents top
Thinking of those mourning Jordan
Loss... what can be said of it. It is as inevitable to life as the rise and fall of the sun. There is no inoculation that makes us immune nor magic medicine to make it go away. There is only time and the determination to move on to what ever comes next. With time we begin to think about it a little less every day. Resolution doesn't mean the pain is gone. It means this: You have become able to put your loss in the proper folder and file that folder in the proper place in the cabinet of your memories both good and bad. Occasionally you will take that folder out and look at it. When you do, you will hurt. Then you will file it away again because new realities demand your present attention. And in the present, joy has new opportunities to visit your life “I just gotta be me.” Sounds good enough on the surface. There's no point in being anyone else. But here's the catch: that can become just an excuse for not trying. There's good and bad in all of us. The things that make our life happy and healthy may take a little work but will be worth the effort. I do “just gotta be me” but I can strive for the best me I can be previous next contents top If you're like me, you spend a lot of time debating with people. Trouble is they're not actually there. No, we're not talking about hallucinations. We're talking about the mental volley ball we play with ourselves. With this technique we can convince ourselves how just and righteous our cause is. And maybe it is. Trouble with this is you keep serving the ball without ever scoring a point. It has no productive end but keeps the emotion alive. A better approach is to confront without aggression. Aggression only stirs a defensive posture in the other person. Try to negotiate a resolution both can live with. If that can't happen, do what you have to do and then release the issue to God. It is what it is until God makes it something different. In the meantime, life must go on and it might as well go on with a peaceful spirit. previous next contents top At a place I used to work in management I was sometimes summoned by the owner when something went wrong on the floor. He would tell me what happened and instruct me, “Go chew 'em a new one.” I seldom if ever did that. I just didn't see how “a new one” was going to fix anything. Anger is easy but reaction and action are not necessarily the same thing. Anger/reaction looks for penalty/revenge. Action is a calculated move toward resolution. In the end resolution is a better choice for emotional wellness. previous next contents top Everything on Earth has it's seasons. When it's time for winter doesn't mean you won't mourn Autumn nor cease to revel in fond memories of Spring and Summer, But winter is inescapable. It must come. Sooner or later is a time for last months. For endings. Endings can be extremely difficult and often painful to the point of blind and endless perpetuation of that which has met it's final season. Yet every ending also clears space for a beginning. And every beginning has the potential to be a season of celebration. A chance to redefine and redirect. Before Christ could rise and sit at the right hand of God he had to die. So the death of one season becomes the parent of a new one. Give grief for the old it's due but muster optimism for the new. It may be the best season of your life. previous next contents top
Life happens and sometimes it stinks. We humans have a massive capacity to color it to suit our hopes, our need to blame, justify, deny, redefine, etc. But life still happens and will continue to do so. While focusing on the good is well advised, sooner or later we will all need to cope with something bad, very bad. In the end truth is truth and to accept and acknowledge it becomes the path to real and long range healing. And remember that acknowledging does mean to live there. It means pause to read the road sign and then continue down the highway to the next stop. previous next contents top
Who get's depression? Every race and gender. Rich and poor. Strong and weak. Blue eyes. Brown eyes. Green eyes. Fat and skinny. Tall & short. Smart and stupid. Every social status. Presidents, Kings, Queens and peasants. Oh... and Christians. Don't beat yourself up about it. It's part of the human condition and will remain so until we molt mortality to inherit eternity. Denial doesn't create a new reality. It simply disregards the truth. Don't be ashamed and don't accept anyone's condemnation. Pray and work for the best wellness you can obtain. Be faithful to deal with the present reality while you wait on the future deliverance. previous next contents top
The longer you sit in a room, the more you see the cracks in the plaster. Unrealistic expectation of people, places and situations will leave you open to disappointment. At the end of the day: people (no matter how wonderful) will fall short, beautiful places will be struck by storms and perfect situations will change. This is not negativism, it's reality. Knowing this is the first step in avoiding being crushed when things happen and the first tool in adapting when called for. You can't repair the cracks until you see they are there. previous next contents top
Venting or cooking stew? The difference is subtle and may take a little while to grasp. Venting is good. Venting means simply and concisely expressing your feelings when a situation arises. However we often confuse that with continually revisiting and rehearsing our complaints. Venting releases some of the pressure and gives others a chance to understand where you're coming from. Revisiting and rehearsing stirs the pot and keeps bringing you're complaints and the associated emotions to the surface. Tempting as it may be to do so, stirring the pot is contrary to emotional well being. Beef stew is good. Emotional stew is not. previous next contents top
Fighting depression is work, hard work. You don't just “get over it” or “man up” or any of the other over simplified and uniformed comments that some will make. But neither will your situation improve by using the untruth of such comments as an excuse to surrender. You have to dig in your heals and fight even when the only thing you want to do is sleep, or cry, or shut yourself off from the world. It may be the hardest fight of your life but you have to do it anyway. When I did peer counseling, after a while you began to see who really wanted to get better and who only wanted sympathy. Those who wanted to get better worked hard and tried things. If 100 things fail you do 101. If 101 fail you do 102 and so on and so forth. There is no pie in the sky but there is progress. Each of us have to decide whether we're ready to work or merely lay down in a bed of sympathy. previous next contents top
Reality Check – We all know we should base our worth on God's love and not peoples opinion of us (including our own). And that's absolutely true in the big picture. But we live our mortal lives in the little picture for the most part. The big picture is what the apostle Paul was talking about when he said, “Now we see through a glass darkly.” (1Cor 13:12) But here's a small screen reality: a large part of our self-esteem is connected to performance. And this is a good thing because that motivates us to do well and when we do well we contribute something good to the world around us. Depression tends to crush self-esteem. Help to fight this by finding something you do well and get better at it. This benefits on multiple fronts. You can change your focus from the woes to the I wills. You can accomplish something to feel good about. That's something in sparse supply when you're depressed. And you can contribute something to the world. I'm not talking about becoming an egotist. I'm talking about recognizing that you have a God given gift for something and using it well and with confidence. previous next contents top
“To every thing there is a season.” Throw in a couple of “turns” and you may recognize this as a line from an old Byrds song. But Solomon of Biblical fame said it first. We talked about seasons in Sunday School this morning. Everything has a season. Whether you are well or sick there are seasons. Depression is a season. Mania is a season. As with the cycle of the Earth, seasons come and go. They will pass. The warm reprieve of spring can not last forever. But by the same token, when you've wrapped yourself up against the cold wind of winter you can know that another spring is coming. Do not lose hope in the blizzard of the moment. The best spring of your life may be on it's way. previous next contents top Sometimes the level of emotion you go through as a bipolar is exhausting. You think, I just want to be like other people. I want to be loved, accepted and, well... normal. No matter how hard you try it doesn't happen. In the end, normal is highly over rated and hard to define. Learn to embrace what is good about you and strive to live up to that. Forget about normal.
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