5 Steps for Letting Depression Be Your Teacher

By Melissa Kirk, author of Depression 101

A fairly recent television ad for an antidepressant that shall remain nameless used the tagline "Depression hurts." And really, you couldn't say anything more truthful about this amorphous and much-studied yet little-understood condition. Depression can sap the life out of you, make you feel worthless, self-destructive, and like there's nothing in the world that's real except for the pain. I know the feeling, believe me. I know how people with depression can be so sensitive to painful situations and triggers that we can sometimes literally be afraid of normal human interaction for fear of the pain. We may pop pills, abuse drugs or alcohol, or numb ourselves in a myriad of other ways just to feel that we can cope. Let's face it simply: Depression sucks.

So how can something so painful be our teacher?

One of my favorite authors is Buddhist nun Pema Chodron. Her book "When Things Fall Apart" sits on my bookshelf, dog-eared and weatherbeaten from much use. Pema was the first person who taught me that painful situations, including depression, are here to teach us something. Another non-dual teacher, Pamela Wilson, teaches that painful feelings are here to sit satsang with us -- that is, to engage in a teaching and learning dialogue. When we are depressed, we either struggle to feel better or we give up and wallow in feeling lousy. Neither of these tactics is likely to make the feelings of sadness, lethargy and hopelessness go away. Medication, though it can be an important part of treatment, only covers up the feelings; excessive talk therapy, though also potentially healing, at its worst simply gives us the chance to endlessly ruminate on our problems. What if there was a way to walk the middle ground, and engage with the hard feelings, even while engaging in other forms of treatment? When we're tired of fighting the sadness and tired of feeling bad, can we face the depression with compassion and curiosity and ask it what it's here to teach us?

Here are five ways you can let depression be your teacher:

1. Start a mindfulness or meditation practice. I know what you're thinking: "Oh, no, not another person telling me to meditate." But if you can't or don't want to sit formally, practice mindfulness and presence in your everyday life, and start a spiritual or grounding practice, even if it's only one minute or so -- set an intention for your day before you head out the door. The practice of continually bringing yourself back to the present moment will serve you for a lifetime and will eventually lessen your tendency to wander off into ruminations and negative thought-stories that can contribute to low mood. This step teaches us to stop and pay attention.
2. Pain will happen, and when it does, use it as an opportunity to be present with the sensations. Look at the pain, even if you can only do it for a second, from the outside. What does it feel like? Where do you feel it in your body? If you sit with it for a few moments, how does it shift or change? Can you practice, even if only briefly, not judging it or trying to push it away? Practice this with compassion for yourself and for your pain. This practice teaches us that we can survive what we think we can't; that we can face pain that terrifies us. See if you can gradually increase the time that you can sit with the pain and not turn away. Play with it, but don't force yourself to go past the point where it feels okay. When you feel you must stop, stop.
3. When you feel depression, can you look at yourself with compassionate care, the way you would a child or friend who is hurting? Ask your hurting self: "What is wrong?" Listen for the answers that are below the stories of how you've been wronged or the something terrible that has happened. See if you can boil your pain down to one or two words: Loss. Loneliness. Feeling betrayed. Feeling abandoned. Hopeless. Feeling unlovable.
4. Now, ask your hurting child-friend self: "What do you need?" Using your words from step 3 as your starting points, boil the answer down, going under the story of the loss or disappointment you have suffered. Connection. To feel loved. To feel wanted. To feel safe. Steps 3 and 4 teach us what the depression is about, really, rather than what the stories are that we tell ourselves about how this or that happened that was bad. Once we know the truth, we can act to fill our lives with more connection, love, safety, or whatever we are missing.
5. From what you have learned about your pain, can you be with the experience of wanting to feel loved, wanted, connected or safe? Can you imagine, viscerally, what it might feel like to feel those things? Everyone wants these things. These needs connect you to every other human on the planet. Let these universal needs open your heart. Can you close your eyes and let this feeling of connection soak into your whole being? One of the worst things about depression is that it makes us feel disconnected and alone. This practice can help us feel connected again, and this alone can lend us strength and the hope that we can feel better.

 

 

 

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Comments

[senorlou]

11:17 AM on 01/27/2011

Very interesting article.  Every depression has a silver lining, but there should be a better way to get it.  Depression is the worst pain, the most draining feelings, the most hateful, wasteful and destructive illness I've experienced.  Any info like this helps.  I'm guessing the author has been through it, which is probably why the tips make sense and are actually doable.  It was great to read.

[tbeth1957]

11:07 AM on 01/27/2011

I suffered from depression, sometimes quite severe, from my mid-teens until my late forties. In my early thirties, a couple of years of talk therapy and Prozac took the edge off and got me through. My constants through all those years, though, were walking and writing. Both drained the poison, and the writing ultimately helped me to understand the psychological roots of the depression and strip them of their power over me. I was diagnosed with fibromyalgia in my forties, and a couple of years into guaifenesin therapy, the depression just went away. Now, on the rare occasions I feel down I know to look to how well I'm managing the fibro and then to attitudes or situations that need to be changed. Depression has been my teacher for most of my life, and now it serves as a very reliable alarm system for my health as well.

[yogisusan]

10:53 PM on 01/24/2011

I have always thought that my depression had something to teach me. I mean, there HAS to be a reason to be having such difficulty keeping up with daily life and such profound sadness. Every week for years I have had a different explanation for why I was depressed and what I was to learn from it. And yet, I am still depressed. I meditated daily for 2 years straight. Now I am unable to sit still for that long without crying my eyes out and getting very frustrated. That doesn't seem helpful. I have come to realize that my depression is messed up chemicals in my head that strongly affect my emotions and therefore my intuition, and that is very costly. All this has taught me is that I can no longer depend on my once-flawless intuition, and that self-help books don't help.
All of the comments here have been so positive, so perhaps I am in the minority of those that these techniques have not helped. I can only hope.

[senorlou]

11:21 AM on 01/27/2011

I'm like you.  I've tried everything.  Some people say that Depression is the "soul" (whatever you want to call it) saying you can't go on living like you are.  Some people say it's a reaction to a sorrowful life or event(s).  I think you could put me in a mansion, give me the greatest family in the world, a great job, and you know what - I'd probably still be depressed.  Maybe if we were still living like our ancestors did (connected to nature) we wouldn't be this way.  It's quite a puzzle.

[tbeth1957]

03:23 PM on 01/27/2011

Sometimes depression is simply bad brain chemistry, whether caused by genetics, disease or diet. The trick is to find the root cause and treat that, but it can be very hard to do. One tip-off that depression is physiological is that the trigger one perceives for it keeps changing. After I discovered that my depression had been caused by changes in my brain because of fibromyalgia, I realized that my mind had grasped for "causes" in events and situations. Yes, some of those events or situations might have been "depressing," but they were not actually causing me to suffer; the symptoms of my depression--exhaustion, confusion, cloudy thinking, apathy, listlessness and feelings of deep sadness--were, for me, symptoms of fibromyalgia's effects on the brain. When guaifenesin cleared my other symptoms, it cleared depression as well. When I was cycling--clearing symptoms--I could feel depression come on in a swift wave of misery unrelated to the events of the day or moment, almost as though a depressant had been injected into my veins, and it became obvious that the cause was physical. I can still have depressive episodes if I'm not taking the guai at the proper dose, or if my diet or sleep habits are poor (sugar and short sleep are major no-nos for me).

[wolfiegirl]

08:05 PM on 01/23/2011

Great article, and all good points to consider.

[Brian Adler]

07:54 PM on 01/23/2011

I very much agree with this article. Back in the 90's when I was finishing undergraduate school at a Buddhist University. I wrote this paper on this very subject:

https://docs.google.com/Doc?docid=0AUTEXaT-W88kZGNjajN3dnJfMHJxdzU5Mw&hl=en

[merlinspinoza]

07:29 PM on 01/23/2011

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5BpGle7vH0&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gL08nMoTHQo&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9VRwMghIemo

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIt-B5dujCI&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0VSyuar6oF8

[phnxrth]

09:26 PM on 01/29/2011

Very nice.

[cmm5713]

07:24 PM on 01/23/2011

I believe these steps are pivotal in real recovery from depression. Medication may helps some. I believe real recovery comes with self-examination and self-discovery. Thank you.

[Alliart]

05:13 PM on 01/23/2011

My first bought with depression was 2 years ago. It lasted 4-5 months, but it wasn't until it was almost over that I even realized what was happening. If you don't realize you're depressed you aren't likely to try to get help for it. My 2nd go round was a few months ago and lasted for about 6 weeks, but was much more severe. Amazingly, I went to my monthly meditation group one night and literally felt the depression drain from my body like a toxin seeping out of my pores. Meditation is an amazing tool and it's a shame so many people are afraid of it and don't understand it. In this case it probably saved my life.

[purenergy]

05:03 PM on 01/23/2011

Nice article and great advice, thanks.

[CreativeGenerations]

03:55 PM on 01/23/2011

This is such a powerful practice.

This is very similar to a teaching by that helped save my life/sanity. Whenever I had a sad feeling growing up everyone around me would tell me to snap out of it. The emotion was irritating, nobody wanted to deal with it. Just be happy, there are lots of reasons to just BE happy, you selfish little child. Ack!

That didn't help me at all. My genuine feelings never got attended to as a child, [as I'm sure is fairly common is America] so I did not know how to resolve them as an adult. Then I heard a Tich Nat Han tape in which he said to comfort your sad emotion just as you would if a tiny child came to you expressing that feeling. Hold the child, have compassion for the child, just sit with it and be with it and tell it that everything will be ok - this too will pass. In a sense you 'play the adult that was never there for you' to your inner child. Once the unresolved emotional feeling has had the proper attention [often for the first time] very often the issue simply dissolves. Dealing with each emotional trauma that comes up in this way, put to rest many lingering anxieties I had at one time thought I would carry with me forever.

Unresolved traumatic emotional issues can be cleared in this way. I am proof. Good fortune on your practice.

[LifeChangeStartsNow]

10:47 AM on 01/24/2011

CreativeGenerations, faved and fanned! The process you describes works like a charm and of course, can be used for any emotions.

When you are aware and are seeking, the solution you require will always present itself.

Congratulations my dear.

[waitingpatiently]

01:42 PM on 01/27/2011

This worked/works for me too! It's very hard for me to explain it to people who don't understand. I have to pretend I'm my own child.

[CptFreakout]

01:20 PM on 01/23/2011

Depression is your minds way of telling you something is wrong be it something you did/doing a problem in society or other parts of our lives its normal .
However in our society we believe in our right to be happy and cant cope with the idea life has never been a 24/7 bliss fest or that our behaviors and attitudes are as much to blame .
We need sadness as well as happiness as a growth and learning tool .

[senorlou]

08:54 PM on 01/27/2011

I agree with much of what you posted, but clinical Depression is not "normal" sadness.  It's not a normal feeling at all.  IT's absolute hopelessness and fear that will paralyze even the strong.  Bliss is not what a Depressive who suffers is looking for.  They want to function again - and just be alive.  I try to tell people that when you're in a Depression, the best thing I could compare it to is a fever of about 104 F.  You can't do much.  You ache.  You lose dozens of pounds (another silver lining).  You don't sleep for days at a time.  Also, with all the side effects of the drugs to treat it - you certainly wouldn't take them if you absolutely didn't have to.  There's no high to Prozac or Zoloft.  There's no fun in taking Trazodone.  Also, depressive episodes - bad ones (suicidal thoughts, etc) can come out of the blue for those of us who have had several bouts of it.  So while we don't want to wipe out normal human feelings - the full spectrum - Depression is out of that spectrum.  It isn't normal at all.  It's just illness, and it's dangerous (I've read one study that said 20% of chronic depressives die by their own hands eventually).  This is not any way anyone would want to learn anything - even though you do learn something, if it's only to stay on your medication indefinitely.

[LifeChangeStartsNow]

01:06 PM on 01/23/2011

With all due respect to the author, while the above information is welcome, it all depends on the state of one's depression.

I was diagnosed as clinically depressed but was functioning "normally" although (in hindsight) I knew something was wrong. In that state of somnolence, you are blind & deaf.

This decade+ depression was diagnosed weeks after I crashed and burned in my office.

I knew I was lost. In that murk nothing exists. All I could think of was that I needed help. I walked the streets in a daze for weeks. No eating, drinking or sleeping and I lost hours just sitting.

One minute it was 9h00 when I sat down and I would decide to go for a walk 5 minutes later only to see, suddenly, that it was 17h00.

No way in hell from this zombieland was I or anyone even close to what I lived through capable of thinking much less applying these steps!

On a scale of 1 to 10, I was a 9 and on suicide watch after I finally found someone who referred me to her psychologist.

I resurfaced 6 months into the treatment after 5 sessions per week with the therapist and phone checks to verify that I was still alive. 6 months after I was in recovery and a different being who had to learn herself all over again.

These steps might have been viable then. This list is certainly not a panacea for every depression that ails you!

[Openyermind]

01:24 PM on 01/23/2011

Bravo on this post.

[WoodsideCraig]

03:28 PM on 01/23/2011

Thanks for your story. You've touched on an important point. Fanned. And I like the name you've chosen.

Just as an aside, most people that I've known who were at risk for depression were creative and sensitive people who had difficulty handling negativity in their lives. They resorted to being passive aggressive, which left them feeling powerless.

[LifeChangeStartsNow]

10:36 AM on 01/24/2011

WoodsideCraig. You been fanned in return buddy.

Also what you say about passive/aggressive is quite correct and that feeling of powerlessness is detrimental to the human psyche.

I managed to channel most of my aggressiveness into work but of course my interpersonal relationships at work sucked because I kept repeating the destructive patterns learned from my abusive upbringing in childhood.

What I have heard since coming out of my depression is that unreleased pent up anger is what really creates depression. We implode! And I can attest to that from first hand experience as I had had 5 ton mack trucks full of the stuff from injustices, cruelty and the like as an innocent kid and it just escalated.

This is why I advise everyone to go see a shrink or a psychologist on a regular basis, be it weekly, bi-weekly monthly or otherwise to talk it out.

That combined with meditation as the author describes here can only take you forward.

I do not hold on to anything anymore especially anger. I don't accuse though that is judge-mental and destructive but I always clearly say how I feel and whoever gets mad, tough!

My psychotherapist taught me to always check in with how I feel during the day and it is also, I realised, a great way to stay present.

Have a great and grateful week!