Feeling Depressed? Express yourself!

[Mykal Stype]

[...] but the problem is that depression and logic just don't go hand in hand.

Yeah, I can have a hard time keeping that in mind, because I solve pretty much everything with reason instead of emotion. Whether for good or bad, I just calmly accept it as it is.
Despite that I always find it enlightening to know more about people and individuals

I like that you want to know more about people. It would be nice if more people did that, but you always see people with wildly uneducated opinions start the "LA LA LA, I'M NOT LISTENING!" song when you try to explain something. We all kind of want to sing that song sometimes, but it's a special kind of ass that actually goes through it, and on a constant basis.

People do often make decisions with their feelings as being coldly rational has detrimental effects even though it sounds like those types of decisions would always be good. For example, "should I buy this CD" has some emotion behind it. Even though one part of your brain is going through your bank statements and what you can afford, there was still that invisible decision that the CD would make your life better enough that it's worth paying for. That's why you started making the decision to consider buying in the first place.
But if you have depression or bipolar disorder, the rational and emotional decisions go off wildly. During a depressive phase, the emotional decision especially goes weird, causing you to think "there's no point in buying this CD. It won't make me feel better in any way, so screw it." But when you're not in a phase, you know that this is irrational as the CD is from one of your favourite bands, so of course it will make you happier, even if for a little bit, which can be repeated each time you listen to the CD. When you're in a manic phase, your thought is "this CD will make me feel so much better! I'm going to buy it immediately. Maybe I should get another one too." But the problem with this phase is that the money never even entered your head. So when you come out of a phase and realize the stupid decisions you made, it can push you a little bit back toward a breakdown, where all of your thoughts are irrational again.
So it's kind of like watching someone else control you for a while. That rational part of your brain still exists and is trying to work, but the depression or mania has taken over too much to be reasoned with. That's why I know that everything you said above is true in some way, but there's still a part of my brain that says "so?"

 

[T3hSource]

*snip*

I am also wildly uneducated on most topics, but I also like learning more about all kinds of things, and I'm very open-minded about anything, no matter how far-fetched or stupid it might sound. I will listen a couple of times, until that person has consistently been proven dead wrong.

The balance between reason and feeling, in this case spiritual value and money.
Even with this "so?", I would probably use the same reasonable arguments and make them sound more convincing, bring up more extreme cases and so forth. The cycle continues... In this case do you know if emotional understanding would do a better job?

Because I feel I'm not fit to that, as I mentioned I don't really let things get to me on an emotional level. Failed? Try again. Ruined? Start from scratch. Didn't quite make it? Shit happens... Shrug it off and move on. But life is just starting for me, I'll be moving out to study in University this year. I will finally experience for myself how poverty makes people desperate and how financially predatory the system is here. When all your practical value feels like it has been lost, all you have is your spiritual value and reason can go out of the window. But the reasoning is still there, just twisted by emotion and desperation and the instinct to survive at all costs.
And as I write this post, now I'm thinking of adding 'I think' 'I feel' 'I assume', not to show insecurity, but my intangibility, because I'm never sure what I say is right, hence I gladly take criticism and correction.
And this is why it's not healthy to assume that anyone and everyone you see in your daily life is stupid, you don't know them, never talked to them, therefore you shouldn't judge them, but you do, as we all do

Yes, I'm just rambling now Thank you for reading and have a nice day

 

[Arakasi]

Life is meaningless...

Inherently, in the way we understand meaning, yes. But we can always apply meaning to our own lives, that's what makes them worth living.

...time is an illusion.

That's quite a contested viewpoint. Time may not exist as a thing, but things still move through space at certain rates, and that is how we define time.

Eventually we all die and everything we experienced will cease to matter.

Before you were born it didn't matter either. Why is it mattering a good thing?

The time between our birth and death is just a blip that will pass before we know it

By the fact that I am consciously here at the age of 18, I can tell you that it has currently not passed without me knowing it. Time only passes without you knowing it if you spend it in a depressed comatose state.

...and the only real thing that matters is avoiding suffering as much as possible along the way.

A very Epicurean view. I consider it a shame that people simply consider the pursuit of happiness to be avoidance of pain, what about acquiring pleasure?

Accomplishments are pointless. Learning is pointless.

Not if they help you avoid pain and receive pleasure.

The human race are like locusts at this point and are destroying the Earth.

Who cares if they are destroying the earth? You won't be around the next 1000 years to see it, so enjoy it while you can.

The beauty that does exist, waterfalls, forests, nature in general is being destroyed and if it keeps up, it may become permanent.

How often do you actually sit down and consciously stare at those things because they are beautiful? I'm not just talking about staring at a computer screen here, I'm talking real life, because you can stare at an image of any of those things at any time. Perhaps if you actually enjoy those things to the extent you seem to you should go out and make the most of them.

Death is something to look forward to.

Think about before you were born, that nothingness. Is that really something to look forward to? I mean, I know anything isn't better than something inherently, but I'm sure as hell going to live my time on this earth to the best extent that I can.

When you die, it's all over. No more pointless effort to exist, no more trying to find things to entertain your brain or keep it occupied all the time. No more responsibilities for others that force you to do things you would rather not.

No peace either, peace requires a conscious mind to deem it as such. If you do not like others forcing you to do things, stop doing the things. Rebel. Remember that you are your mind. If it is not occupied, you are not occupied, if you are not occupied, you are bored, if you are bored you are doing it wrong.

If there is anything beyond death for humans, we will all eventually have to deal with it anyway, so putting it off doesn't change a thing.

There is no good reason to expect that there is, better enjoy life while you have it. Hell, better enjoy life while you have it even if there is an afterlife, some of those religions paint a very scary picture...

So death is what should be celebrated, not birth. We should all have death days every year where we celebrate the day we will eventually die (planning deaths in advance would give us all something to look forward to!).

I agree that we should celebrate death, we should celebrate birth to. We should celebrate everything, enjoy ourselves to the fullest extent, then become the focus of another celebration one day.

----
I know all this may be seen as pointless (as depression isn't likely to be cured by simple talking, especially not by some random on the internet), but I do not doubt anyone's capacity for reason until they show it to me, you're worth the effort.

 

[Arakasi]

I am depressed due to some mental conditions I am afraid to have diagnosed because I don't trust medicines. I am afraid what mind altering chemicals will unleash. I have internal personalities that always bicker and give me conflicting thoughts, often resulting in full on arguments. One of said personalities is downright evil, inserting thoughts really nasty things like how easy it would be to kill grandma.

If you are worried about what they may unleash, get a pair of handcuffs, chain yourself to something, set up some kind of timed release thing for the key, or tell someone to give you the key after X time, then you can judge after you've taken the medicine, what it's effects were, and whether or not you would benefit from them. It may seem a bit extreme, but this is your life we're talking about, is there anything more important?

 

[Mykal Stype]

I am depressed due to some mental conditions I am afraid to have diagnosed because I don't trust medicines. I am afraid what mind altering chemicals will unleash. I have internal personalities that always bicker and give me conflicting thoughts, often resulting in full on arguments. One of said personalities is downright evil, inserting thoughts really nasty things like how easy it would be to kill grandma.

What do you think that the drugs will unleash? You say that you have multiple personalities in your head, so try the drugs as it can't get worse than that. You especially need to try as you say that one of those personalities is "evil." At least go see a psychologist, who will help you determine if you should see a psychiatrist.
When you see the doctor, he or she isn't going to just throw drugs at you and see if they work. They have drugs that are proven to work in these situations and set you up with what is needed, judging by severity and any issues you have alongside the main problem. They then monitor you with regular visits until you start to stabilize, then they will space out the appointments a bit more once once the drugs are definitely working. They'll also teach you how to catch any signs that the condition may be coming back and then possibly increase or change the meds, but that's usually done if intervention in other means doesn't work.
Psychology and psychiatry isn't like One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest anymore. The drugs are still mind altering, but for the best. Especially for the best with someone in your condition. Besides, doesn't altering your mind to be healthy sound better than what you have now?

I was worried about starting drugs too, and while they aren't perfect--sometimes I go into relapses, one which I'm in right now--I feel better than I thought I would without them. Relapses are more common in bipolar than a lot of other issues, so you'll probably be changing meds less than me. But if you have a relapse, it's easy to fix once as they find out what works. The only reason I'm still in one is because I'm being readjusted right now.

 

[Mykal Stype]

While you're waiting for your meds to work, try to learn how to ignore the personalities that are bad. Think of them like a drunk uncle. Your psychologist will help you with that as she or he knows how to deal with irrational thoughts and will try to help you. But you have to trust her, which is hard sometimes when you start.

 

[knight steel]

A chemical imbalance in my brain has caused me to suffer from anxiety/panic attacks that require medicine to fix and allow me to function normally, however this problem has resulted in me missing out on a lot socially causing me not knowing how to interact with people properly and not having good relationships.

To try and gain friends/attention I create an over the top personality-constantly trying to be quirky and unique so that people will like me this unfortunately has backfired on me and I come off as needy-desperate-creepy-and an assclown which has just made my self-esteem/anxiety worse and then in turn makes my interaction harder which then makes me become more attention whore which starts the whole process over again

I can't seem to win: be myself and I'm ignored and viewed as withdrawn-try to be outgoing and friendly and I come across as needy and desperate,this has lead me to become depressed on top of my already troubled mind,this even extends to me here on the escapist,I try and be bubbly by posting happy anime gifs and calling people sexy/my rivals which annoys people-I become antisocial stating controversial opinion's and people get angry both of which resulted in me receive warnings and ending up in the red which makes me even more stressed to the point that every time I see that I receive a message I panic that it's another warning the fear of which has even resulted in me crying once.

 

[TheNaut131]

Well, I'm thoroughly sure I don't have clinical depression and I probably shouldn't be posting in this thread. (Then again, I've never really thought about being checked out and would rather not) Though I do feel like shit for a number of reasons.

For one, I seem alienate everyone around me and I instantly ruin everyone's day. Every time I try to contribute something to a conversation, I either don't and just try to emulate everyone around me due to my lack of actual personality or I merely make an ass of myself in a sad attempt of humor. I'm a walking joke for the most part, not hated, mostly ignored, just a joke. I don't really communicate with the few people I can call friends and I tend to inadvertently hold back. I suppose this is some defense I built up after being bullied for awhile, but truth be told, I'm thoroughly sure I deserved every insult, flick, and shove I got.

This dumb kid who tried to be everywhere at once, trying so hard to fit in, to get attention, to emulate what people wanted and what I wanted at the same time...and failing miserably. Then there were my attempts at not letting people step all over which just made me look like a retarded psychopath and a whiny *****. And stupid suicide talks, blah, blah...

But alas, live and learn. Shit happens, you move on...except you realize you're not really getting better at this life thing and I find myself alienating people and sucking. I keep telling myself that I don't have any actual problems, worrying about this is stupid, but I can't seem to shake the feeling of shit. Then I begin to honestly and personally contemplate suicide, not because I'm honestly sick of life, but more or so, because for some irrational reason I'd rather not deal with it. And also because I'm too much of a pussy to do actually do anything.

But then I remember nachos exist and say, "maybe another time", and try to ignore the fact I'm overly self-aware and that I'm an idiot.

Which is why I'm not clinically depressed and probably shouldn't be posting in this thread.

 

[wulfy42]

Life is meaningless...

Inherently, in the way we understand meaning, yes. But we can always apply meaning to our own lives, that's what makes them worth living.


We can create illusions of meaning, or more to the point, all meaning is an illusion, but a necessary one for most humans to remain "sane". We choose what has meaning in our lives, and if we choose that nothing has meaning...well then our lives our meaningless. That doesn't stop it all from being an illusion though.

...time is an illusion.

That's quite a contested viewpoint. Time may not exist as a thing, but things still move through space at certain rates, and that is how we define time.

It may be a contested theory/viewpoint, but I am talking about in a personal sense. Time flies by before you know it. One second your 10 years old, and the next you are 30. The older you get, the easier this is to realize and notice. Nothing really matters, but....if nothing matters, you might as well try and make others existence better if you can. That does require energy and motivation which can be hard to maintain sometimes though.

Eventually we all die and everything we experienced will cease to matter.

Before you were born it didn't matter either. Why is it mattering a good thing?

The point here is that all the effort you put forth throughout your life, you would hope it mattered at least. Being born is not always a good thing, and I would not have chosen to be born if given a choice. The point here is that IF you have to exist, then at least having your existence matter would make it worth the effort/pain etc.

The time between our birth and death is just a blip that will pass before we know it

By the fact that I am consciously here at the age of 18, I can tell you that it has currently not passed without me knowing it. Time only passes without you knowing it if you spend it in a depressed comatose state.

Ah, but when you are at the end of your life, the last few seconds, your life will seem to have passed so fast. You can look back and remember things until that point, but once you die...no more memories, no more knowledge, no more you. So what then is the point?

...and the only real thing that matters is avoiding suffering as much as possible along the way.

A very Epicurean view. I consider it a shame that people simply consider the pursuit of happiness to be avoidance of pain, what about acquiring pleasure?

Pleasure is, in some ways, bad. Why? Because you then compare the rest of your experiences to whatever you have enjoyed so far. Moderate amounts of pleasure, goals, and meaning in life is probably the best bet. People who have everything they want, and don't need to strive for anything are often the most depressed.

Accomplishments are pointless. Learning is pointless.

Not if they help you avoid pain and receive pleasure.

That is true to a point, but ceasing to exist also achieves the same result, without so much effort. If everything goes poof when you die, do accomplishments or all the things you have learned and experienced in life really matter?

The human race are like locusts at this point and are destroying the Earth.

Who cares if they are destroying the earth? You won't be around the next 1000 years to see it, so enjoy it while you can.

If anything maters, I would say a world where life exists does. To destroy it......even if I will not be around to see it, is horrible. I doubt the human race will make it another 100 years (I believe Stephan HAwkings just said something similar as well), let alone 1000. I might even be around still when things start falling apart at this rate.

The beauty that does exist, waterfalls, forests, nature in general is being destroyed and if it keeps up, it may become permanent.

How often do you actually sit down and consciously stare at those things because they are beautiful? I'm not just talking about staring at a computer screen here, I'm talking real life, because you can stare at an image of any of those things at any time. Perhaps if you actually enjoy those things to the extent you seem to you should go out and make the most of them.

I love those things, and have mountain climbed, river rafted, hiked to see waterfalls. Sadly I have not been able to do so in the recent past because I have a bed bound, sick wife that needs constant care. I have struggled with depression my whole life, but stick me in a house without being able to be more then 15 minutes away for over 2 years....yeah...hard to look at the bright side right now.

Death is something to look forward to.

Think about before you were born, that nothingness. Is that really something to look forward to? I mean, I know anything isn't better than something inherently, but I'm sure as hell going to live my time on this earth to the best extent that I can.

YES!!! Nothingness is something to look forward too. It is what I most desire. I have struggled my whole life with the question, if given a wish by a genie, would I wish to never be born, or just to cease to exist. I've helped many people. I've been depressed most of my life so I focused on helping others, but if given the option to not have existed....I don't think I could resist. Nothingness is the most likely result of our death, and it is what I want more then anything. Depressed or not, and I have had periods of at least lesser depression if not happiness, I have ALWAYS wanted that.

When you die, it's all over. No more pointless effort to exist, no more trying to find things to entertain your brain or keep it occupied all the time. No more responsibilities for others that force you to do things you would rather not.

No peace either, peace requires a conscious mind to deem it as such. If you do not like others forcing you to do things, stop doing the things. Rebel. Remember that you are your mind. If it is not occupied, you are not occupied, if you are not occupied, you are bored, if you are bored you are doing it wrong.

To me peace means not being conscious. That is what I am looking forward to. I force myself to do things, others do not. I do them because they are what I believe is right, and because I think it is better to suffer yourself, then to cause others to suffer. And sadly, if you are bored, you are not always given many options. My life, over all, is better then 99.5% of the people on this planet probably (as far as comforts/food etc) I have tons of ways to entertain myself at home etc, but boredom is still a constant danger which requires constant effort to battle.

If there is anything beyond death for humans, we will all eventually have to deal with it anyway, so putting it off doesn't change a thing.

There is no good reason to expect that there is, better enjoy life while you have it. Hell, better enjoy life while you have it even if there is an afterlife, some of those religions paint a very scary picture...

I do agree we should all enjoy life as much as possible, and help others do the same. I do try to enjoy things as much as I can. Sometimes it can be hard, or even seem impossible though.

So death is what should be celebrated, not birth. We should all have death days every year where we celebrate the day we will eventually die (planning deaths in advance would give us all something to look forward to!).

I agree that we should celebrate death, we should celebrate birth to. We should celebrate everything, enjoy ourselves to the fullest extent, then become the focus of another celebration one day.

I, in general, try to live my life that way, celebrating things as much as possible. It has always made me very popular with other people. It is an effort to do so though. Being happy, for me, is often an act, and almost always and effort. But I'm a good actor.

----
I know all this may be seen as pointless (as depression isn't likely to be cured by simple talking, especially not by some random on the internet), but I do not doubt anyone's capacity for reason until they show it to me, you're worth the effort.

Thank you for your responses, and for trying. I am not fixable though. I have come up with ways to deal with my depression, and to make my time on this earth positive at least. I have tried medication, but it just dulled everything, so I could not enjoy things even...which is actually one of the ways I cope with my depression (find things I like, look forward to etc, and focus on them etc....which can be bad when they don't happen, but having a goal, or something I want is very important). Drugs just take the want away, making everything into a dull grey existence. Counselling also doesn't really do anything for me, I have tried it. The best solutions I have found by myself. It has worked well enough to get me through 40+ years, have a wife, save multiple lives, make other peoples lives better/happier and allowed me to take care of multiple family members for years. I might not appreciate my existence, but certainly others have.

 

[Ruedyn]

Perhaps I'm cheating, I feel more frustration than depression. Still, that won't stop me from ignoring all the problems of better people than I and continuing.

I have recently broken my hand. That feels like a good way to start this. This is the culmination of severa things. My stuff gets stolen, often, because I lack friends. I've pushed them away in a poor attempt at self renewal after a mutual break up with a violent aftermath. Most of my friends preferred her, I can't blame them I felt the same way for several months.

Because of these, my stuff gets stolen. Among these things are my PE clothes. When they get stolen, I have to miss a day, and get sent to the office for saturday school. These are essentially shitty detentions made to make kids lose sleep, it seems. So, these have piled up, I feel tires near all the time. My mind feels like it is wrapped in a heavy fog, and I'm forced to use impulse over my usual strain of logic only I ever seem to follow.

Because of my over abundance of saturday schools, and swearing at a teacher after I stubbed my toe, I was noticed to have gone over the amount. I was suspended. I was led into the front office like a child, told to wait for the class period. I used this time to help around, opening doors for others and such. I liked to think I was helpful. Eventually, they bothered to let me see the vice principle.

She asked me why I was there. I had the inkling it was another saturday school. She corrected me, and told me to sign three pieces of paper, which I would give to my parents to let them know I fucked up.

I let emotion take over as I left, I punched a wall. I punched it as hard as I fucking could. I broke my hand over three rage fueled strikes. The class I had interrupted by banging on their wall was polite enough to get me an ambulance. Despite the broken hand, or perhaps because of the reasons behind it, I was grounded from my computer. Still I was allowed my phone, which this was written on.

And that is my biased account over why I've been a moody bastard for the last... god knows how long ago this self destructive cycle actaully began... I don't know, I apologize for wasting space. With pointless high school bullshit.