The word “depression”
or “depressed” is commonly heard in conversations today and is used to describe
just about any emotion or feeling that is the opposite of happy.
What happened to
being “sad” or just experiencing "melancholy"? Its
almost as if whenever we feel less than happy we are described as being
depressed. Everybody throws the word depressed around as a way of describing a feeling. Its like we have forgotten the language of feeling.
The following are some
definitions of depression as described from Websters dictionary:
1. A mental state
characterized by a pessimistic sense of inadequacy and a despondent lack of
activity.
2. A long-term
economic state characterized by unemployment and low prices and low levels of
trade and investment.
3. A sunken or
depressed geological formation.
With this in mind I’d like to pose the
following. Depression is a dip in
the road, an opportunity to take a rest, a time for reflection, a place to go
within away from the chaos in the world, a time for a holiday, to go walkabout,
to meditate, a curve ball, to contemplate, or create.
Is it possible that
western society with the help of psychologists have taken a normal human emotion or feeling and labelled
it in such away as to limit it? Is
depression no different to the common cold? If we do not look after our immune systems then the cold
becomes a flu and we experience more symptoms. We know that if this happens we
need to look after ourselves better and we take vitamins etc….
Depression, is
no different.
Dr Masuri Emoto of Japan, study on water molecules. Check this youtube clip from the documentary "What the bleep do we know"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWAuc9GIvFo
Is it not perfectly
normal to go in to "self" from time to time to evaluate, to look at ourselves and
contemplate this journey we are on?
To hold ourselves accountable, to take responsibility. I believe that this
is the perfection of the human being, our own inner thermometer. OUR OWN JUDGE
AND JURY.
In other cultures
around the world such as in Asia, depression is not recognised quite the same
way. It is looked upon as being a
more physical issue. Stephen Lau from “Depression and the Oriental Health”
writes that: “from a Chinese medicine
perspective, depression is largely related to the stagnation of
liver"qi." ("Qi" is internal life energy coursing through
the physical body, nourishing your body cells with life-giving oxygen. When
there is blockage, instead of smooth flowing, of "qi", disease and
disorder occur.)
Your liver is related to the
emotions of anger and frustration. It is important you learn how to manage your
anger and frustration, including expressing and repressing them. Stress
management plays a critical role.”
Perhaps in viewing
depression in this way we can start to become more empowered and realise that
we have the opportunity to use this energy to our advantage instead of becoming
a victim of it. When we start to
feel the overwhelm of our modern lifestyles taking over our thoughts and
emotions this is like an alarm clock, alerting us to take time out, to take a
step back and ask yourself, is this behaviour, activity or thought form serving
me right now?
In feeling these
feelings and asking ourselves these questions we start to move from a place of
limitation and suppression to a place of expansion. If we take the opportunity to take a break from the mundane,
everyday and enter into our daydreams, we are transported and move into a place of creation and expansion. Let
me give a personal example.
Recently I was feeling
overwhelmed by increasing pressure to have a job, maintain a mortgage, be a
single mum to 4 children and somehow keep my creative soul alive. I could feel myself getting more
weighed down and losing my enthusiasm for life again. I was finding it hard to get out of bed and generally lacked
energy. My thoughts started to
become self defeating and I was feeling trapped and oppressed by my
situation. In my frustration I
went for walk on the beach, with a million negative and conflicting thoughts in
my head, after a while I stopped took a breath, sat down and quietly I spoke to
heart. “Tell me what I need to do?” I just waited. I emptied my mind of all
thoughts and just sat and focused on my breathing and the ocean in front of me.
After about 10 mins of
silence, I heard it, very quietly but I heard it. The answer came and I knew it instantly was the right
thought because it felt GOOD. It
felt expansive, it felt infinite, it felt full of possibility and most of all
the energy I had been missing returned suddenly. Every time I spoke about or thought about the answers I had
received that day, I could feel the surge of excitement at the possibilities
and infinite potential that surrounded me. No longer did I feel trapped and
powerless. I felt empowered.
The details are not
important, as most people will tell you, depression is not caused by one
thing. It just is. I believe that depression is here to
show us ourselves, its asking us to look at how we are being and change
it. Its asking us to flip it! Its
asking us to look deeper without fear of who we are and embrace it.
The length of time we stay in depression
is based on our resistance to feeling it.
I am somebody who through my life’s journey learnt to work with
depression and use it for my creative pursuits. It doesn’t mean I am never sad, or glum, or challenged or
feel grief. The key is to feel and
to understand the feelings, get to know your feelings and do not fear
them. They are there to help you
stay true to your heart and be a human being full of infinite potential and
expansiveness. Limitation and suppression is created by our fear of ourselves. Its all a matter of perception.
Depression is a necessary tool for our understanding of “SELF”.
By Kate Brilli
Nutrition for the Soul
30/06/2012
To follow the heart is not necessarily going
to rid you of the fear you are perceiving, in the current moment, it may even
accelerate the feeling of fear. 
