Depression and Discernment: ysabetwordsmith

Depression and Discernment

One of my perennial interests is discernment: the knack for and process of figuring out which of various possible causes is active in a particular instance, and what sort of things one can do to distinguish between them. This includes determining whether there is a magical or a mundane cause behind the issue, or even both. In another context, the topic of depression came up; this (and other types of mental upset) makes a good example because it can have so many different causes.

Depression is miserable and people usually want it to go away. Will [solution X] remove or lessen your depression? Well, it depends on the cause of your depression...

* If your depression is caused primarily by a biochemical imbalance, something needs to be done to make your body work right or compensate for the fact that it doesn't. Conventional medicine is probably the best bet; sometimes herbalism, dietary changes, or other alternative options may help or may work better. Conventional medicine is terrific for identifying exactly what physical factors are outside of optimum parameters; but when it comes to fixing body problems that affect the mind, there's still a lot of trial-and-error involved. A broken brain is a lot more intricate than a broken leg. If no physical problems can be identified, the cause is probably something else and physical remedies are less likely to help. If everything in your life is okay or great but you still feel depressed, a physical problem is likely and physical remedies should help.

Note that physical imbalances can be a primary OR secondary factor: a healthy body surrounding a severely upset spirit can develop physical problems, and a healthy spirit in a malfunctioning body can develop mental/emotional/spiritual problems. If at all possible, track back to determine which came first, because it's usually more effective to solve such problems in order of occurrence.

* If your depression is caused by a life upheaval that happens and then stops, time is the main fix; you should return to normal eventually regardless of what is or isn't done, unless something else gets damaged in the meantime. It's typical to be depressed over a death in the family, a lost job, or other major impacts. If you can point to one of those, and you feel like your depression is a reasonable response, don't feel compelled to "fix it" just because mainstream culture is getting into the bad habit of expecting people to be happy all the time. Upheavals have the advantage of being easy to spot, so always check for those.

Catastrophic upheavals can cause enough damage that the mind and/or body can't recover without help, in which case talking or other mental approaches may help the mind and drugs or other physical approaches may help the body. If you've gone through an upheaval some time ago, and you feel that you should be getting better but aren't -- or if you feel like something is broken or out of place -- then consider taking more active steps. You should also check for other causes.

* If your depression is caused by ongoing ambient stressors, such as a toxic emotional environment or improper diet, then it is unlikely to get better until you change your environment or move to a safer one, regardless of what else is done. Some things, such as talking or drugs, may blunt your awareness of the ongoing harm but won't actually fix it. (That's a bad idea for the same reason that taking painkillers so you can walk on a sprained ankle is bad: the problem tends to get worse while you're not feeling it.) Some situations are obviously harmful, such as an abusive relationship; others, such as a bad reaction to certain food additives, can be quite subtle and difficult to pinpoint.

* If your depression is caused by a damaged or absent connection to the Divine, then spiritual work and faith will be needed to fix that. Drugs won't help and neither will anything else. This one is hard to cover up even somewhat with other methods. It's relatively easy to identify in acute form -- the classic "crisis of faith" triggered by a shocking event that makes someone doubt or hate God(s). But it also has a chronic form in which a person's spiritual life is wearing on them or is unsatisfying; that can be harder to spot. God-hunger in someone previously agnostic or atheistic is somewhat easier to spot, but very hard to handle because the person usually rejects that as a possible cause.

* If your depression is caused by an untrained talent or unfulfilled life purpose, that needs to be taken care of. Nothing else will fix it, although some things such as drugs may blunt your awareness of the problem for a while. (This is another "walking on a sprained ankle" situation, with two added twists: 1) some drugs can shut down some magical talents ... which may later erupt wildly if the drug is ever discontinued; and 2) if someone isn't doing the main thing on their list of life goals, sometimes the Universe decides to use a bigger hammer.) Some magical talents (empathy, healing, shamanism, spirit communion, etc.) are quite prone to making people miserable when out of control. The person usually won't recognize them as such, so these must be tracked with observations and questions similar to those for identifying talents in more positive situations. Life purpose issues can cause a sharp awareness of what's missing -- which is straightforward to handle, by pursuing the missing activity -- but more often manifest as vague but intense feelings of melancholy, frustration, uselessness, and "something is missing but I don't know what." This requires the extra step of puzzling out the purpose so it can be met. Divination and other mystical investigations can be helpful for exploring causes in this area; some people may find them useful for spotting other types of causes, to be further pursued with methods suited to the relevant area.

* If your depression has multiple causes, which is fairly common, then each of them needs to be identified and addressed. Otherwise, any single effort will fix only part of the problem. Unfortunately, most care providers only know one style of treatment; a doctor won't think to check your spiritual health and a priest has no oversight for your physical health. So it's a good idea for you to take charge of visiting people who specialize in different fields, particularly if you've had the experience of "well, this sort of helps, but I still don't feel quite right." Never assume that the first plausible cause is indeed the active cause in this instance -- or the only cause. Check thoroughly. Use different methods of exploration to cover different areas. The above list covers the most common causes and some of the less common ones, but other causes are also possible.

This is not intended as a recommendation for or against specific solutions; different things work for different people and circumstances, each with its own set of pros and cons. There are also no guarantees regarding the identification of specific causes; just varying degrees of probability and frequency, and assorted clues. This is intended as an example of how complex and interesting (or frustrating) it can get when people are trying to figure out what is going on and pin down one or more active causes for a particular instance from among a list of mundane and magical possibilities spread across multiple areas.

Deleted comment

Too true!

ysabetwordsmith

July 30 2009, 20:07:55 UTC 11 years ago

New comment

I do a lot of work as a priestess helping people figure out what is on their life list. The cool thing is once they have an idea what's on it, they usually have little difficulty putting things into action. Most life list items are sort of ... pre-enabled. It's the figuring that can be a challenge, as you note, particularly in a culture that doesn't support that.

talix18

July 30 2009, 19:57:07 UTC 11 years ago

Unfortunately, knowing is only part of the battle. And I'm not much of a fighter.

Yes...

July 30 2009, 20:09:12 UTC 11 years ago

Knowing is only the first step. But if you get that one right, the other steps -- however difficult -- will at least be in the right direction. Not knowing means maybe spending tremendous effort going in a wrong direction.

catherinew

July 30 2009, 20:24:49 UTC 11 years ago

Interesting point about dealing with things in order. I wonder about long-standing issues where the issue was never really faced, just sidestepped or papered over.

When the time comes that the papered-over solution is no longer adequate, it seems that the long-standing issue should finally be dealt with first, or at least concurrently with anything else that also needs help.

Just musing...

July 30 2009, 20:40:01 UTC 11 years ago

That's pretty much how it works. A lot of times, it's difficult or impossible to fix subsequent problems, because their cause is that old issue that hasn't been solved. The downside is that it's often hard to figure out which came first, and harder to deal with old entrenched issues; the upside is that sometimes fixing the old issue causes the later ones to disappear or greatly diminish without requiring separate fixes for all of them.

erisian_fields

July 30 2009, 20:40:37 UTC 11 years ago

May I link to this?

Yes, please!

July 30 2009, 21:05:43 UTC 11 years ago

I'm glad you found it useful, and thanks for the networking assist.

Anonymous

July 30 2009, 20:46:04 UTC 11 years ago

My personal opinion from reading books on the subject (both psychological and spiritual) and from personal trial and error, is that we are always affected by what we see on a subconscious level - thus no matter what sort of mood we find ourselves in, it is a product of chemical reaction.

Learning the value of imagery (dream and while awake) and how to read it (something we do in childhood but are later taught should be refuted)is a basic way to start healing and being aware and in control of your life.

The chemical excuse for being solely responsible for depression doesn't work for me at all. I think it a cop out because everything affects us chemically. I have heard cases where diet, activity, and intentional structure has helped the worst of depressive states. I myself am prone to long dark bouts of depression, it is a personality type, I believe. With two suicide attempts as part of that history, and while I do feel affected by things, I believe that to not is a matter of discipline. And in a world where we are increasingly taught to accept a quick fix, discipline falls by the wayside.

Self fulfillment, achieving life as you have envisioned it is also the real source of happiness. I do not find that Psychologists are very helpful as they seem so fast to medicate a person. This is why I love Jung, as far as I can tell his work has been very helpful but he also takes psychology where many psychologists would hate to go, into the spiritual, philosophical, and religious realms.

Supposedly there are many kinds of depression, but to me depression is depression, it either lasts or doesn't, returns rather quick, or doesn't. In the end the only thing to do is live a well thought out life, take responsibility, and exercise some sort of discipline over ones own life through cultivating good habits and intentional structure.

This was an excellent post, thank you.

just_the_ash

11 years ago

Thoughts

bridgeweaver

July 31 2009, 01:40:11 UTC 11 years ago

This is an excellent post, and I am friending you on the strength of it. I am

erisian_fields' husband, so you know who I am.

Welcome!

July 31 2009, 03:38:55 UTC 11 years ago

I'm glad you found this useful. Meanwhile I've Friended you back and am visiting your blog.

You might also check out

haikujaguar who is writing a series of posts on mental hygiene.

janetmiles

July 31 2009, 04:30:47 UTC 11 years ago

Another aspect of physical causes: other illnesses can mimic some of the symptoms of depression, and it's rarely going to be a bad idea to be checked out for, for example, thyroid imbalances or diabetes.

July 31 2009, 04:37:25 UTC 11 years ago

... and on the magical side, empathy can mimic depression if you're picking it up from a genuinely depressed person nearby. That's a different problem than empathy creating so much emotional mayhem that it wears you down and makes you depressed yourself.

Things aren't always what they seem. And sometimes what you observe makes no ever-living sense so that you have to rummage through your entire memory looking for things that are vaguely similar.