Depression can overcome us unexpectedly and without explanation. Other times, we feel it coming for hours, days or weeks. We brace ourselves for the tangible sensation of the heavy curtain descending, blocking out the light. It feels as though we are fumbling in a dark room, looking for the light switch. We find it, only to remember, it’s of no help. The power is out. There is no quick fix, no source of illumination. There’s only the right now. And we have to make it through each desperate moment, until the right now changes. Fighting our own invisible battle, one breath at a time: the difficult and challenging fight to overcome depression.
How to Cope with and Overcome Depression
We fight the strange urge to succumb to the siren’s song of sadness. The downward spiral can be alluring. Why does it appeal to us to follow dark thoughts? To do things that we know will worsen our frame of mind.
We feel almost compelled to nurture our sadness.
Anyone at any age can suffer from depression, even teen anxiety and depression exist too.
But regardless of where we are in life, we tend to make some of the wrong choices.
We seek out the wrong people.
Engage in the wrong conversations and habits.
Lock down in solitude.
At these times it can help us remember, we each have a buried capability that can help save us.
If we can tap into it, we each have the means to see in the dark.
Shadows, at first. But the more we practice, the more developed our vision becomes. It’s like how our eyes adjust to the blackness of a dark room.
Once we find that switch, each time we need it, it’s easier to find our own personal set of night goggles.
And each time we do, those glasses will light up a bit more of the bleakness around us.
And illuminate the next step on what may be a long path. But it’s a beginning. A start on the road to overcome depression.
When we’re trapped in blackness, it helps to have this thought to hold onto.
To keep perspective and memories front and center.
Knowing what lies beyond the darkness and staying cognizant of the temporary nature of the darkness.
And reaching for strategies that help move us closer to the light.
Seeing the Light at the End of the Tunnel Can Help Us Overcome Depression
We know, if we hang on long enough, the light returns.
At first in glimmers, embers from a long-forgotten fire.
Eventually, the depression and darkness start to recede.
We may not even be cognizant of it in each and every moment as we were before.
Suddenly, we can rise and cope and meet the day, perhaps not with joy just yet, but with something less than foreboding.
At these times we must seek to identify and commit to memory the thoughts, feelings, instances of hope that helped restore us.
Catalogue carefully the inspirations and dreams that helped guide us from depression towards the light on the horizon.
I call these my memory banks. The meaning is twofold. They are thoughts and memories, but I also picture them as the slats in a bridge guiding me across a murky sea.
From my previous dark, depression, to safe and sturdy shores on the other side.
They are my own survival kit. Thoughts that help me emerge from the darkness when it gets to be too much.
A handful of memories and ideas, powerful enough to keep the tide of darkness in check, they comprise the essence of my “why”.
These thoughts help me remember that if I can outlast it, there will be light around the next bend.
Or the corner after that. Somewhere down the road that will leads to the moment when we overcome depression.
If you are struggling with depression, keep this thought in mind: I can hold on by tapping into my own ability to see in the dark.
Thank you as always for reading.
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Joan Senio is the founder of KindCompassCoach. Joan’s career includes clinical healthcare plus 20+ years as an executive in a nationwide health care system and 15 years as a consultant. The common threads throughout Joan’s personal and professional life are a commitment to non-profit organizations, mental health, compassionate coaching, professional development and servant leadership. Joan has had the privilege of mentoring early and mid-career professionals as well as current and future executives and leaders. She is a member of the International Organization of Life Coaches, serves as a thought-leader for KuelLife.com and is also a regular contributor to PsychReg and Sixty and Me. You can read more about Joan here: Joan Senio.
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