Conquering depression

There are moments when we feel so down that many of our daily routines and responsibilities are affected. Most of the time this is triggered by a traumatic incident like the discovery of a debilitating illness, loss of a loved one, or the loss of a viable

Many researchers, however, found out that Filipinos are very resilient when it comes to dealing with problems. In fact, because of this somewhat strange ability, a recent international " happiness" survey gave the Philippines high marks.

We are a happy people, no doubt about that, but this does not mean that we don't get depressed. Depression defined Diane Tillman, a California-based educational psychologist and family therapist, defines depression as "pervasive low mood or sadness that continues to last."

In simpler terms, it is a feeling of being unhappy; being constantly worried of things especially those that are beyond our control; having feelings of anger, including unexplainable ones; and being unsatisfied.

A person who is clinically depressed, she said, would be someone who feels very sad for more than a couple of weeks, and whose feeling of hopelessness would lead to losing interest on things and activities that they are normally interested in. Graver forms would be associated with psychosis.

Depression, an opportunity "(Feeling depressed) is pretty much a normal thing in this age," she revealed. "And it is very useful."

She explained: "Depression is an opportunity, and the more we learn from the opportunity, the more we learn about what virtue or new understanding or truth that we need to realize, then the more we will be free from that type of thing ever affecting us again, so that gradually overtime you could become freer and freer and freer."

Easily said, but exactly how do we become free from these feelings of despair? It seems that with the growing number of calamities and challenges that we face every day and the seemingly unending sorrowful situations, there is just no time for us to process our emotions and experience constant happiness.

Tillman suggests three main steps in overcoming depression, in particular, and feelings of sadness, in general. Charged First, a fully charged emotional and spiritual energy is needed. For this, we need to " meditate, take in love and peace, (and) be in the present."

" Have a screen saver in your mind. Think, ' I am a jewel of contentment'. Have a (positive) point (to meditate on) and then enjoy that," Tillman said, adding that during our meditation, we could visualize absorbing positive energy from God in order to recharge the soul. It would be like being bathed in the comfortably warm rays of the sun.

"There's positive psychology now based on happiness," she said.

"Be grateful for things. At night, write positive things, write letters of love. If we can stay in the present and fill our mind with love and peace, then we collect spiritual energy, and we want a reservoir of that energy," she added. Learn and stop the blame Next, Tillman said that we must start to learn and stop blaming, and for this, respect is needed, including self-respect.

Tillman particularly pointed out feelings of guilt and the act of blaming ourselves for every bad thing happening in our life and that of others.

"If you feel guilty, it means that you are a good person," she said. However, she also cautions that guilt is only useful for the first five seconds; after which, it becomes destructive. So, her advice: Don't sulk on your mistakes.

Instead of sulking, she suggests that we meditate on the feeling, on the situation and the mistake that we committed and then analyze what is the best approach to use for that particular situation. She also said that we must learn to see the virtue behind the mistake and to "grow on it," so that the next time that we encounter such situation, it would be easy to handle and the mistake won't be repeated. Deal with the pain Lastly, we must learn to deal with our pain and sadness when it occurs.

"The key to preventing depression is loving acceptance. If I lovingly accept my feelings, my emotions, then the negative ones won't stay very long," Tillman said.

She suggests that we put a stop to the critical voice inside our heads. "Say goodbye to the critical voice," she said. One of the methods that Tillman suggests is an internal conversation with ourselves every time we feel bad, sad, or depressed.

The scene would involve a dialog between a child, which feels the negative emotions, and a nurturing mother, who allows the child to speak his mind and guide him towards the discovery of a solution.

She cautions that as a "parent", we must not be judgmental, rather, we must be accepting, talking to the " child" with positive reinforcements.

"Try to protect the child and you will find out that as the inner child becomes older, it will protect you," she said.

"If we nurture our inner child, that inner child would grow up and become a source of strength and protection," Tillman added. Aside from the mother-child conversation, another method is to find the root behind the negative emotion that triggered the feelings of depression.

"When there is something that bothers you, look at the root. Find out what you need to do, what virtue you need to develop, or what quality you need to have. Do not dwell on the root," she said.

Depression is a universal problem. As long as there are problems in the world, there will always be that window that would somehow allow this debilitating emotion to set in.

However, just like any challenge, there is always a way out of it, a way to lovingly escort the feelings out the door. In order for this to happen, we must learn to change our negative feelings into positive emotions that would allow us to grow and to experience freedom and

happiness.