Are you radically different than your younger self? Are there key elements that have stayed the same? Most parts? Do you feel as if you’ve followed the “roadmap of life” or forged your own path? Have there been “chapters” or do things all sort of slide into one contiguous flow? Share what you’d like!
Reminds me of the events that transpired over the last half a decade or so.
Over the last several years my mental state was deteriorating. Stress accumulated. Various stuff, employment, overworked, underpaid. Inability to afford housing. Covid. War overseas. Had a mental breakdown at some point. Ended up on meds and in therapy. After multiple sessions was informed by my psychologist that “the reactions you’re exhibiting are normal for a person that has experienced all the items and stress associated with all we discussed up to now, unfortunately I cannot help you as the response is perfectly normal and there’s nothing wrong with you”
I still don’t know how I feel about that specific statement after several thousand dollars of therapy, but I guess it’s better than assuming my depression isn’t “good enough” to be real depression.
There’s a good chance the world should be ashamed to be in the state that it’s in, not for you to be ashamed that you finally see it as it is.
You might like this hidden brain on languishing and how if unadressed it can turn into other mental health issues. But basically the concept is you’ve got everything you need - yet you still feel this uneasiness inside your being. Your call, but it was an interesting listen. *It is tied to an author who just published a book just a heads up.
I had a listen, thank you.
Unfortunately it does not resonate with me since the issues I faced… or rather still currently facing, are basic things that are missing, for example not having a safe space or being able to afford a place to call my own in which I could even think to begin to thrive. It’s not that the shrink didn’t see my problem, it’s that he understood that most of these are socially engineered problems, that given proper legislation from the government for social services and habitat and controlling/reigning in the rampant runoff capitalism that we’re experiencing would alleviate or resolve, and unfortunately he, being a medical professional, is not able to assist with that. He validated that I was indeed exhibiting symptoms of severe depression from these items and did the best he could, but even today, the situation stays much unchanged in most of those items. And no, I don’t have much hope for anything to change in the future, despite all the social movements we’re seeing pop up.
I’d love to be proven wrong.
Hey thanks for giving a listen. I thought it was a interesting thing to hear. Cause you see, one of my lovelies just had a babe. She’s setup, I’m happy. Life is good, or not. Cause like legit she’s going through it. But I also have a friend, brilliant buddy, actuary (so he makes that $$) but he sort of always feels this low-grade depression haunting him. He figures it’s just life. These kinds of things make me think. And make me think this guy, maybe he’s on to something. Just it’s nice to have a sit and think about stuff you know?
The only thing that helps me exist in the space you’re talking about is two things. a) Letting go of what I cannot change. Because I cannot do a damn thing about a majority of the crap going on in the world. And the crap that is affecting my life directly. Like you said, it’s a rigged thing. You just don’t have much agency over these kinds of things and we’re all setup in different ways even from before birth. Which is naners when you think about it. Your shrink sounds like he is a realist, but it also sounds like he didn’t do much to help you big-picture. Just confirm your feelings. Which I mean, that’s big because when you spend your whole life thinking “am I crazy or…?” that shit wears on you. But also, I can say from my (piddly but very meaningful) experience with my shrink that I can ramble (and can’t I?) and rattle off all the shit oozing from my brain. But then she kinda like gathers it and helps me sort it out. And then she like, helps me not feel so shitty about it all by offering an alternative (not correct, not happier, not better) perspective and lets me have a think on it. And if I dig it, I take it. And if I don’t, I let it go. And it kinda helps because we’re very similar people as far as I know. And I am so thankful she’s in my life. But legit I found her on Open Path and went through scores of people (just tabbing through) until I found someone who resonated with me. Which has sorta been the thing that has worked for me as a whole in my life. I head on through life, and the people who resonate with me tend to be the people who help me grow. So like, maybe you just haven’t found your right fit yet?
But all shit aside, you’re not alone in a lot of these things. And finding ways to mitigate the pain, while not adding to it long term (like addiction) is super good. If you’ve got even a 4x6 space you can carve out consider popping some hitt into your life. It helps with a lot of things, but first and foremost it’ll slow your brain down a bit. And then maybe spend some time refinding yourself. Figure out what you like, what you don’t. If you don’t like anything right now - maybe find something you could like or reembrace something you used to like. And if you’ve got even one human being you can talk to regularly (and I am talking like guy at the gas-station, online, childhood homie) just keep doing that. Cause they will help pull you through this.
Just work little by little. I bet you there’s a sea of people on here who will tell you they didn’t think their lives would get any better than they did. I felt like I lost it all at one point in my life. But you just put together the pieces little by little and you come out stronger for it in the end. It feels like shit the whole way, but it’s way better being emotionally on top, than being drowned on the underside. You just gotta find the path that works for you to that point. And you’ve gotta know that you aren’t the only person feeling this way. And of course there’s a million ways you can go about it. But yet again, try to go the healthiest because it’s easy to keep smashing yourself to pieces instead of grabbing the glue. Gl =/
