Take The Day Off
However deep or light our depression is, a day off is good for all of us.
Even if we think that this applies to everyone else but us, we take a day off anyway.
Beating our depression can simply be about putting ourselves first. Some of us can turn the corner by this one, simple objective and a day off can help us achieve this.
What Are We Taking A Day Off From?
We need to take one day off from our responsibilities. This means we need to go out and play.
It doesn’t mean we take a day off work and then clean the house or do the odd jobs that we are desperate to get finished.
It means we do something that used to fill us with joy and we haven’t done in a long time. We must be self-indulgent and do one big thing for ourselves. Here are some examples:
Go to a park
Take a long, warm bath with candles and scents
Have a massage
Go on an early morning hot-air balloon flight
Go on a picnic
Visit the seaside
Walk in the country
Paint a picture
Book a ride on horseback
Write to your heart’s content
Sleep all day
Climb a large oak tree
Take a dog for a long walk
We find it very hard to do these sorts of things when we are depressed. We think we don’t deserve it, we haven’t worked hard enough, or we don’t have the energy – in which case we can simply lie down for the day.
Learning To Fly
When you learn to fly a plane, you have to become skilled at managing the controls: the rudder, the elevator, the throttle and so on. It can become quite a tricky business making sure all the controls run as they are meant to.
If these controls are not operated in symmetry, the plane and the pilot can enter a flat spin from which only a very experienced pilot can climb out. Once the plane is in that lethal situation, it takes real skill to recover.
A Cessna, however, is a common plane in which to learn to fly. If you get into difficulty, or a spin, and you don’t know how to recover from it, you simply let go of the controls.
This gives the plane the opportunity to sort itself out because it is designed to be dynamically stable.
When learning to pilot a Cessna, the instructor will get you into a muddle and then ask you to let go of all the controls. Naturally, it is easy to feel a sense of fear as you do this, but then a sense of calm takes over as the plane adjusts to being free of unnecessary interference.
When I Suffer From Depression Where Do I Start? Let Go Of Control
We are running from our painful feelings and sending ourselves into a flat spin. Just let go and allow your spirit to re-balance itself.
Deep inside us, no matter how hidden, we have a stable spirit. We are designed to move forward, grow, develop and mature. It is part of human nature to love, experience loss, grieve and accept. It is the gift of life that we can experience bliss and joy.
However, we are inclined to interfere with this natural cycle by trying to control how we feel, ignoring our emotions or using something to suppress our pain. We do this because we are sure the depression will catch us up and devour us. But it won’t – it will simply keep us on the run.
Once you hold your hands up in surrender, you may feel overwhelmed by the strength of anguish that follows. Do not despair; this is a backlog of sensations that have been building up.
Thoughts of suicide
Some of us are frightened that if we surrender then we may not survive. These words are for you.
In our most depressed state of being we can experience thoughts of suicide. We may feel ravaged by the world and think that the only way out is to stop living.
Surrendering to our depression in this state may seem like a foolish thing to do. But running from these thoughts may harm us more because it is the running that wears us down. We become too foggy- headed to make a clear judgement.
Thoughts of suicide can hit us for two main reasons: either the pain is too much for us to bear or we are so enraged with other people that we want to punish them.
In either case we have given up trying to protect ourselves because we have failed in the past.
We feel backed into a corner and there seems no other alternative. All reason has gone and we are at a loss to see any other option but to take our life and end the suffering.
It is at this point that we don’t want anyone else to try to talk us out of the way we feel. When we have suicidal thoughts, people may say things like:
‘Oh, come on, it’s not that bad’
‘Don’t be silly, you don’t really want to do that’
‘Pull yourself together, you’re talking like an idiot’
When we hear those kinds of comments we want to show them exactly what we mean. It can fuel the desire to commit suicide even more and become very, very unhelpful.
If you have thoughts of suicide, surrender to the feelings that lay behind the thoughts.
A technique to help you do this is to look down to the floor. This will help you to ‘feel’ whereas looking upward helps you to ‘think’. Behind your thoughts lies the utmost pain that any human has to bear. Here's some things you might experience:
You might feel the intensity of human degradation, the devastating pain of loss or the wretchedness of a lifetime’s neglect.
You might feel your spirit has dried up and your essence has been ripped away.
You might feel like a ‘nothing’ or a ‘very bad person’.
You might sense that everything you touch, you damage.
You will probably be living in a dark tunnel.
You might hate every part of you as much as you hate others.
You might feel a desire to injure others as you have been injured.
You might want to destroy others as you have been destroyed.
You might simply be lost.
When You Think To Yourself, I Have Depression, Where Do I Start? Do These Things:
Whatever the passion is, then just for today stay with the feelings and ignore the thoughts or the action.
Just for today hold yourself around the tummy as you recognize the emotions behind the thinking.
In this moment acknowledge that you feel so bad that you want to end your life.
Don’t do anything else except surrender into it.
Tomorrow you can take action, but just for today, surrender.
Hold your hands up and give in to the feelings.
Say out loud, ‘I surrender’ and take just one day off.
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