12 Step Meeting, Anxiety, Choice, Depressed Anonymous, Faith, Fear, Helpful, Helpful Thinking, Mindfulness, Mutual Aid, Positivity, Prayer, Stress, Supportive Actions

Catastrophic Thinking

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Dorothy Rowe shares with us some helpful thoughts on how to deal with those thoughts which we label as catastrophic.

Suppose that there is some event looming and you are frightened of what is going to happen. Your Mother may be coming to stay or you are required to go to the firm’s ball, or your daughter expects you to go to her graduation or your son wants you to take him along – all fearful events of course – and you can’t see any way of avoiding them other than being very depressed. Try something else. Write down what it is you are expected to do and then say, ‘if I do this, what is the very worst that could happen?’

Write down your answer and look at it in the cold light of day. If you have said ‘I’ll die’ then rejoice your troubles will soon be over.

If you have said, ‘I’ll make a fool of myself’ ask ‘What is the opposite of making a fool of oneself’? Then ask ‘Why is this important’? See if you dare commit to paper just how vain you are.

Then go back to the original situation and say, ‘How many different outcomes can I see?’ List them all, the good ones as well as the bad, the fantastic ones as well as the prosaic, see if you can predict what then actually happens. (No cheating by using self-fulfilling prophecies like ‘I am sure I won’t enjoy it.’)

Then there are the things that you feel compelled to do. No strange force is compelling you, not any person other than yourself. When you see your own values clearly you can ask, ‘Do I do this because I believe it is right or do I do it because the parent in my head tells me to and I am too scared to disobey’?

You are you, you are the parent in your head, you are the child who is scared to disobey. You can spend the rest of your life `going around as three squabbling people, or you can choose` to make into yourself one whole person.

Resource
Copyright(c) Dorothy Rowe. Depression: The way out of your prison. SECOND EDITION. 1983, 1996. Routledge, New York, NY.pp.225-226.

12 Step Meeting, Belief, Choice, Community building, Depressed Anonymous, Despair, Fear, Fellowship, Hope, Pain, Purpose, Spirituality, Step 01, Step 02, Step 03, The 12 Steps

We can do the possible – the impossible takes a little more time

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If there are challenges for me today, I remember other days when what seemed impossible was made possible.
– AA Grapevine

Can you relate to this statement? I sure can. Like most of us, I always felt that when facing an obstacle of whatever kind and size, I just believed that the effort was too much. This was always my thinking, especially when I was living in my emotional and mental desert of depression.

Just getting out of bed was a Herculean task. I didn’t even know why I couldn’t get out of bed, but I did know this, the effort that it would take was just impossible. The challenge was more than my mind and my body could handle.

When I discovered the twelve spiritual principles (steps) of recovery I discovered that I had to face the challenge, admit that and that I was powerless. By using the tools which my fellowship group, Depressed Anonymous, was giving me, I began to climb out of the hole that I was in. From that point on, the challenges that faced me every day, I found they were no longer impossible to face and overcome. Yes, the impossible does take a little more time and work, but no longer living in a hole, makes taking on the challenge worth it.

Hugh S., for the fellowship

12 Step Meeting, Fellowship, Service

New DA Speaker Meeting Recording 04 Mar 2022

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We’ve uploaded the talk from Moore that he gave on Friday 04 March 2022.

We have a number of recordings of people sharing their story at a speaker meeting. The link to that page is: https://depressedanonymous.org/depressed-anonymous-meeting-recordings/

The link can also be browsed to by selecting Tools for Recovery from the horizontal menu, then Depressed Anonymous Meeting Recordings

As we record more speakers the recordings will be posted there as well. The list is in reverse chronological order (newest first).

Depressed Anonymous

What is the “group conscience” as understood by Twelve Step fellowship groups?

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Depressed Anonymous follows the model pioneered by Alcoholics Anonymous. Sometimes it’s helpful to read literature from AA to get insight.

I think many oldsters who have put our AA ‘booze cure’ to severe but successful tests still find they often lack emotional sobriety. Perhaps they will be the spearhead for the next major development of much more real maturity and balance (which is to say, humility) in our relations with ourselves, with our feelings, and with God. Reinforced by what grace I could secure in praying I found I had to exert every ounce of will and action to cut off their faulty dependencies upon people, upon AA, indeed upon any set of circumstances what soever…Plainly I could not avail myself of god’s love until I was able to offer it back to him by loving others as he would have me. And I couldn’t possibly do that so long as I was victimized by false dependencies. For my dependency meant demand a demand for the possession and control of the people and conditions surrounding me.
– From the AA Grapevine, January, 1958, Bill W.

Also quoting AA literature:

The term informed group conscience implies that pertinent information has been studied and all views have been heard before the group votes. This is achieved by the group members through the sharing of full information, individual points of views, and the practice of AA principles. To be fully informed requires a willingness to listen to minority opinions with an open mind. On sensitive issues the group works slowly, discouraging formal votes until a clear sense of its collective view emerges.
– AA group pamphlet, 1992.

Comment

I believe that these two articles, (Google) published under the title OF Tradition Two: Group conscience OR mob rule? can be a good reference for those Newcomers who may not have a understanding what “group conscience” is.

Hugh S., for the fellowship

12 Step Meeting, Fellowship, Service

DA Speaker Meeting Recordings

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We have a number of recordings of people sharing their story at a speaker meeting. The link to that page is: https://depressedanonymous.org/depressed-anonymous-meeting-recordings/

The link can also be browsed to by selecting Tools for Recovery from the horizontal menu, then Depressed Anonymous Meeting Recordings

As we record more speakers the recordings will be posted there as well. The list is in reverse chronological order (newest first).

Choice, Courage, Focus

Doing what you can, even if it is really small

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My depression wants me to wallow in doing nothing. I want to crawl into the Bill cave and let the world pass me by.

If I give into that thought completely I am doomed to remain in the pit of my depression. I must take action! What if I don’t have the motivation? Well I don’t need to muster up the energy and motivation to do the grand projects. Maybe my house is an utter pig sty and I really should fully clean my house. That’s OK – start small. Perhaps all you need is a small self push of picking up all the dirty dishes in your house and bringing them to the kitchen. If you’re feeling inspired perhaps scrape the leftovers from the plates into the garbage. Tell yourself that you are going to load the dishwasher in an hour. Two hours from now you’ll wash the pots and pans.

You don’t need to do it all right now. You don’t need to undertake all the work of recovery right now. All you need to do is to take action on the small thing in front of you. Remember you don’t climb a mountain in a single small step. Climbing a mountain is done a step at a time. Sometimes looking at the peak while we are in the valley is overwhelming. Believe me, I’ve been there. Don’t focus on how far the peak is. Just be mindful of your surroundings and where you are going to place your next step. Then take that step, then the next. Eventually you will be at the peak. The pit of the depression will be behind you.

The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.
– Tao Te Ching

Yours in recovery, Bill R

12 Step Meeting, Acceptance, Anxiety, Choice, Courage, Depressed Anonymous, Exercise, Faith, Fear, Fellowship, Helpful, Honesty, Hope, Isolation, Mutual Aid, Negativity, Positivity, Purpose, Spirituality, Step 12, Stress, Supportive Actions, The 12 Steps, The Promises

Depression made me think I was losing my mind, until I did two things that changed my life forever

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“What is happening to me,” I asked myself, as I spent another week of struggling to get out of bed. It was like a 500 pound lead weight had dropped on top of me. I felt that whatever commands I issued to my body, “like get out of bed,” the message never reached my body.

The only thing that I knew what to do was to force myself to move the body and hopefully the mind would follow, be it reluctantly. And that is exactly what happened. Every morning after was a struggle, but I did manage to push myself out of bed and I got myself to work. When work ended, I went home and immediately hit the bed. What’s going on here? I asked. I had no clue that what was the matter was that my body was shutting down and that my mind gradually became powerless to make any positive changes in my behavior or thinking.

It was only as I started to walk five miles a day in a local mall, just to promote the fact that I was up and out and able to get to work. I want to make the point here that even though this walking continued for over a year and half, I still was forcing myself to get out of bed. Every morning the debate in my head started all over again. By now I had developed some resistance to staying in bed and just realized, if I was to save my job, I had to walk.

Eventually, the walking was a way out of the prison that my mind had constructed. Eventually, I learned that the way I was living my life and the negativity that I had embraced in my thinking, together threw me into a deep dark pit. Before I was able to figure out what was happening to me, I became depressed. The more I tried to figure out, in my mind, why I was depressed the more I became further depressed, isolated and alone. Then I did something that changed my life to this very day.

The first thing that I did was to force myself to get out of bed and walk, walk, and walk some more. (I still walk three times a week). I know first-hand, the potential life-threatening nature of depression.

The second most important discovery for my recovery was to find a group of men and women just like myself, all who were depressed and looking for a way out of their depression. It was this 12 Step fellowship group, Depressed Anonymous, that has been an integral part of the way I live my life today. If you are looking for what I found, namely, a way to quit saddening yourself, this support group may be your lifeline as much as it continues to be for me today. And I still attend this meeting, even though I have not been depressed for many years, I attend because I find that I can help others to find the hope and peace that it promised and provides for me today.

Discover important information at depressedanonymous.org for our online virtual Zoom meetings which meet every day of the week. Other DA sponsored groups also meet during the week. There are no fees and dues. Come and share or just come and listen. You will find that you are not alone. We are all on this journey of hope together…and we do recover.

For the fellowship, Hugh S.

Choice

Change is of the nature of a spiral instead of a straight line

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How many times have I heard clients tell me that they want to change. Most times the change that they desire is to remove pain from their lives. This pain could be an emotional one, a physical pain or a pain of a botched relationship. Pain, no matter how you look at it, prompts us to look at our lives, habits and relationship.

One time I asked a client why he drank so much. I wasn’t prepared for his answer. It was honest enough, but nevertheless a surprise. He told me unabashedly that he drank because it made him feel good. I was thinking that he might be drinking because of a lost job, a relationship or marriage that didn’t work out. But he told me that he was going to keep on drinking. No one was going to take that away from him.

Has depression distorted us from the truths of life? Namely, that life is to be lived with hope and serenity. Nursing along a good habit can in time wean us from old and debilitating habits of thought and behavior. We want to daily fill our day with the gratitude that we are indeed better and that the trust that we have is indeed placed in the Higher Power.

In order for us to escape depression we need to begin to be aware of the process of how people change.

12 Step Meeting, Community building, Faith, Fellowship, Gratitude, Helpful Thinking, Higher Power, Spirituality, Step 01

Life is a Symphony

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Sometimes, I am plagued with thoughts like, “what is the point?” or “what is this going to change anything anyway?” which leads me to doing nothing at all and just wallowing in my own sadness.  I was having one of those days that I am so familiar with, just to feel safe. But because of this program, I decided to do one thing that brings me joy; playing the flute.

As I played, it reminded me of the joy of being a part of a symphony. To be one part of a whole, even through the secondary melodies and many minutes of rests as the other instruments exploded in their grandeur, being swept away when I harmonized with another or sat in silence waiting for the entrance of my own instrument…

Before recovery, I was the conductor of the symphony of my life. It consisted of a jumble of solos as I reached for the next quick fix that would keep the music going for just another second longer. Now that I am in recovery, I have stepped down from the role, and let my Higher Power do my job. The God of my understanding knows and is capable of actually leading all parts of my life, and will never quit on my musical masterpiece. The 12-steps was my leap of faith to put my trust in God, and now I don’t question why I must play this inaudible sound, because I am not in charge anymore.

My happiness is a beautiful melody and it consists of many tiny sounds and noises. I don’t have to understand to partake in it anymore. I just have to do what I have to do, one day, one hour, one second at a time, and be joyous about making that one part of a whole happen.

I am humbled by this program after being helped so many times, and I am still learning new things every day from my fellows. I am filled with gratitude to be a part of this DA symphony, with all of our strengths and weaknesses, coming together, playing the most serene music I have ever heard.

Yours in Recovery,

Anna T

Hope is just a few steps away!