Category Archives: Focus

Talk is not cheap! Walk the talk!

March 16, 2019 Hugh Smith Leave a comment

When I first attended a 12 Step mutual aid group meeting I found the members talking about their feelings, life situations, and other painful memories. Talk is not cheap! It cost everyone in the group who wanted to talk about their lives that sharing themselves comes at a certain price. At the same time, they discovered that by opening up to others and talking with others, an important shift began to take place in their thinking. Many times when they were sharing they found others in the group who also wanted to talk about these same problems. Even though each of us was a unique individual , we all suffered from the same compulsion and addictive attachments.

The price that each of us paid at these meetings was an investment in personal freedom releasing us from what had kept us locked down in despair. For some, this talking with others was the first time they were able to share their hurt and pain with others.

For some, including myself, it took awhile to trust others. It is only when someone else talks about a life situation that I was given the prompt to talk and share how we had the same experience. Talking helped me to see that I too could be accepted and loved–just for me. Talking helped me believe that from this time on I was not alone.

Talk is not cheap. If you don’t talk, it could possibly cost you a lot more.

Hugh

Depressed Anonymous, 3rd edition. Depressed Anonymous Publications. (2011) Louisville, KY.

Focus

Change the view of yourself. Reframe!

January 23, 2019 Hugh Smith Leave a comment

It is not the facts about myself that results in higher self-esteem – it’s how I view the facts (how I hink abut them).

Some of the very most accomplished people still have low or poor self esteem.

For example:

Some people view Bob Dylan as the greatest, most talented folk singer of the day, others hear his voice and songs and think he is unbearable.

Some people love to hang out at (put your own favorite restaurant here) and others wouldn’t put a foot in the place.

It isn’t whether we are good or bad, talented or untalented, attractive or unattractive.

Self-worth comes from the view we have of ourselves.

+When I am depressed I have a negative, punishing, self critical view of myself. It’s as if I have on dark glasses and I see everything about myself as ‘dark’ and negative. But when I am less depressed I see myself much clearer.

I’m not as critical and judgemental about myself. It’s as if I have on clear, clean glasses.

REFRAMING

Reframing is simply selecting another way of looking at something. It’s a little different from self-defense but similar.

The following a examples of how to reframe my negative view of myself to something positive..

1. Stubborn can be determined.

2. Emotional can be passionate, caring.

3. Loner can be Independent

4. Inconsiderate may instead be purposeful.

5. In decisive could be considered careful.

6. Hyper Is energetic.

7. Unpredictable may be accommodating

8.. Pushy can also be forceful.

9. Dependent may be cooperative

10. Critical my be discriminating

EXERCISE

Cover the right column. In the left column CIRCLE all of the negative view words that you apply to yourself. Do that.
Now remove the cover and CIRCLE all of the corresponding words in the right column which are positive non-judgmental views of the same behavior and qualities.
To get used to thinking about yourself in positive terms, read the circled words in the right column out loud and say “I am……” before each of these characteristics.

Part II:

The following is a partial list of additional positive personality characteristics. Circle the ones that apply to you. At the bottom are some blank lines. Add some other good qualities that you can add to the list.

Thoughtful

Courteous

Polite

Helper

Persistent

Forceful

Emotional Diligent

Friendly

Determined

Cheerful

Truthful Adaptable

Gentle

Sensitive

Courageous

Enthusiastic

Hard working

Creative

Compassionate

If you circled less than five of these qualities, select someone from your support group, family member and ask them to help you find others in the list that apply to you.

III. Pick three positive qualities from the previous lists and write examples of when you showed the quality:

I am _________________________________________________________________________and I showed that when I____________________________________________________________________________.

I am also _____________________________________________________________________and I know that when I ______________________________________________________________________________.

In addition, I am ___________________________________________________ and I showed that when I____________________________________________________________________________________

__________________________________________________________________________________________..

Source: Doctoral dissertation from Oregon Univ.

NOTE: Tomorrow, more thoughts on building self-esteem.

Acceptance, Depressed Anonymous, Fellowship, Focus, Honesty, Hope, Mindfulness, The 12 Steps, Victim Thinking

Was finding this phone number a coincidence?

October 23, 2018 Hugh Smith Leave a comment

Helen shares her story about finding help–when she needed it most.

“I finally knew after two year or more of sleepless nights that someone had to help me. I found a card saying Depressed Center, in the back of the phone book. It has a phone number and that was all. I talked to a man on the other end of the phone. I said to myself this man is too busy to talk with me, but anyway I made the first appointment myself. I made myself go. I thank God I did. I thank God that I went for help. It was a whole new beginning for me. I wanted to get well so badly. I think people do have to want to change. I went in with an attitude that I have to get well. I had heard things about counselors that scared me, but this was just all the old negative feelings that caught up with me and boxed me in. I got better and started to think differently. I started to get rid of some of my negative thoughts. I began to feel better and I continued to see my counselor. I started in Depressed Anonymous some weeks later.”

If you are curious about how the mutual aid group changed Helen’s life you’ll need to read her full account in the Personal Stories section of Depressed Anonymous, 3rd edition, pages 169-172.

She also has something powerful to say about pleasing people and how she needed to get her priorities straight and begin taking care of herself.

Sources: Seeing is believing: 15 ways to leave the prison of depression. (2017). Hugh Smith. Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville, KY.

I’ll do it when I feel better.(2018) Hugh Smith. Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. KY

DA Literature, Focus

Life can be good for a change.

October 16, 2018 Hugh Smith Leave a comment

I read the Depressed Anonymous manual, go to counseling, and attend the Depressed Anonymous meetings. The meetings are a must. I need them to survive. The support group’s members help each other by listening, talking, expressing their feelings, and giving support on how to cope with depression. By letting my Higher Power help me, I am beginning to feel free from depression. I am not so nervous and tensed up. My Christian inner faith is getting stronger. I am not so stressed out and I am beginning to get confidence within myself. I still have trouble with sleep pattern and I am getting some motivation back. I have learned how to handle anxiety by taking deep breaths when I am nervous or troubled. This was suggested by my therapist. I also am learning how to stand up for myself.

All these tools have helped me and will continue to do so. They also taught me not to dwell on my past, to live life one day at a time, and to look toward the future, but not live there. It will take me a long time to deal with depression, but I am glad that these tools are available. Life can be good for a change. Please don’t give up.”

~ANONYMOUS

Anonymous, is one of the many persons who share their personal story of recovery in the group’s manual, Depressed Anonymous.

For more of her story and many others please go to The Depressed Anonymous Publications at www.depressedanon.com.

DA Literature, Depressed Anonymous, Focus, Hope

My moods began to spiral upwards once I regained control of my life!

October 10, 2018 Hugh Smith Leave a comment

Is it that simple? Gaining control of my life didn’t happen overnight. I did know that most people’s depression usually lifted after a year’s time. Mine did. The catch is, that for me, it took some work and patience. No magic wand waving over my head and no silver bullet automatically killing the demon of despair that continued to beat me down. But what gradually happened was that my mood came back providing me with hope and a plan for my recovery. I began to feel some control over how I was feeling and the new mood of cheer gave me the courage to keep on doing what I was doing. In my case, my mood began to be lightened the more I continued my daily walking.

Just my determination to take of myself physically paid huge benefits. For once, in many months I felt some control over my mood and the direction where my life was heading. I was beginning to be in control instead of my life being out of control and unmanageable.

I remember in Graduate school I gave persons depressed a questionnaire determining how much control they felt they had over their lives. Interestingly, the person who felt they had less control over their lives, or none at all, these more depressed persons felt less in control over their environment and the way the direction of their life was taking.

Those who were less depressed answered that they were begin to feel more in control of their lives. These persons were experiencing more hope and the direction of their lives was providing purpose and meaning.

What to do?

First of all, get a plan that will work for you. My plan was this Step by Step program of recovery we call Depressed Anonymous. The best part of the plan is to find friends who, just like ourselves, are working the same plan. This fellowship, this non judgmental approach and support of the group provides us with our marching orders. When members of the fellowship share their story–we hear our own story. We know that just by admitting that we need help it is at this initial starting point, where we begin to spiral upwards instead of continuing the spiral downward.

If you want to take control of your life and your mood, it would do you well to join us and discover how others gained control over their lives just as it is possible for yourself.

SOURCE: Depressed Anonymous, 3rd edition (2011). Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Ky.

DA Literature, Depressed Anonymous, Focus, Hope

My life is out of control!

October 8, 2018 Hugh Smith Leave a comment

“I have come to the Step program because my life is out of control. Whatever I do or think or say seems to make no difference on the way that I feel right now. I feel out of control, and some other force is in charge of my life. I know also that this force, this power other than myself, this sadness has me captive and somehow I have felt unable to do much about it.”

Until today!

In our Home Study program of recovery, we use the Depressed Anonymous Workbook in conjunction with the Depressed Anonymous Manual, together let them lead us, Step by Step out of our depression.

The Depressed Anonymous Workbook facilitates a new self awareness by questions which we need to answer. Each Step is provides further meaningful thoughts from the “Big Book” of Depressed Anonymous. By reading certain noted paragraphs, as indicated in our Workbook, (Page #), we move through all the questions with that greater self-awareness of how depression controls every day of our lives. Actually, the Workbook, by its questions and my responses, continues to open up for me where my life can be lived with hope once again.

Example: Workbook question #1.9 “What areas of one’s life appear to be more out of control now that you are aware of how depression can isolate a person. What areas of one’s life appears more manageable now that you are aware of how you can change things around — choosing to feel differently?” Workbook, Page 9.

“It is in the admission that we are out of control that a remedy can be applied to our battle with depression. It is a paradox for our understanding of depression to learn that only when we give up control, do we gain control over what we want to be, think or do. If there is anything that creates a sense of hopelessness, it’s when we fee that we don’t have any control over our lives. When we are depressed, we feel dependent on all the forces that act on us and our environment. We feel that we are like the victims of the interminable feeling that we call depression. Depression can be like a hell or bottomless pit from which we feel we can never escape. It’s like being in an eighty foot hole with an eight foot ladder.” Depressed Anonymous Manual. Page 28.

Depressed Anonymous, 3rd ed., Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Ky.

The Depressed Anonymous Workbook, (2002) Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville.Ky

Many Depressed Anonymous meetings use the Home Study as a meeting Step Study group

For more literature about Depression and the Twelve Steps click onto the Depressed Anonymous Bookstore.

Fellowship, Focus, Hope

Please don’t tell me to “snap out of it.”

October 7, 2018 Hugh Smith Leave a comment

The Mental Health Award winner Dorothy Rowe Ph.D., tells us

” that the best way depressed people can help themselves is to help one another. Form a group, get to know one another, support one another. ”

CLARIFICATION OF THOUGHT

Some folks think that all I have to do is just be cheerful and my mood will automatically change. Wrong. It’s like telling someone to stop their diarrhea as if they had any control over it. My depression took time to develop and so it will take time and work to remove. The people who are the most support are those who have been depressed themselves, they won’t tell you to snap out of it!

I best support myself when I find other people like myself and try and help them. Look for a Depressed Anonymous Group in your community.

MEDITATION

God, grant us the serenity to accept the things we cannot change, the courage to change the things we can, and the wisdom to know the difference.

WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ABOUT THIS? Please write out your comments here if you like.

SOURCE: Copyright (c) Higher Thoughts for Down days. 365 daily thoughts and meditations for members of 12 step groups. Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Page 201.

12 Step Meeting, Belief, Counseling, DA Literature, Depressed Anonymous, Fellowship, Focus, Hope, Journaling, Serenity, Step 03, The 12 Steps

Faith Appears To Be Good For One’s Health

October 1, 2018 Hugh Smith Leave a comment

Joyce was a client of mine a few years back. She was in her early sixties and just recuperating from a successful open heart surgery. She also was very depressed. That’s where I come in. I was asked by my clinical supervisor if I would spend some time with her and see how I might be of help to her. I agreed to do what I could do.

In the midst of counseling and listening to Joyce’s story, I discovered her strong faith, which included her personal faith in God which gave her the belief that she was going to get through whatever that had her in lockdown.

She wasn’t aware of our Depressed Anonymous group and so I shared my story with her and the fact that I too was once depressed. I told her how I became a believer in the spirituality of the Twelve Steps and how my belief in God delivered me from my symptoms of depression. Now don’t get me wrong -my own story is that it took me over a year to finally get free of this noose around my neck. Also, because of my faith in a program and the recovered people who lived it out in their daily lives, I started on the road to recovery.

My faith told me if I would follow some of the simple steps outlined in this recovery program I would get better. My faith got me off of my seat, out of bed and out my door to begin walking. I believed walking might be the key that unlocked my prison of depression. I read that some Doctors in England were writing out prescriptions for exercise for their depressed patients. I figured that it worked for them and so why wouldn’t exercise work for me. After a year of walking everyday I finally walked out of the mental fog, lost the jitters and became free of depression. My faith in a Higher Power and my getting my body moving on a daily basis produced the healing effect that I had hoped for.

Back to Joyce. She and I had ten sessions together and I suggested to her that she start to think about the things that she did before her depression. What provided the satisfaction and those pleasant events previously in her life. She talked about how she at one time was a cartoonist as well as a lover of writing poetry. So, that is what I suggested — that she involve herself with these pleasant activities again. She said that she believed that she could do it–even though her mind and body rebelled at moving out of her comfort zone of doing absolutely nothing. The main defense for doing nothing is the oft repeated mantra from all of us when we are depressed which is “I’ll do it when I feel better.”

With each new session she would share with me a cartoon or a poem which she had created the previous week. As she continued doing what she liked, I noticed more energy in her voice as she shared her feelings about her new creations. All the while, she was compliant with her own physical recovery from heart surgery. Her pleasant moods gave her a feeling of being in control of her life and her future. She came to believe that a power greater than herself would restore not only her sanity but her health as well. Her faith was renewed in the God of her understanding while restoring her belief that her health was going to get better. Not only did she have a plan to follow but she made the spiritual principles of the Twelve Steps her way out of depression. She continues to follow this map to this very day.

The following quote is from a work titled, The Secret Strength of Depression written by Frederic Flach, M.D., K.H.S.

“Faith appears to be good for one’s overall health. Cardiovascular illnesses are more frequently seen in depressed individuals, in patients with coronary ischemia, depression worsens the outcome, possibly due to alterations in platelet function and changes in autonomic tone. Depression is also associated with a higher mortality rate following acute myocardial infarction; for those patients who survive, the recovery process is often a more complicated one. Studies suggest that the recovery rate from medical and surgical procedures, from the repair of hip fractures to coronary bypass surgery, is faster among believers. Moreover, patients undergoing such treatment appear less likely to have serious complications or die.” Page 239.

SOURCES: Depressed Anonymous, 3rd edition. Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Ky.

Copyright(c) I’ll do it when I feel better. 2nd Edition 1986, 2013. Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. KY.

Copyright)(c) Believing is seeing:15 Ways to leave the prison of depression. (2017) Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Ky.

Choice, Fellowship, Focus, Mindfulness, The 12 Steps

If there is one thing that you crave when you are depressed it is certainty

September 1, 2018 Hugh Smith Leave a comment

AFFIRMATION

I am willing to live in the imperfect moment and focus on the now, not yesterday’s now or tomorrow’s now.

“So it is if we are to make changes in our lives we must be courageous. Such courage can be found relatively easily in two kinds of situations. When we are certain that the new situation in which we shall find ourselves will bring us every advantage and happiness; when we are certain that the situation we are leaving is totally and absolutely bad.

Thus if the new situation promises perfection, or if the old situation is totally imperfect, we have certainty, and if there is one thing you crave when you are depressed, it is certainty. ” Dorothy Rowe. Breaking the Bonds.

CLARIFICATION OF THOUGHT

My thinking always had been very black and white when I was depressing myself. I know that if I want to continue to live in uncertainty, in time, my depression will also be left behind me in the darkness of yesterday, as I live in the light of today.

The only certainty that I have today is that I want to free myself from the attachment that I have to sadness. I must be willing to risk giving up the certainty that my life will always remain the same. I know that it is only by living with some uncertainty, that my life can be lived with any hope.

MEDITATION

Today, we pray for the courage to remove as much fear from our lives as possible. We pray that God will let us live with the conviction that our lives can be one without fear of people, places, or situations. We believe that once we begin to live without the every present need for certainty in our lives that our fears can be diminished.

(Personal comments: See March 12, 2015 in the Archives of the Blogs.)

SOURCE: Higher Thoughts for Down Days: 365 daily thoughts and meditations for members of Twelve Step fellowship groups. Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. KY. September 1.

Acceptance, Anger, Attachment, Choice, Depressed Anonymous, Despair, Focus, Grief, Hope, Journaling, Mindfulness, Mutual Aid, Purpose, Serenity, The 12 Steps, Victim Thinking

Drinking Depression: One Man’s Story Of Recovery From Alcoholism And Depression

June 7, 2018 Hugh Smith Leave a comment

DRINKING DEPRESSION: One man’s story of recovery from alcoholism and depression and the parallels between the two.

By Steve P.

“I have had experiences with alcohol abuse since childhood. I have also struggled since childhood with depression. I quickly learned to rely on both.

I call this paper “drinking depression” because that’s exactly what I did when I no longer had the alcohol. The following thoughts will express my feelings and the parallels that I have seen between these two addictions.

RELIANCE

There was always an excuse to drink, mostly I was upset with something –I should say angry, for it was anger at the root of my depression that I was trying to suppress in medicating myself with alcohol. Later, I learned to do the same thing with my depression except to be in a depressive state high. I didn’t even have to leave the house and after awhile I didn’t want to break the cycle of reliance that dependency had begun. Where I was absorbing alcohol into my blood stream I was now injecting the depression into my soul and absorbing it like a sponge

FAMILIARITY AND COMFORT

As a recovering alcoholic, I can look back on my drinking and see where I took comfort in being drunk because eventually the numbness became the only way I could feel better. When I was drunk I could retreat into myself and not have to deal with everyday life.

The same escape tool was used in the form of depression. I could ball up like a wooly worm and the outside world was not going to hurt me. However, the more I wallowed in the darkness of my depression the deeper I got stuck in the mud of despair and hopelessness.

DESPERATION

In order to deal with alcoholism and depression I had to hit rock bottom. I had reached a point in both that I had to call out for help or drown in my addiction. I called on my Higher Power to help deliver me from alcohol and he led me to a counselor to also help me with my depression. With the guidance of the Holy Spirit I am harnessing my talents now and I am seeing incredible results. My recovery has not been overnight but it is a day by day and step by step recovery process.

THE PHYSICAL

After some time had passed, the drinking affects the physical body breaking it down. Once I saw a film in which the brain of an alcoholic was compared to the brain of a heroin addict and they were very similar. The depression I experienced also had physical implications. For over twenty years the way my body would respond from too much emotional stress was to pass out. Instead of blacking out from alcohol I was using depression to numb myself and my brain.

THE SPIRITUAL

When I was drinking I felt alienation and guilt. I felt professing Christians did not drink. The more I drank the more guilty I became. I felt much more distant from God the more I drank and spiraled further down into a cycle of despair.

In my depression, I felt God had no time for me and that I was unworthy of his love. Again, it was a carousal filled with guilt and anger going round and round so that I couldn’t get off the merry-go-round.

SELF-ESTEEM

When I was drinking, I was sure that no one cared or could understand what I was going through, so I had many pity parties and I was the guest of honor. Why should I care if no one else cared? This was my way of thinking.

From painful experiences in my childhood I felt I was of no worth and just taking up space. It has taken therapy and the support of family and friends to finally look in the mirror and begin to like what I saw.

HOPE

I have been sober over two years although I often have the desire to drink I daily call on my Higher Power to help me and march on one day at a time experiencing serenity and a release from my need to take that first drink.

I have been in therapy for almost a year off and on, although in order to recover one has to stay with it. I have to take my emotional and spiritual healing, like my drinking —one day at a time knowing I can make it. It is only by opening the door of the past that the light of the present can get rid of the darkness today, providing hope for the future.

It is my hope and prayer that this has helped you, in some small way. It has helped me by writing about my experiences. May God put walls of protection around you so that the way ahead for you may be crystal clear so that today may be your first step towards recovery.”

God bless.

Steve P.

+This article first appeared in THE ANTIDEPRESSANT TABLET, Spring 1994.

Hope is just a few steps away!