Category Archives: Helpful Thinking

Courage, Fear

I will outgrow fear

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AS Bill W., states in the Big Book

” …we let God demonstrate through us, what God can do. We ask God to remove our fear and direct our attention to what God would have us be. At once, we commence to outgrow fear.”

We believe that as we become aware that God dwells in each of us and demonstrates its power in us the more we remain open to God’s presence.

We humans are so grounded in the material and the spatial that it is veritably impossible to be conscious of a Higher Power in and around us. We now believe that we can tap into this God consciousness and let it unfold its plan, it purpose and mission for our life. It will not plan something small and insignificant  but will, by small steps, lead us, cause us to unfold in our lives what it has for us to accomplish. And I believe the spiritual nature and the fellowship of Depressed Anonymous is what God uses to get us aware and conscious of its love and presence.”

In this quote from I’ll do it when I feel better we learn from the 7th Promise of Depressed Anonymous that as we move through the Steps and our daily  use of the program of recovery  that “we have less concern about self and gain  interest in others.”

“I set in motion a force, a loving force of the creator in my personal life. In time I am filled with energy and found that this power can change me and restore my life with purpose and meaning.”

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SOURCE: Copyright(c) I’LL DO IT WHEN I FEEL BETTER. (2014) Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. pp.43-45.

 

Belief

Six ways to build a prison of depression for yourself

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“Hold these as if they were real, absolute and immutable truths these following six options.

  1. No matter how good and nice I appear to be, I am really bad, evil, valueless, unacceptable to myself and to others.
  2. Other people are such that I must fear, hate and envy them.
  3. Life is terrible and death is worse.
  4. Only bad things  happened to me in the past and only bad things will happen to me in the future.
  5. It is wrong to get angry.
  6. I must never forgive anyone, least of all myself.”

Excerpted from the book by Dorothy Rowe: Depression. The way out of your depression. Routledge and Kegan Paul. London. 1983. Page 15.

Comment by Hugh S.

I believe that the above list of the  six immutable beliefs is an accurate summation of the major beliefs that one needs to hold if they want to truly stay walled up in their prison of depression. And as Dorothy Rowe always brings out so dramatically -if you build the prison you can likewise take the walls down.

You dismantle your depression by thoroughly examining your own beliefs and how you construct your world. It’s in the way we usually think about ourselves and the world that enables us to predict with accuracy the way things turn out. If I believe my life is hopeless and that I am an evil person, that fact that someone claims that I am not that way still won’t change the way that I believe about myself. The way I have constructed my world will invariably set my life up in a way so that I will feel hopeless and evil.  It is only when I find out that others who once had the same negative mind constructs and thoughts about themselves,  but who now are living with hope that I am beginning to listen and take note. Is there really a way out of this prison of depression?

People who know the painful and deadening experience of depression realize  that they can never just Snap out of their deadness. Just as their sadness feels like it can never come to an end, so does their ability to do anything about the hopelessness seem impossible. But once the depressed person begins to  share their story and the history of their personal experience of sadness the more that can experience hope and the possibility that maybe they too  can escape depression.

Not only do I see people who are depressed gradually start to live with hope and energy but I also see this happen more quickly while they are engaged in a group of other depressed persons. In time, with a person’s   involvement with the group they sense a feeling that they aren’t alone any more and that they can make a choice to try and feel differently. In other words, they will be meeting on a regular basis  with people who will never say SNAP OUT OF IT but instead will say  I’M WITH YOU.  They will also find a new family where they are accepted, understood and strengthened for the work they need to do on  themselves to get better. Again, I can’t emphasize it enough how Depressed  Anonymous is the program  to follow if you want to start feeling better.”

SOURCE: Copyright(c)The  Antidepressant Tablet. Volume 2:1. 1990

12 Step Meeting, DA Literature, Depressed Anonymous, Ego Deflation, Fellowship, Isolation, Mindfulness, Mutual Aid, Purpose, Spiritual Heroes, The 12 Steps

I said to myself, “if I ignore it maybe it(depression)will go away.”

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“There was a time when we ignored trouble, hoping it would go away. Or, in fear and in depression, we ran from it, but found it was still with us. Often, full of unreason, bitterness, and blame, we fought back. These mistaken attitudes, powered by alcohol, guaranteed our destruction, unless they were altered.

Then came AA (and DA. OA, NA,  Al-Anon etc). Here we learned that trouble was really a fact of life for everybody – a fact that had to be understood and dealt with. Surprisingly, we found that our troubles could, under God’s grace, be converted into unimagined blessings.

“Indeed, that was the essence of A.A. itself: trouble accepted, trouble squarely faced with calm courage, trouble lessened and often transcended. This was the A.A. story, and we became a part of it.  Such demonstrations became our stock in trade for the next sufferer.”

COMMENT: It was with my own experience with depression that I tried to deny that it was anything that could keep me from a life lived with hope and joy. I thought that if I just ignored it, like Bill W., stated so well above, it would just evaporate like the morning midst. Of course this just didn’t happen.

As I commented on this denial factor which is a big part of all addictions, I also came to believe that,  “well, what I am going through will surely pass. It isn’t so bad, really. I can put up with a little discomfort.”  Sorry. It didn’t work that way. And as I pointed out in   I’ll Do It when I feel Better  I said  ” we also learn that our depression is a defense and predictable and for some, depression is even come to be a comfort and as has been said before, at least one knows what they have with depression. And to change and risk removing this numbness is better not to be undertaken  because it’s better to know what one has than to risk getting something worse. Much like the example cited before of the debate within ourselves to go to the dentist for the toothache or just tough  it out and hope for the best.  We call this denial.” Page 17.

To examine more literature about depression and using the Twelve Steps in your personal recovery , please taker a look  at VISIT THE STORE here at our website.

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SOURCES:

1) As Bill sees it. Page 110.

2)  I’ll do it when I feel better. (2014)  Depressed  Anonymous Publications.                                  Louisville.

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

 

The Promises

…to lend a helping hand is an absolute necessity

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“…And, despite all your good intentions, you are conscious of a terrible inability to help as you would like to. Then comes the voice of the tempter: Why torture yourself? It is no good. Give up, stop caring. Be unconcerned and unfeeling like everybody else.

Still another temptation arises —compassion really involves you in suffering. Anyone who experiences the woes of this world within  his heart can never again feel the surface happiness that human nature desires. When hours of contentment and joy  come, the compassionate man cannot give himself unreservedly to them, for he can never forget the suffering he has experienced with others. What he has seen stay with him. The anguished faces of the poor return; the cries of the sick  echo in his mind, he remembers the  man whose hard lot he once read about-and darkness shuts out the light of his joy.  Darkness returns again and again. In cheerful company he suddenly becomes absentminded. And the tempter says again:  You can’t live like this. You must be able to detach yourself from what is depressing  around you. Don’t be so sensitive. Teach yourself the necessary indifference, put on an armor, be thoughtless like everybody else if you want to live a sensible life. In the end we are ashamed to know of the great  experience of empathy and compassion.  We keep  it a secret from one another and pretend it is foolish, a weakness we outgrow when we begin to be “reasonable” people.

The three great temptations unobtrusively wreck the presupposition of all goodness. Guard against them. Consider the first temptation by saying that for you to share experience and to lend a helping hand is an absolute necessity.  Your utmost attempts will be but a drop in the ocean compared with what needs to be done, but only this attitude will give meaning and value to your life. Where ever you are, as far as you can, you should bring redemption, redemption from the misery brought into the world by the self-contradictory will of life, redemption that only he who has this knowledge can bring. The small amount you are able to do is actually much if it only relieves pain, suffering, and fear from any living being, be it human or any other creature.   The preservation of life is the true joy.

As for the other temptation, the fear that compassion will involve you in suffering, counter it with the realization that the sharing of sorrow expands your capacity to share joy as well.  When you callously ignore the suffering of others, you lose the capacity to share their happiness, too.  And however little joy we may see in this world, the sharing of it, together with the good we ourselves create, produces the only  happiness which makes life tolerable….”

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It is always a joy to connect with any person like ourselves who lives with depression everyday and give them the serenity and peace which they are looking for.

In our Twelve Step program of recovery, we know all about compassion and healing the hurts of those still suffering-especially those persons depressed.   It is when a person who has worked through all of the Twelve Steps reaches the Twelfth Step that they realize that now that they have experience the healing power of their work with the Steps – now they will want to share this “gift” of recovery with all those persons who are “still suffering.” It is in the sharing of their own experiences and suffering that will lead others to the hope that they too will have the same peace and joy as those of us who have lived out the Promises given to us by the spiritual principles of Depressed Anonymous.

The Twelfth Step tells us that “Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these Steps, we tried to carry this message to the depressed, and to practice these principles in all of our affairs.”

 

SOURCES: (c)Albert Schweitzer.  Essential writings. (2005) Introduction by James  Brabazon.  Orbis Books. NY. Pages 148-149.

(c)Depressed Anonymous 3rd edition. Depressed Anonymous Publications. (2011) Louisville.

(c)   I’ll do it when I feel better.  (2014) Depressed Anonymous   Publications.Louisville.

Ego Deflation, Fellowship, Higher Thoughts for Down Days, Miracle Thinking, Mutual Aid, People Pleasing

It’s the miracle of the group where I can start loving myself!

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I have hope that I can accept myself today and just let fly all the old messages from the old tapes of childhood.

“You desperately wanted people to love you, but you became wary of giving your love to others.  You reasoned that the less you loved another person the less it would hurt when the inevitable rejection came.” Dorothy Rowe

CLARIFICATION OF THOUGHT

I have been holed up for so long in my own little world of feeling hurt and rejection that to attempt to love someone else like the greatest challenge of my life.  I desire so badly to be loved by someone else that this lack of another’s love makes my isolation from others so hurtful.

After having witnessed the miracle of the group in DA, where depressed persons come together with their feelings of being hurt and rejected, I find that other’s love and nurture challenge me to hope once again,. I can share with the group the fact that I haven’t measured up, that I am angry and that I just want to lay down and die.

I am open enough now to let the light of love from others , who like myself, realize that I am not alone and that  I am beginning to feel better already now that I no longer need to be perfect.

This means to be willing to affiliate and give of myself for someone else’s good. In the program I am starting to love-myself.

MEDITATION

We are going to make a mental decision right now to let God, as we understand God, guide us and instruct us on how best to love ourselves .”

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Source: Copyright(c) Higher Thoughts for down days: 365 daily thoughts and meditations for members of 12 step fellowship groups. Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. March 3rd. Page 47.

Meditation, Mindfulness, Prayer, Purpose, Spiritual Heroes, Spirituality

Our thought life will be on a higher plane…

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“On awakening, let us think about the 24 hours ahead. We ask God to direct our thinking, especially asking that it be divorced from self-pity and from dishonest or self-seeking motives.  Free of these, we can employ our mental faculties with assurance,  for God gave us brains to use.  Our thought life will be on a higher plane when our thinking begins to be cleared of wrong motives. If we have to determine which of two courses to take, we ask God for inspiration, an intuitive thought, or a decision. Then we can relax and take it easy, and we are often surprised how the right answers come after we have tried this for a while.

We usually conclude our meditation with a prayer that we be shown all through the day what our next step is to be, asking especially for freedom from damaging self-will.” Page 243 (As Bill Sees It).

And some more thoughts from our friend Bill W.

“In meditation, debate has no place. We rest quietly with the thoughts or prayers of spiritually centered people who understand, so that we may experience and learn. This is the state of being that so often discovers and deepens a conscious contact with God.” Page 108(As Bill Sees It).

Hope

Anxiety and the four simple rules for recovery

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–the cure for physical symptoms of anxiety–

Four simple rules

FACE:  Do not run away

ACCEPT: Do not fight/floating

FLOAT PAST:  Do not stop/pause and listen in

LET TIME PASS:  Do not be impatient with time

For example, the nervously ill person usually  notices each new symptom in alarm, listens in  apprehension, and yet at the same time is afraid to examine it too closely for fear this will make it worse. So he/she agitatedly seeks occupation to try to force forgetfulness.

This is running away, not focusing

He may try to cope with the unwelcome feeling by tensing himself against them, thinking, “I must not let this get the better of me.”

He is fighting, not accepting and floating.

He is listening in, noticing each new symptom with alarm

He also keeps looking backward and worrying because so much time has passed and he is not cured -and if there is an evil spirit that could be exorcised if only he or the doctor knew how to do it.

He is impatient with time, is not willing to let time pass.”

Check in tomorrow for a more account of how this all works, especially whilre learning more about the First fear and the Second fear.

 

The two works which have helped me most of my life in recovery are these two books  written by Dr. Clair Weekes:

Hope and Help for your Nerves

Peace from Nervous Suffering.

 

Mindfulness, Prayer, Serenity

..we became interested in seeing what we could contribute to life

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Promise #4: We comprehend the word serenity and we know peace of mind.

Agitation, anxiety and jitteriness were all part of my life as I muddled through day after day, one foot in front of the other.  Serenity was definitely not a part of my life.

As with any attachment to a negative behavior, serenity and peace was the farthest thing from my life. The new beliefs and thoughts which I heard expressed at Depressed Anonymous meetings started to help me change the way I thought about myself, my world and my future.

I believe that it takes work, time and prayer and quiet periods of meditation to achieve the peace and serenity that we are talking about here.

  PEACE OF MIND IS THE RESULT OF:

  1. A clear conscience
  2. Living in the present
  3. Gratitude everyday
  4. Belief that the God of my understanding will get me through the problems of my life
  5. Forgiveness of myself and amends to all person I have harmed
  6. Doing God’s will means letting go

I am firmly convinced that in order to continue any semblance of peace and serenity I will have to structure a daily quiet period into my life. This is an essential part of the prescription for getting well and staying well. Also, I believe that when I am quiet, God can give to me all that is mine to have. My will and my life  have to be attuned to God’s presence and love.  We will know that in order for God to make itself present to us and demonstrate its love we have to sit still, be quiet and listen with purity of heart. This is an essential part of the formula where we will find our sobriety and serenity.

It is my belief that God does speak to those who remain quiet and have a design to listen. Peace is defined as “an undisturbed state of mind, absence of mental conflict.”   Serenity is defined as “a quality or state of being serene; calmness, tranquility.”

The quality or state of being serene all takes time, work and discipline. I believe that  the big book of AA says it best: ” When we sincerely took such a position, all sorts   of remarkable things followed.  We had a new employer; being all powerful he provided what we needed, if we kept close to him and performed his work well.

Established on such a footing we became less and less interested in plans, our little designs  and ourselves.  More and more we became interested in seeing what we could contribute to life. As we felt new power flow in, as we enjoyed peace of mind, as we discovered we could face life successfully, as we became conscious of his presence, we began to lose our fear of today, tomorrow or hereafter.. We’re reborn.” ( Page 63, AA).

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SOURCE: Copyright(c) I’ll do it when I feel better. (2014) Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Pages 36-38. The Promises of Depressed Anonymous.

 

Belief, Blame

We believe that no one can love us…

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We come to believe that if we do consider ourselves bad and worthless, we just know that no one can really love us or accept us. We just know the more we look at ourselves and our few remaining relationships, that we really aren’t accepted – people just put up with us.

“…There is  one great advantage about seeing yourself as helpless and in the power of others. You don’t have to be responsible for yourself. Other people make all the decisions and when things turn out badly you can blame other people. And things always turn out badly. You know this. That’s why you always expect the worst.” Dorothy Rowe.

Responsibility is the name of the game in recovery and it is here that we need to focus our attention.  As we get into discussion with other people who are depressed, much like ourselves, we see that they talk abut feeling better while at the same time acting on their own behalf. These people who are doing better are also talking about taking charge of their lives and doing things for themselves. In fact, at Depressed Anonymous meetings, the recovery people often delight at how assertive they are becoming now that they have gained a sense of mastery over their lives. They are also committed to their own recovery. People who want to change begin to swallow their pride and ask for help.  They get in touch with their feelings and feel!  This is truth and this is getting in touch with one’s best self. ”

SOURCE: Copyright(c) Depressed Anonymous, 3rd edition. (2011)  Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Page 91.

Purpose

The meaning of Depression seen from the perspective of Judaism

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THE JEWISH VISION

As an ongoing examination of major world religions, our  first being Buddhism, we would like now to focus on  Judaism’s perspective on the subject of depression.

Abramo  Alberto  Piattelli tells us  in his paper presented at the world conference on depression,  that he would like to refer to cases of depression that are to be found within the Jewish community and try to identify its causes and focus on the contribution that Judaism can offer to a solution to this problem in the light of millennia- old tradition.

From an examination of the condition of a depressed person, what most provokes anxiety and interest is to see that in such a person every vital dynamism is suppressed and this is translated into a strong diminution in that person’s interests and initiatives.; indeed, to the point of reducing the activity of the subject to a state of complete inhibition.

In a society in which individualism is exalted and relationships between people are limited, every individual runs the risk of being alienated and isolated by society.

From a theological point of view, the human community works against the loneliness of man and the loneliness of God. Thus it is that a Midrash states ‘since the first day of creation the Holy One, may He be blessed, has wanted to enter into communion with the terrestrial world and live amidst the creation together with His creatures.’

“…the whole of Jewish practice is constructed in such a way that the individual finds his proper role in that community.”

“…society as a whole cannot ignore the condition of the individual human being but must, rather, see him  as an integral part of itself.”

“…what Rabbi J.D. Soloveitchik defines as the ‘community of prayer’   he means a community united in shared pain, in shared suffering, and also in shared joy. According to the Jewish tradition, the language of prayer must always be in the plural so that the praying person always associated his own neighbor with the supplications that are expressed. Individual prayers, that is to say those expressed at times of illness, mourning or other critical moments, must also be expressed in the plural.

“…the whole community takes upon itself the suffering of another person and works for his reconnection with the community.”

The correlation that exists between the individual and society, and the obligations that derive from this correlation, are the foundation of the whole of Judaism.

During our time, in which the most evident symptom of depression lies in the marginalization of the individual and his non-relevance within society, the Jewish tradition emphasizes the value of the participation of the individual  in the life of the community, precisely because in this context man is called by his destiny to manifest all his dignity. The concern of the community in relation to the individual who suffers from depression involves freeing this person from worry, paralysis and  desperation.” Pages 106-107. THE JEWISH VISION.