Category Archives: Spirituality

Mindfulness, Spiritual Heroes, Spirituality, Step 12, The 12 Steps

Dr. Alfred Adler’s Prescription For Depression

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“Years ago, Dr. Alfred Adler prescribed this remedy for depression to a patient.  “You can be helped if every day you begin the first thing in the morning to consider how you can bring joy to someone else. If you can stick to this for two weeks, you will no longer need therapy.”

Adler’s “prescription” of  course  is not much different than the suggestion that we work more intensively the program’s Twelve Steps to rid ourselves of depression. When I am depressed do I keep my feelings to myself or do I do what friends in the program have suggested that I do?” Source: A Day at a Time. 1976.Sept 10.

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I like Adler’s “prescription” as a real concrete and positive aid in being mindful of the needs of others. In a Twelve Step meeting we find ourselves in the midst of a group of people, some who are newcomers, some who  have been in the group for a period of time and others who have gone through all the Steps, one after another. That’s the beauty of the 12 Step program of recovery. 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.”

One of the instances for me personally of putting  the prescription of Dr. Adler into practice and  before  I  leave for work , is to ask God to lead me to that person who needs a loving presence the most. I happen to work in a long term care facility and because of a person’s different stage of their dementia, just to be a silent presence can  give a  person comfort.

But if we stay holed up in the isolation of life deadening thoughts all we can reflect upon is our own pain, much less the pain of anyone else. So, get the picture?  Reach out to someone else; leave the prison of our isolating and negative ruminations; connect with another human being and give ourselves someone to think about other than ourselves. Who knows, maybe we will come away from our encounter the other and be grateful  of what we can still do that has a positive effect on another’s life.

Acceptance, Choice, Despair, Fellowship, Hope, Isolation, Mindfulness, Miracle Thinking, Spiritual Heroes, Spirituality, The 12 Steps

YOU DON’T HAVE TO HAVE YOUR LIFE PARKED IN NEUTRAL!

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I just returned from a combined (Edenton and Elizabeth City, North Carolina) Depressed Anonymous fellowship  workshop which I was asked to give. It was an all day workshop, with morning open to the public and then the  afternoon sessions committed to the two groups speaking to each other about their own personal experiences with the Twelve Steps and how their lives have changed since being part of these two groups.

These groups both were formed right before Christmas 2014. Both groups now have a strong presence in their communities because those in recovery now want  to “carry this message to those  who are still suffering from depression.” This is the bottom line for all of us who have found hope and healing in practicing and putting the spiritual principles of the Twelve Steps  into our daily lives. Hope is what we are sharing. You don’t have your life parked in neutral.

“THE MOST COMMON FORM OF DESPAIR IS NOT BEING WHO YOU ARE! ”  —  Soren Kierkegaard

”  Depressed Anonymous is a spiritual  program where you will find people like yourself, honestly, openly and willingly dealing  with their character defects (staying isolated) and gradually admitting that they have to change their lives and lifestyle, if they are going to be a whole and honest human being.  The decision is yours. You make the choice!  The Twelve Steps and your own personal story can now be shared with others and can help them in their own life’s journey. Give the hope that you have now with those who have lost hope. Build it  (mutual aid) and they will come! ”

Source: Depressed Anonymous, 3rd edition. (2011) Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Pages 108-109.

I witnessed the “miracle  of the group” again this past Saturday in Edenton, North Carolina when the participants of both fellowship groups came together and shared their stories of how they moved into drive and  out of neutral. I thank  all you beautiful people in North Carolina as you continue to work your program of recovery! You are becoming who you really are and whom God means for you to be!

Choice, DA Literature, Depressed Anonymous, Fellowship, Focus, Spirituality

I AM FINDING MYSELF ACCEPTABLE TO ME.

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AFFIRMATION

“How many times have we heard persons say that ‘my depression is such a comfort to me.’ Many depressed people say that this feeling of worthlessness and hollowness is all they have ever known. In fact, they add, ‘since all I’ve ever known I’m too scared to feel something different.’ It appears that their whole identity is based on how they feel, and so they feel they are bad.” (9)

CLARIFICATION OF THOUGHT

I know that I can recover and feel good about myself. Each new day I can choose to think differently about myself. I believe that, with time and while working my Twelve Step program, I can feel better. I will make a list of how I want to feel and then start to experience these brand new feelings of mine.  My spiritual program of letting God run my life is beginning to payoff as I can feel a change in myself occurring.

I am taking out one of the main bars of my prison cell. I am no longer considering myself as someone who is bad, worthless, unacceptable to myself and to others. I am finding myself acceptable to me.

MEDITATION

Our feelings of hollowness  are greatly diminished after and during a meeting where we hear the hopeful stories of those members of the group who are feeling better because of the Depressed Anonymous program of recovery.

-Copyright(c) Higher thoughts for down days: 365 daily thoughts and meditations for 12 step fellowship groups. (1993, 1999) Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. page 112.

DA Literature, Depressed Anonymous, Fellowship, Higher Power, Spirituality, Step 01, The 12 Steps

I Think I Hit A Home Run!

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“During my first night in the hospital, a member informed me of a support group known as DEPRESSED ANONYMOUS. I decided to give it a try. By telling me about this wonderful, miraculous, and very spiritual program, this person had not only worked the Twelfth Step, but has   also given me a key, a key which would open many doors for me.  Walking through these doors  was like admitting defeat. I was playing first base in a  ball game in which I would eventually win. If I struck out, I was back on Step One. By playing ball with a positive attitude, I was allowing my Higher Power to walk the Steps to recovery with me. With the help and the positive sense of fellowship that I enjoyed in the group, I began to understand God’s will for me. With the love, support, and true friendship of three faithful members in the group, I began working on my driver’s license when  two members of the group took me in for my road test. A new sunnier life had begun for me. The worst was finally over.”

–Lena

SOURCE: Depressed Anonymous (3rd.Edition) Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville, Ky.  “We never talked about our feelings.” Page 112-113.

Acceptance, Depressed Anonymous, Fellowship, Spirituality, Step 01, The 12 Steps

We Admitted That We Were Powerless Over Depression And That Our Lives Had Become Unmanageable

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To admit that there is a problem is the first step which can move us into recovery. The First Step of the Twelve Steps begins with the word WE. This is a WE program–a program about us as a group of hurting people. Since we have tried to tackle our problems alone and in the confines of our own mind we soon discovered that for most of us this was not enough. We still were saddled with a life destroying and  unmanageable situation. There must be a solution we thought. Yes, there is a solution. For many of us who have traveled this path of recovery, living out the spiritual principles of the Twelve Steps and being part of the fellowship of Depressed Anonymous we have found peace and a new way of living,

Depressed Anonymous, Hope, I'll Do It When I Feel Better, Miracle Thinking, Spirituality

Hope Is A Hard Habit To Break

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Brad Cohen, the main character in the powerfully moving film FRONT OF THE CLASS, makes this statement about his own efforts to change his life.

The following instructions, HOW DEPRESSED ANONYMOUS WORKS, is read at every Depressed Anonymous meeting.

You are about to witness the miracle of the group. You are joining a group of people who are on a journey of hope and who mutually care for each other. You will hear how hope, light and energy have been regained by those who were hopeless and in a black hole and tired of living.

By our involvement in the group we are feeling that there is hope – there is a chance for me too – I can get better. But we are not the people with the magic pills and the easy formula for success. We believe that to get out of the prison of our depression takes time and work.

And so at every Depressed Anonymous meeting the group listens as we hear what it will take to escape from the prison of depression.

Also at every meeting of the fellowship we hear how by using the spiritual tools, our Twelve Steps, we can gradually find the path that will and can lead us out into the light of freedom. We come to believe that a power greater than ourselves can restore us to sanity…”

SOURCE: (c) I’ll do it when I feel better. (2011) Hugh Smith. Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Page 65.

DA Literature, Focus, Higher Power, Journaling, Spirituality, Step 02, The 12 Steps

God Is The Rudder Of My Boat. I Am Going To Put My Oars In The Water!

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 AFFIRMATION

I will have the peace I desire as I continue to pray to do God’s will.

“Being in God’s will is the beginning of peace and the beginning of the end of your depression with its hollowness and jitters.” (8)

 CLARIFICATION OF THOUGHT

Most people don’t understand this who have not been in the program very long. What it means is that I must attempt to work and live this spiritual program. I need to let myself be guided by God’s hand in my life and so become open and ready to fiollow his guidance.

The beginning of wisdom is to hear the voice of God. It is imperative that I take an active role in getting better. I often say that God is the rudder of my boat and I have to put my oars in the water if I am going to get to the shore. I believe that one of the best ways for me to start to feel better is to take each step (Depressed Anonymous, Third Edition (2011) Depressed Anonymous Publications) and try to do what it suggests.  Keeping a journal lets me know what I am feeling for each day. I have come to believe that a power greater than myself can restore me to sanity.   I wonder sometimes if this hollow feeling inside myself isn’t more of a longing and hunger for a spiritual food that nothing in my life now can and ever will provide.

MEDITATION

We pray that God will show us the way out of our depression by living and following the program that  has healed other people who have been addicted to a behavior or a substance and which  continued to bring them down instead of up.

SOUIRCE: Higher Thoughts for Down Days: 365 daily thoughts and meditations for Twelve Step Fellowship Groups. Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Page 71.

DA Literature, Depressed Anonymous, Fellowship, Hope, Spirituality

SHARING ONE’S HEALING CAN BECOME A HEALING LIGHT FOR OTHERS

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Greetings and a warm hello to all.  So many persons, from so many different cultures, race,  spirituality   and national groups come here to find a bit of light and hope. I welcome you all. I continue to write from my own experience with the darkness and invite you to share whenever and however you would like your own experiences.

In my own life, my own brokenness brought me into another 12 step fellowship years ago. It was truly the dark night of the soul for me. The darkness for me was like being in a dark cave, paralyzed by my own blindness – unable  to find a way out. Then, because there was a lighthouse (12 step group)  in my small rural community,  I slowly came into the light of hope and found my way out.

Then once again, my life needed another shot of hope when I slowly slid down a slippery slope of hopelessness. It was then that  I  came to see that a group, which I had already formed, using the 12 steps for melancholia, came to my own rescue. I then began to help others form Depressed Anonymous groups. And gradually and slowly other depressed persons started groups in their own communities. Now here we are today, attempting to light and ignite hope in those who themselves want to discover how to leave the darkness of their own helplessness and darkness. For those who come and see how others have been able to climb out of the cave’s darkness into the light and use our spiritual recovery program of the steps, know that they too can have the light of hope in their own lives.

I often tell those in our groups that my own darkness and my coming into the light  has been a gift. A gift  for others. How often do people know that when I speak about my own experience in the darkness, there is  no doubt that my experience is  in many ways similar to their own.  It takes  one to know one.

In fact, the 12th step of Depressed Anonymous suggests 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.”  (Page 159. Depressed Anonymous, 3rd edition. Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville. Kentucky. )

When you have some good news in your life –especially joy and hope –that is something to talk about!  I continue to carry on.

Hugh

Ego Deflation, Spirituality

DEPRESSION IS ABOUT LOST SELVES. DEPRESSED ANONYMOUS IS ABOUT THE DISCOVERY OF THE REAL SELF!

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“Without the defense of depression the human race would not have survived. By shutting ourselves in this prison we keep out all the dangers and uncertainties that otherwise would overwhelm us.  By making every day in the prison  the same as the next, we deal only with the bare minimum  of issues that we can manage to deal with, and we make sure that nothing new gets in to frighten  and stress us.  By concentrating on just ourselves we do not have to face what is happening to others. Locked in our prison we can avoid acknowledging that the inescapable disasters that the human  race is prone to — death and loss and the tragedies that nature or our own  cruelties and stupidities bring upon us. In depression we can give ourselves a breathing space before we confront all this again, or we can keep ourselves safely locked away forever.`” (14)

Depression is about lost selves — and the struggle to regain the self. We are in a perpetual lock down! It is indeed a battle with one’s self to survive – that is why Dorothy Rowe calls depression a prison. We build the walls as a defense to keep us safe till we can combat our  demons and find which  way out is the best for us. ”

I found all this to be so true in my own life until I admitted that something was very much wrong with what was happening inside of me. I was always tired, anxious and feeling painfully hallowed out inside of me. I truly was imprisoned by my own fears and shame.  In time and with work I forced my prison door open as now I had a key–a key that allowed me to see that I didn’t have to stay here. The pain was so great that the only temporary relief was for me to be proactive and get moving. I walked. I walked some more. Everyday I walked.  I began to feel like Forrest Gump. And actually, for me, walking was the key that helped me to  walk out of the fog. Once my energy level came back, I came into the Fellowship of the Twelve Steps and there began to work on the things that brought me down in the first place. My experience from feeling lost to discovering my real self was all made possible through the working of the spiritual program that we call the Twelve Steps.

—SOURCE: I’ll do it when I feel better.  2013. Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville,. Kentucky   40217. (p.76)

Addiction, Depressed Anonymous, Higher Power, Spirituality, The 12 Steps

FRED DIDN’T HAVE THE FOGGIEST NOTION OF WHAT GOD HAD TO DO WITH HIS SADNESS.

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“I remember Fred on his first visit to Depressed Anonymous. He said that he had been depressed all his life. The group listened to Fred, and of course for the most part Fred said he didn’t have the foggiest notion what all this talk of God had to do with his sadness and how it was supposed to help him,. But it was the pain of Fred’s depression that brought him back time after time to the meetings and he started not only to feel better, but he began to look better.  Then as he heard about the Twelve Steps, he saw that he could trust this Higher Power, and that maybe the depression that had been such a lifetime companion was not for him anymore. Fred took the plunge, came to believe that a Power greater than himself could restore him to sanity — and it did just that.  Fred said he didn’t need his depression any more, got busy making amends to family, friends and co-workers for being such a negative person, and began to take inventory where he needed to Spring clean his house. In time, Fred began to reach  out to others in the group and he began to understand how he had  become like many others in the group – a saddict.   Depression for many was an addiction to sadness. The only way out of Fred’s addiction was to let go of it, admit his life was unmanageable and start to work on himself and his character defects. Fred still keeps coming back to the meetings to share his story with others on the how of his recovery. He talks about the way it was before Depressed Anonymous, and the way  it is now since he has been working the steps and handed his life over to the Higher Power.”

Source: Depressed Anonymous, 3rd edition. (2011) Depressed Anonymous Publications. Louisville, Ky. (pgs.96-97).

I can relate to Fred in such  a personal way when I too came into the Twelve Step program of recovery. I belonged to a Church that professed certain dogmas and doctrines –not some vague, impersonal Higher Power that the group say they espoused.. I came back week after week to the meetings, and when  I  gradually weaned myself  from all my negative thoughts about the Twelve Step program,  I finally “got it” as they say. I,  too, after all these thirty years as a member of Depressed Anonymous have the deepest confidence that the “God of my understanding” has everything to do with my own  recovery from depression. And by the way, I still belong to my Church with its dogma’s and doctrines, while having a “spiritual awakening ” along the way, thanks to the spirituality of Depressed Anonymous. Now the God of my understanding is my Higher Power.  Please go to our website here at the Menu if you are interested in finding hope and information  on the way out of your own sadness. Please join us on this journey! You’ll be glad you did.