Is depression a natural reaction to an insane world?

[Unbeliever]

This is a thought I have been pondering for a while.

The default to view depression as "something wrong", or a "brain chemical imbalance" or as "a disease" or something that "needs to be fixed" or requires "medication" or "therapy" appears to be the most common response of practically everyone. 

From doctors, to psychiatrists, to therapists, to the general population, to the depressed individuals themselves... the universal belief appears to be that "the person needs to get help".

But what if... the living in depressed state is correct? What if it isn't an "imbalance" or isn't something "wrong"? What if being depressed is the only natural state to be in for an intelligent, empathetic, compassionate, informed, thinking individual to exist in the current state of our world?

What if to NOT be depressed about is the true indication of mental sickness?

I'm not saying that being depressed is fun in any way... most people on this forum would be well aware that it sucks. But that is not what I'm saying. 

What I mean is... could existing in a state of depression be completely natural for someone living in a place where so many things are obviously terrible... both on a personal level and in the world as a whole?

My reasons for this perspective are numerous. Far too many to write in only 2500 words. But basically...

The real world is an extremely depressing place for any person that cares at all about anything outside of themselves.

Eg. If you care about animals... the reality is many beautiful species are already lost forever, many others are so close to the verge of extinction that even if everyone worldwide decided to do everything they could to save them... they would still be lost. At home there are people that still buy people animals as christmas gifts, refuse to desex their pets, the massive amount of pets put down in pounds annually. There is backyard animal cruelty, the dog racing industry using live bait, shooting race horses with legs, women's hormonal treatments for menapause, the meat industry, birds choking on our plastic half a world away, overfishing. The list goes on and on.

It is reality and it is depressing. Care about animals and feeling "depressed" about it IS correct. And that is one tiny subject in a plethora of subjects.

3 billion people in starving poverty, the water wars, religious fanatics, corrupt governments, womens rights violations, slavery, wars, child rape, etc etc

It's the people that are not depressed that worry me.

[Unbeliever]

Moonstruck,

I said explicitly in the post that "my truth" is not "the truth" (meaning obviously that I don't believe in anything "100%")... hence always on the lookout for new data. I apologise if that was not made blatantly clear enough.

Yes, you are absolutely right. It did take up an awful lot of my time in my youth... now less so as my belief systems developed over time. Of course, not working for years, an excessive lack of sleep over a period of decades and a brain that never really switches off also has been somewhat useful in granting me extra time.

Plus... did I mention that I was actually employed to do this for a living over a period?

I do love theorising and hypothesising on "what ifs" and "what could be's"... always have. Fantastic exercise for the imagination... everyone should do it. But regardless of how much I would like many things to be true... the unseen and unproven (although sometimes very cool) still inherently carry doubt. The whole "blind faith" thing never really sat with me that well realistically. "Sighted faith" however is something I can get behind.

"Joy" however although "unseen" is not exactly unproven now is it! (You might notice that sentence did not end with a question mark... which I mention just in case it was not obvious enough). However, as I am posting in a depression forum section and in a thread posing the question of whether sadness is a natural response to the world we live in... a person might summise that perhaps "joy" has not been an overwhelming influence in their life regardless of whether they "took time out of these tasks" or not.

Not sure exactly how devoting time to trying to understand things on a deeper level and desiring to avoid time wasted believing in falsehoods has anything to do with "allowing" or not allowing myself anything either. Seems about as relevant as the price of fish in Albania (perhaps even less so).

As I said, this originally in primary school was an attempt to simply understand and to try to be as honest as possible... both to myself and to others. And it has occured to me numerous times in my life that despite my best efforts there still is an exceptionally good chance that quite literally everything that I believe is wrong... but at least I have tried.

[Paullus]

Hello Unbeliever

I have been following your posts with interest with your in depth analysis of the various threads you suggest are your truths, not the absolute truths, just yours. I won't attempt to match your intellect or your way with words and I won't even pretend to grasp the meaning of much of what you say in terms of your understanding of mental illness more broadly. I would just like you to perhaps read my take on my battle without all the flowery words. There is nothing remarkable about my life in terms of upbringing, early life, schooling, young adult to the present. I am 63. I did not seek an anxious life experience with the accompanying depression, it came uninvited causing me much confusion initially until I realised what was happening. I don't know if it has anything to do with chemical imbalances, I read a lot but am not any the wiser. What does my anxiety look like? ... it is an involuntary feeling of always being on edge, of not being able to relax the mind or body in a true sense, of being hyper alert, overly frustrated with much of what happens around me. The only relief being sleep, but even then, sleep being invaded by dreams, not necessarily bad ones, just constant ones. I love the idea of mindfulness it is so hard for me to achieve though. With regard to depression, my typical day is accompanied by an overwhelming sense of melancholy that weighs heavily in a material sense, it's not bought on by an event past or present, it's just there, every day. I know it's there because every now and then the fog of melancholy lifts, its only temporary, but in those brief moments there is peace and clarity and its these moments that I hope will come to visit one day and stay. These moments prove to me that the burden of anxiety and depression is real because I do experience "normality" on those rare occasions. This probably doesn't add much at all to your experiences, but then it might.

[aegidius]

Great posts all. Just discovered this thread and read it cover to cover. I've occasionally wondered if depression could be just a natural response to things too. Very funny/perceptive people often have mental issues that go hand in hand, there are so many of them (one of my favourites was Spike Milligan who spoke in those terms). The discussion also reminds me of the concept of "rational suicide" and the discussions, often heated, about whether any suicide can be rational - there are arguments in both directions.

[Birdy77]

Dear Unbeliever and everyone,

I was reading something and this quote popped out.

It brought thus thread to mind.

I will leave it with you all:

Compassion hurts. When you feel connected to everything, you also feel responsible for everything. And you cannot turn away. Your destiny is bound with the destinies of others. You must either learn to carry the Universe or be crushed by it. You must grow strong enough to love the world, yet empty enough to sit down at the same table with its worst horrors.

Andrew Boyd.

It's a difficult dichotomy we face every day.

Stay strong everyone ❤

🌻birdy

[Just Sara]

Oh Birdy;

I wish I could hit the 'Helpful' button 10 times! That quote was my world in 2015/16. A legend of a quote for sure...

Sez

[Just Sara]

The history behind the way we treat personal possessions going back to both world wars and the depression is full of tips on valuing and prolonging the lifespan of everything we own.

Prioritising the difference between a privilege and a right for ownership of possessions was rationale and workable. In this day and age though, those values are being lost to a 'throw away' society.

I've used the term; 'The simple life' many times on this forum over the yrs because I appreciate the value of a simple existence vs one of hectic worry and how 'things' have become a primary focus.

Competing with profit driven money moguls continues to frustrate and defeat our will. ("Greed is good" from Gordon Gekko in the movie 'Wall Street') I totally understand UB's 'insane world' premise in this respect. In a perfect world, we'd all be satisfied with just enough to survive on so everyone 'has a job, food in their mouths and clothes on their backs'. (a post war/depression saying)

I feel sad just writing about this stuff tbh. When my illness was full blown, these issues plagued my mind with dire consequences. I ended up hoarding items I'd bought thru a 'retail therapy' response to my depressive state which opposed values I'd grown up with.

I'm embarrassed to disclose this and don't really understand how or why it happened because it nearly broke me financially. I haven't 'shopped' since the penny dropped. Better late than never I suppose..

Is this a case of the chicken and the egg?

Sez

[Peppermintbach]

Hi Sez and all,

Just a very quick post from me as I need to go...

I’ll leave the chicken and egg question to someone else...

I feel maybe you’re being a little hard on yourself with the whole retail therapy thing...

Here is my opinion on retail therapy, I feel (in some ways) it’s not that different to people turning to food, alcohol, long hours playing computer games, etcetera, etcetera. Ultimately, I feel the common goal between all those “coping mechanisms” is we use it to stifle our anguish and pain temporarily....

Unfortunately we then need to go back for more once we start feeling the pain again...so it can become a vicious cycle.

Shopping as a bandaid. Alcohol as a bandaid (that’s one of my vices). Long playing computer games as a bandaid. The potential list is endless...

I suppose what has changed now is shopping is generally socially acceptable, as well as highly accessible (24 hour shopping online)...

Anyway, I hope you’re being kind to yourself. Perhaps try to gently remind yourself that, at the time, it was what you needed to do to cope. You did what you had to do to survive your emotional turmoil...

As for

In a perfect world, we'd all be satisfied with just enough to survive on so everyone 'has a job, food in their mouths and clothes on their backs'. (a post war/depression saying)

I feel a lot of people have the above and aren’t happy or even satisfied for a whole range of reasons. I know you didn’t mean for us to take it too literally and was more commenting about having adequate basics...but even then, even if our basic needs are met, sometimes people are not happy or satisfied. I suppose what I’m saying is it’s complex...this whole thing is complex

must go now...

Love,

Pepper xoxo

[Unbeliever]

I came up with a theory in highschool I called the "Universal Happy Graph".

I theorised that on a brain chemistry level, every human being throughout their lives constantly re-created a "balance of unsatisfactory happiness" depending on what was their normal daily experiences.

As we know, when we experience pleasure, we get a chemical spurt in our brain (dopamine, oxytocin, serotonin, and endorphins).

These chemical releases can come from pretty much anything... food, hugs, sex, walking in a park, gambling, taking drugs or alcohol, seeing a cute dog etc and also less nice things like bullying, punching, gossiping behind someones back, yelling at a spouse... and things much worse as well.

The variables are practically limitless and are completely different for every individual.

So I theorised that anything that happens with too much frequency... no matter how good will eventually decrease the amount of "happy" chemicals released into the brain in reaction. So over a long enough period it will reach a point of no chemicals being released at all.

This also would work the other way as well. Sadness could also be dictated from the point of a persons unique level of "normalised".

I also theorised that this ever-shifting level of "normalisation" for each person would inherantly feel "unsatifactory" to each individual and drive them to continually desire more than whatever they currently have... regardless of how much that was.

I also deduced that the feelings of normalisation would "feel" the same no matter where you were on the human spectrum. From the poorest person who had nothing to the billionaire who had everything.

On a chemical level a person who didn't have enough food to feed his starving child that day would "feel" no worse than a person who's Ferrari was wrecked and the insurance company refused to pay up. Or a starving person being given an apple would "feel" no better than a broker who made 1 million dollars on the stock market overnight.

My happy graph showed that the point of "normal" for each individual shifted throughout their lives... and became a new point of "dissatisfaction" and so what made them happy or sad (above or below this line) would shift along with it continuously throughout a persons life. Therefore an unmoving level of "continual satisfaction" could not be achieved by a person over the long term.

If it's true. It is a fundamental flaw in our design and would explain a lot about how we let the world get this way.

[Just Sara]

Hi UB;

I'm smiling; your young self was an intelligent and interesting soul, driven by personal perspective re depression? The theory's complex and has components of neuro-psychological brilliance for that age group.

Yes, variables are too many for an hypothesis, but you seemed to have gotten around this ok; very smart actually. 🙂 Your Universal Happy Graph is indeed special, but could it exist without comparisons?

I attended a lecture called 'The Happiness Trap' at a local University a few yrs back. He also spoke about 'happy' not being measurable so definitions and comparisons were futile, unless done individually. Addiction to happiness was another aspect of the discussion, but this was brief. I tend to agree with his sentiments and wonder; what prompted you to develop your graph in the first place and what did you hope to achieve?

Have a great day!

Sez

[Unbeliever]

Cont...

On another level this theory went a long way to explain things like "obsession", "addiction", "over-indulence" and even "compulsive disorders" (at least for me).

It also could be applied to things like escalating violence and cruelty and even unfaithfulness and infidelity.

This theory would mean that a person did not actually become addicted to alcohol, drugs, gambling, food, shopping or anything else... they were in reality only addicted to the chemicals in the brain that were released in reaction to these things. An addiction that increasingly over time could not possibly produce as powerful a result if they only did it by the same amounts (dosages) at the same frequency as before... meaning the "feeling" would become increasingly duller and would require an ever increasing escalation to achieve the same desired "feeling".

Obsessions would be the consistantly desperate pursuit of "that feeling" that this thing or person gave them the first time they encountered it. But only with the "chemical fix" they associated with it... not actually the thing or person themselves.

Over-indulgence would be the inevitable result of equal amounts only achieving ever decreasing chemical rushes in reaction to them. So needing more and more constantly to achieve the same past result they remember. It would almost be like building up an immunity from conditioning.

And a person that learns that the feeling of power over something or something else produces a "happy chemical" reaction early in life, also would start to crave an escalation to get an equal desired result as more and more time passes... quite likely leading to physical violence in the long run.

Infidelity also would not be as much about "falling out of love" or "desiring someone else more" but the desperation to reconnect to the feelings (chemical rush) of the early days in the relationship which over time had ever decreasing chemical payoffs... even though the relationship itself had not changed and was as good as it was before.

And interestingly, all these things when suddenly taken away or lost would create a powerful chemical withdrawal reaction. The absence of the things that we have taught ourselves to provoke the release these chemicals would result in strong withdrawal symptoms... one of which could likely be described as "depression"... especially if over a long period of time no suitable substitute able to release the necessary chemical fix could be found.