Depression Talk

Even in years when the Olympics aren’t going on, we are still often exhorted to “Go for the gold” and “follow your dreams”. The media is often full of real life (and fantasy) stories to inspire us to go further, dare more and be extra-special.

This is a lot of pressure that those of us with depression just do not need. The best we can hope for in a day-to-day basis is to strive to be average. Just doing everyday chores and routines that the non-depressed take for granted is often next to impossible for the clinically depressed. Just getting out of bed can be a hurculean task. So, in this way, we clinically depressed should not get down on ourselves for being extraordinary, but should praise ourselves whenever we can do something average.

The Idea of Averageness

I wish I could say that I came up with the idea of striving for averageness, but that would be a blatant lie. The person who best expressed the idea of averageness as a shining goal was one of the idead of the founder of Recovery, Inc Dr. Abraham A Low.

Dr. Low hoped to give what was called “nervous patients” the mental training to help them change their thoughts and try to stay calm in everyday situations. Back in the 1940’s and early 1950’s, there wasn’t any Prozac for “nervous paitients” (who would today be called clinically depressed) In order for a petient to get medical treatment, they usually had to go into shock therapy (usually insulin shock therapy as opposed to electric shock therapy).

Get The Sports Announcer In Your Head

When you have clinical or major depression and even bipolar depression, you certainly need to take your medicines. But you also need to be aware of the thoughts in your head. With depression, you tend to think, “It’s no use. I’ll never be any good.” This needs to change.

You need to get a pretend Olympic sports announcer in your head to help encourage you to try and be average. “She’s been slammed by a bad childhood and a backed up sump pump, but she knows she has to get up and go to work. Can she do it? Well, she’s moving into position and swining her legs out of bed. I think she’s gonna go for it, folks! Yes, yes, she’s putting on clothes in record time! Just take a look at that form!”

Well, maybe you shouldn’t have that annoucer in your head all the time, but on some days when being average can take all of your energy, it can help. When you can do regular activities, it makes it that much easier to try and reach for your dreams.