Depression is depressing.

Being depressed is well...just depressing.

Struggling with this, I am aware there are a number of ways I can navigate this experience. As I explain to my grand daughter, Tiggy, all things come and go. All stuff, all feelings, all thoughts, all beings. Yes, this too will pass but what do I do with it while I’m in it. Well, I can submerse myself completely into this body/mind experience of depression. In completely surrendering to that which is, in stopping the argument with reality about why I am feeling down, I stop piling suffering on top of more suffering. Perhaps I can stop being depressed about being depressed. 

Maybe I can tenderly and compassionately look at these thoughts that remind me that I should be grateful for what I have but, in fact, are self deprecating. That I should realize that many people struggle with depression that goes on for year after year. I should acknowledge that others because of the strangle hold of depression subsist on very little. I should be thankful, like many others, I do not self-medicate. 

Now that I’ve finished shoulding on myself, I must gently remind me of the insidious nature of thoughts. Just as they bubble up so too do they burst. They are insubstantial.  Thoughts are transient, they come and they go. Thoughts are not really an accurate take on reality but are more of the same. Using gratitude as a weapon is contrary to the experience of gratitude. 

Yes, I feel flatter then pee on a plate. No, that is not who I am. This is an experience of the emotional pain body. 

As I write this, there is a glimmer. It is in the sun streaming through my garden doors. It is Sparky lying in the warmth of the sun’s rays, his coat sparkling. It is sitting outside on my garden patio eating a poached egg and noticing, really noticing how the yolk is golden yellow. 

As I read this, I now feel gratitude that with words I am able to self soothe, with time and compassion this feeling of depression will also pass. (And, truthfully, may return.) Enough of doing, gently I remind myself to be with this depression and to know that it is not who I truly am.