Depression – The Spiritual Perspective

How is depression explained, medically?

Depression is defined as an illness that negatively affects how you feel, the way you think, and how you act. It’s a feeling of sadness and/or a loss of interest in activities you once enjoyed. It can lead to a variety of emotional and physical problems and can decrease your ability to function at work and home. Symptoms of depression include:

• Feeling sad or having a depressed mood
• Loss of interest or pleasure in activities once enjoyed
• Changes in appetite — weight loss or gain unrelated to dieting
• Trouble sleeping or sleeping too much
• Loss of energy or increased fatigue
• Increase in purposeless physical activity (e.g., inability to sit still, pacing, hand-wringing) or slowed movements or speech (these actions must be severe enough to be observable by others)
• Feeling worthless or guilty
• Difficulty thinking, concentrating, or making decisions
• Thoughts of death or suicide

What’s the spiritual standpoint on depression?

We are awakening to a new world that finally realizes all diseases begin before the first mental or physical symptom. The seed of any illness is sown in our historic, genetic, or even childhood memories.

An illness does not just pop up out of nowhere. It is the direct result of traumas and limiting beliefs that have suppressed you from expressing your true self. The low vibrational energies fester in our energy fields, turning into our behaviors and personality. This in turn attracts the environment we live in, the people we interact with,  and the choices we make in life. Eventually, when those traumas or limiting beliefs go unchecked, they translate into mental and physical illnesses as a way for your energy field to warn you that your current lifestyle will lead to a ‘system failure’. Depression is one such mental translation of deeper traumas manifesting itself as a warning.

Depression is an opportunity. Why?

At your very core, you are a being of profound depth and infinite vastness. It is only in this depth that you find your home, your source, your true self.

However, our mainstream society has taught us to value and seek happiness in the accumulation of faster, more exciting, more entertaining surface-level experiences – shopping, travel, latest gadgets, new lovers, etc.

Take a look at the word ‘depressed’: it is spoken phonetically as ‘deep rest’. Depression is our mind, body, and spirit asking us to slow down and look within after many years (even lifetimes) of the frantic search for outer success, achievement, and thrill.

This is good news. It means depression is treatable, and it is inviting you to reorganise your life in a way that is more aligned with the truth of who you are. For a mind willing to make a change, the battle against depression is already won. The rest is just a matter of following through and reprogramming your mind. Here’s how:

Change your perception of Depression

You deserve to have an illuminated perception of depression to set the tone for your healing journey. Going through depression is a cathartic, life-changing experience and deserves the dignity of being perceived as a ‘transformative experience’. In many religious and spiritual traditions, depression is called the ‘dark night of the soul’.  It is your soul’s journey from despair to ascension – a test of faith and an occasion for transformation.

Stop adding fuel to the fire

Depression can show up as a reaction to many past experiences, from a parent making you believe you are unworthy, to past life traumas, to being physically or emotionally abused, all leading to the symptoms listed in the previous section.

However, for many, the most grueling and painful part of depression comes from an additional layer – the deep self-loathing, self-blame, guilt, and shame they hold about being depressed.

What’s encouraging is that, for the most part, this layer of experience is largely avoidable.

The best way to start the journey of healing – is to STOP adding fuel to the fire. This means instead of investing your energy in negative self-talk, ruminating on the past, and judging your current experience, you opt for more positive thoughts, or even for silence.

Focus on what is going well

In the beginning, most of my clients can’t see anything positive in their life. I could be holding a big flag of happiness in front of them, and all they’ll see is that the flag is probably heavy. This is explained by a psychological phenomenon called Negativity Bias. Research has proven that the human brain is wired to pay more attention to negative events than positive events. But taking small, consistent steps to observe positive things daily, helps to re-engineer the neurological activity in our brain.

My suggestion: Start a gratitude and love list. Every day, write down 5 things you are grateful for and 5 things you love about life. Each day, read the list you made the days before. Make sure you don’t repeat any of them. Put your mind to the task of remembering the positive things in life. In 30 days, you will see a real shift in your life.

Get help from a sound professional

I cannot stress this enough. But let me try…

If you think you have depression or feel any of the symptoms listed at the beginning of this article – speak to a professional. But, before you admit yourself to a medical professional who might pump you up with medication to fix the surface level experience,  give yourself a chance to connect deep within. Explore the possibility of healing through the power of your mind, with the support of a good coach or therapist familiar with the divine nature of this illness.

A good coach will stand by you and be a supportive, dependable voice. They will let you know that you are not alone and help you heal through introspection, reevaluation, and reengineering of your energy field.

If you give yourself a chance and believe in your capacity to rise – then depression can be a life-changing experience.