Background
You spent the first twenty-odd years of your life assuming that the deep depressions you entered were normal, and that the social anxieties you encounter as part of it were particular failings on your part. A ‘develop your personal brand’ brand of 2000s online individualism did not help. Neither has a growing awareness of a difficult layoff-filled stint in early 2010s Toronto and some rough relationships with parents and partners.
Here are some things to remember the next time the voices on the subway become to loud, when every person around you is a suspect and secretly loathing you, and when you have no energy beyond lying in bed. This may not apply to anyone else (Which is why it was so hard to curate it), but it at least applies to you. It will hopefully not be the last word.
Always remember
- Nothing has changed except what your brain is doing.
- Your brain is mostly lying to you, given you didn’t feel everyone hated you yesterday/last week and you can’t think of anything that would make them do so. Even if it was true before, nobody has ever acted on it without feelings that activated even outside this mood.
- All the things that would be different “if only you had …” would very likely be different, it’s true. But that was true yesterday/last week, when you didn’t care about things being different. And you only care today because you want to stop feeling the way you feel right now.
- I don’t blame you for not wanting to feel the way you feel today. That your brain turns on you like this is hella bullshit
- There are no life decisions you made that caused your brain to turn on you. It always has. It will again.
- The flip side, though, is that it will stop eventually :)
- Remember that these outbreaks are not different from a chronic joint pain. Consider this a painful swelling of your emotional mind. Take care of yourself, take it easy, the way you would a swelling muscle.
- Now is now the time for grand thoughts. Now is the only the time to make it through the day. Low-level action by low-level action. Focus on each moment until you are safe in bed.
- There is nothing wrong with holing up in bed sometimes. You will be a person who needs to do this every so often. Ride it through.
- If you busted your ass on something, you have no energy, and that’s possibly why you’re here. Your strength, being able to persevere in adversity without panic of complaint, comes at the cost that you need to heavily recharge afterwards when back in safety. When you think about it, it’s a pretty sweet trade-off :)
- If someone has made you socially anxious, it makes sense why you’re here. You have had much to be legitimately socially anxious about. It only makes sense that social issues are the things that hurt you most. Now is not the time to deal with them. When you’re ready to get back into the game, that’s when you’re ready to deal with whatever hurt you.
- Put away Twitter and Facebook. Put away chat groups. Find the least involving pleasure-generator you can think of, a book, a game, a show … and put it away if it stops inducing pleasure. What you need today is chicken soup.
- Remember that before you were 30 you lived entire lives like this. Until last year you could spend weeks like this, and they happened every month or so. Nowadays they are somewhat rare and, if rested, can go away as early as overnight! That’s huge process! That’s the opposite of whatever failure you are convincing yourself you are :)
- 90s RPGs seem to cheer you up. Play them.
- Anime always makes you feel things and you are bad at feeling things. Consider avoiding them.
- Your cats are there for you. Shove your face into their fur.
- You keep thinking that you’re too anxious to be around friends, but every time you’ve forced yourself into it, you’ve shortened your depression by hours or days.
- Drink water when you wake up. You’ll wake up earlier. You’ll get up easier if that’s what you want to do. You’ll feel there is more day to play with.
- If there is sun, be in it.
- If there is no sun, that’s probably other reason why you’re feeling this way.
- Please remember to think about and add new ideas to this list the next time you come back our of a depression.