Depression Help + Tips. 💙 (Heal Depression Advice) 💙

If you haven't managed to cook today, if you haven't managed to clean today, if you haven't managed to have a shower or get dressed or even get out of bed, it's okay. This is what depression does to us. 💙 Please don't make it worse by beating yourself up and saying, "I should have been able to do those things". When you're depressed, you're ill and it's good to take time to be in bed and try to rest and recover, it's necessary. 💙 So please don't beat yourself up with things you haven't done today. There's always tomorrow. 💙

Oftentimes, in depression, we can be incredibly hard on ourselves. One of the ways this shows up is when something goes wrong and we try to refer to ourselves in just one word. An example would be something goes wrong and you think to yourself, "I'm such a blank", or "I'm so blank", and it's often a negative word. 💙 People are much more complicated than one word. They can't be summed up in just one word. That's unfair to ourselves to do that. So the next time you catch yourself trying to refer to yourself as just one word, think that's not the case. 💙 I'm not that simple and other people are not that simple. We're much more complicated and try to give yourself a bit of space and a bit of perspective from that one negative word which does not sum you up in any way, shape or form. 💙

One of the things it's really important to do to heal from depression is to start generating compassion. So that's both self -compassion and compassion for others. Now unfortunately people who suffer from depression are highly likely not to have much compassion around them in their environment or to have been shown much compassion growing up. 💙 So it's therefore difficult for them to engage with compassion, to draw on any kind of compassion. So one way I like to think around this is to look for specific incidents from your past that weren't family, maybe a little bit removed, like did a friend show you compassion, did a colleague show you compassion, a teacher show you compassion, something like that. 💙 Or to look to more historic figures, if you have a specific historic figure in mind that was compassionate. Or even look to literature and films, someone like a Dumbledore or a Gandalf showed compassion. 💙 And you can have multiple of these characters to draw on. 💙

Please consider that someone who's suffering from depression may do things that you consider to be attention-seeking. But in actual fact, they're cries for help, but the person suffering from depression just doesn't know how to express themselves and how to ask for help. 💙

Sometimes, people say to those who are suffering from depression, just look on the bright side. And I can understand how that's a hurtful comment for those that are in depression to hear because when you're in depression, you're in the crushing depths of blackness and despair. There is no bright side to look on. So I completely understand how that's really hard to hear. And as a comment, it doesn't really make much sense. What does it mean to look on the bright side anyway? I don't really understand the concept. So it's not exactly a wonderful piece of helpful advice. But if we reframe that advice, if instead of looking on the bright side and I don't know, laughing our socks off, maybe we can take that down a notch and just look at things a bit less seriously because we're very prone to looking at life exceptionally seriously and negatively when we're in depression. And I know this is a big ask, but if we continue to do things the same way as they got us into depression, we will stay in depression. So just maybe once an hour or once a day even, when something happens, try to take it a bit less seriously. Like say you drop something on the floor and you're like, oh, well, it's bad to happen. It's bad to happen. Of every 100 times I carry a knife and fork around, I'm going to drop them once in a while, aren't I? That's just the way life is. And suddenly you've put a bit of perspective and a bit of distance away from the event, which could have been a trigger for a negative spiral. Of course, I dropped the fork. I'm always dropping the fork. I'm so clumsy. I'm always dropping stuff. Why is it always me? No one else drops stuff. And suddenly you're on a negative spiral. But if you can take that different perspective and a bit of distance and go, well, yeah, people drop stuff all the time. It's no big deal. Life goes on. Then that's just tweaking your way of thinking. It's not looking on the bright side, but it's looking at things a bit less seriously. So I know it's a big ask, but perhaps try that once a day whenever it crops up, something that could launch a negative spiral. Just look at it with a bit of a twist, a bit of a less serious perspective, and hopefully that will help on your journey out of depression.

Depression loves to beat us up, and our past "mistakes" are its neverending punches.💙 But if you did the best you could with the skills you had at the time, that was good enough. 💙

Depression can sound like, "I'm weak because I need extra rest", and then that can lead to a spiral of thoughts such as, "other people don't need to have extra rest, other people are able to get loads done. Why aren't I as good as those people? Why am I not good enough?" 💙 It's important to short-circuit loops like that, loops of negative thoughts. It's okay to have extra rest once in a while. 💙 If your body needs extra rest then it's self-care to get extra rest and self-care should be encouraged because it helps support both our mental and physical health. 💙

One of the problems of depression is being considered selfish. So people think when you withdraw from them, when you withdraw from your responsibilities, your job, your chores, that you're being selfish and self-centered. 💙 What you're actually doing is self-preservation because what's going on for you is so overwhelming and it's so difficult to cope with and so painful that you withdraw in order to try and simplify your life and to try to keep things the same and unchanged so you can try to get a grip on them, but it's so, so difficult. 💙 So what you're doing is self-preservation, but it actually looks to other people that you're selfish. 💙

One thing you may not know about depression is that the cognitive impairments that come with depression, such as memory problems, inability to think clearly, struggling to make decisions, "brainfog", these impairments can persist into recovery. 💙 So when you no longer have depression, you can still have these cognitive impairments. There's a scientific study done that said that during an acute depressive episode, 94% of people reported these cognitive impairments, but that was still 44% of people when they were in partial or complete remission of their depression symptoms. 💙 So if you hear someone say, do you think you're depressed, or if you think you might be depressed, please go and get it checked out. The word depression should be like a fire alarm going off for people to have them go and get treatment because depression is very serious and the cognitive impairments can persist even after treatment for depression. 💙

One of the most mind-bending things about depression is as you start healing from it, you think, oh, I'm going to get back to the person I was. 💙 But you don't get back to the personality of the person you were before depression, because even though you really kind of only have a vague concept of who that was before the depression kicked in, the work you do to heal the depression actually pulls out the real personality of you who you've never encountered before. 💙 So you're not the person who was depressed, and you're not the person who you were before depression, you're a completely new person. And that's really kind of mind-bending to think about. 💙

When we're depressed, we're generally not happy. We're the opposite of happy, we're unhappy. We're unhappy with our lives, we're unhappy with how we feel, we're unhappy with being stressed, we're unhappy with the environment, we're unhappy with having no goals, no motivation. 💙 We're very unhappy. And that leads people to think that as you recover from depression, you should seek happiness. But happiness is fleeting, it comes and it goes, and you can appreciate it while it's happening, but it shouldn't really be a goal because then you'll be forever chasing happiness like you chase a high from a drug or something like that. 💙 I would suggest that instead of seeking happiness, you aim for contentment. So building a life that fulfills you by doing things that feed your soul and keep you in a state of contentment with your life rather than chasing the highs of happiness. 💙

You may have heard of "black and white thinking" but have you ever thought about how it's applied to feelings? 💙 "Black and white thinking" is using words like "never" or "always" or "everything". So "everything goes against me", "nothing ever goes for me", "it will never get any better", "I'm always in this situation". 💙 So those are black and white thoughts but you can also apply those to feelings as well. If you feel bad in the moment, a black and white thought on top will be like "I've always felt bad and I will always feel bad" or if you feel unhappy "I've always felt unhappy and I will always feel unhappy, I can't ever see it getting better". 💙 So that's applying black and white thinking to feelings. Let me know in the comments if this applies to you, do you do this or is it something you've had to work around? 💙

As I healed from depression it was like life returned to me. 💙 My mind came back online, I was able to be curious, to ask questions, to take different perspectives, to make connections and join the dots. My memory and concentration improved, I could make decisions because I could understand options.💙 My body came back online, it didn't want junk food or alcohol so I haven't had any for two and a half years. It wanted to move so I started running and then lifting weights. My interest in other people came back, a genuine interest. 💙 I started taking pleasure in small things like leaves, birds, flowers, stars. I laughed at things again, even silly things like dropping a fork before that would have really frustrated me. It's simply staggering to look back and realize how much I'd lost. 💙 It's like being reborn from a death you didn't know you had. So I hope you found that interesting. Please follow for future videos and tips on mental health and depression in particular. 💙

I read a social media post the other day saying that boredom can lead to depression and I don't really think that's the case. 💙 You can feel bored in the short term if you're listening to a lecture you're not enjoying or you're listening to a friend going on about their holidays and you're not completely interested you can feel bored but that's kind of a short term thing whereas depression is a much more long-term kind of listlessness and lack of motivation, lack of goals, feeling overwhelmed and stressed and not able to cope with life so the two are quite different. 💙 I can see how someone who's depressed could use the word bored to describe what's going on for them that lack of connection that kind of numbness but I don't think that means boredom leads to depression. 💙 I think it's mixing up cause and effect. 💙

People with depression often see crying as a sign of weakness and they avoid it or suppress it when in fact crying is just a signal that we're in pain or we're hurt and it's a perfectly natural human response. 💙

A compilation of over 50+ original "Depression Tips" by Neil Shearing, Ph.D. 💙 Please follow the channel for new tips! 💙 I suffered depression for about 20 years. It gradually got worse and worse over time. Eventually I got help because of a divorce which blindsided me. I've been doing therapy and self-help work for over three years. 💙 As a previous scientist, I love diving into the complexities of the human mind and body in an attempt to understand them. When my curiosity returned, I dived into learning about depression. It's a horrible illness that robs people of their feelings, energy and ability to think clearly. You become less than human as your vitality is stolen. 💙 I now want to combine what I've researched with what I've learned from therapy and offer it to people currently in depression. 💙 I believe a lot of people, millions, can be helped to recovery from this terrible illness. You can heal from depression. 💙 Please like, follow or share with anyone you think may be helped by this information. Thank you! 💙

A compilation of over 50+ original "Depression Tips" by Neil Shearing, Ph.D. 💙 Please follow the channel for new tips! 💙 I suffered depression for about 20 years. It gradually got worse and worse over time. Eventually I got help because of a divorce which blindsided me. I've been doing therapy and self-help work for over three years. 💙 As a previous scientist, I love diving into the complexities of the human mind and body in an attempt to understand them. When my curiosity returned, I dived into learning about depression. It's a horrible illness that robs people of their feelings, energy and ability to think clearly. You become less than human as your vitality is stolen. 💙 I now want to combine what I've researched with what I've learned from therapy and offer it to people currently in depression. 💙 I believe a lot of people, millions, can be helped to recovery from this terrible illness. You can heal from depression. 💙 Please like, follow or share with anyone you think may be helped by this information. Thank you! 💙

People often wonder "whether depression can get better on its own", and, while it's a complicated question with a complicated answer, in short, no depression won't get better on its own.💙 That's because depression is a way of thinking and feeling about yourself.💙 So, without work, depression and the way you think about your feelings and your thoughts and the way you react won't change.💙 Depression can temporarily get better if a person has stresses and strains removed from their lives at the early stages of depression it can get better. 💙 But if those stresses and strains come back maybe in a different form then the person will get worse.💙 If someone has one episode of depression, they've got a 50% chance of a second episode. If they have two episodes, they've got a 75% chance of a third episode and if they have three episodes, they've got a 90% chance of four or more depressive episodes.💙 So depression is a self-reinforcing way of thinking and feeling that is very unlikely to get better on its own.💙

One of the things that people with depression struggle with is a sense of self-identity and self-belief. And unfortunately this makes them prone to accepting the opinions of others. And lots of others when it comes to depression can be very judgmental. 💙 They can have thoughts or express views that depression doesn't exist or it's all in the mind. You can just pull your socks up, pull yourself together and things like that. So the depressed person, due to their lack of self-belief will then take on these opinions as fact and it will lead to even more sense of worthlessness and powerlessness and beating themselves up. 💙 So I just want to let you know that those judgmental opinions are not true. Depression is real, it is a physical and a mental illness and it's really important that you try to not listen to judgmental opinions. 💙 They are not helpful and they are not true. 💙

Why does it feel like people who have depression are often trying to push away those that are actively trying to help and support them? Well, it's often not the case that that's what people with depression are doing. 💙 They're not actively saying they don't want help and support. They can be, but that's unlikely. It's more likely that they're feeling so worthless and insignificant and down that they fear that they would be perceived as a burden to anyone trying to do anything for them or anything to support them. 💙 So they're feeling that they're not worth that love, care, affection and attention. So it is then perceived by the person that's offering it that they're being pushed away. So they may be taking it personally. 💙 When it's not intended personally, it's not like I don't want to do something with you, but I will do it with someone else. It's like I can't do it with anyone. 💙

People with depression will often try to hide it and this actually compounds the problem and makes it worse. So in response to judgment or criticism or rejection from people such as colleagues, co -workers, bosses, family, friends, people like that who generally will not have a great understanding of depression, the person who is depressed will have a very heightened sense of being rejected or criticized. 💙 And so any comments that are perceived as negative will affect that person with depression and they will withdraw and they will try to hide and mask their depression. And that then cuts them off from potential sources of compassion and support and help. 💙 So it's very important to be exceptionally careful if possible around people with depression. 💙

Two things that I think are really important for a recovery from depression are curiosity and compassion. And I don't think it's a coincidence that one is mind-based and one is body-based. So the mind-based one, curiosity, is really helpful because it helps you dig into things like, "oh, why was I triggered just then"? 💙 "What's the core belief that is underneath? Why I was triggered?" And then maybe you can challenge the core belief and it allows you to unpack and understand things, take different perspectives. "What if I looked at it this way or that way?", "Why did they say that? What are they probably feeling?" 💙 And compassion is the bedrock on which your emotional understanding is built because it allows you to reach out and understand and be with others, feelings and emotions and experiences, and also your own. 💙 Because if you're triggered by something, you can say, "well, okay, you know, that's hard for me. Why is that hard for me?", and you can feel into it. 💙

I've just got back from a therapy session. When I started therapy, I was deep in depression and now I consider myself recovered from depression but I still find therapy to be incredibly helpful. I think it's amazing how getting another perspective on things that are bugging you thought-wise or feeling-wise and you're just like looking for a second perspective, how helpful that can be. 💙 So I'm just curious as to whether if you'd like to share, if you feel comfortable sharing, I'd love to know if you're in therapy, if you've tried therapy and dropped out and what the reason might be, or if you've never tried therapy and what the reason might be behind that. 💙 So if you feel comfortable sharing in the comments, I would love to hear some feedback from you regarding that. 💙

One of the important things I learned from therapy in healing from depression was to celebrate the little wins. So we have loads of little wins every day, such as getting out of bed, getting a shower, doing the dishes, or in this case someone likes the video, follows, subscribes, leaves a comment saying that that particular video helped them. 💙 Those are little wins. And because my core belief was that I wasn't good enough, I overlooked little wins. They never counted because I was always aiming for the next target and the next target and the next target and there was never an end in sight. 💙 So I missed all the little wins and all the little chances to feel good about yourself. And that is one of the important parts of recovery from depression, to feel good about yourself rather than continually not good enough. 💙

One of the breakthrough insights I had in therapy for depression was that if I've thought something to myself a thousand times and I haven't been able to come up with a decent answer or solution then thinking it a thousand and one times or a thousand and two times is not going to help or be productive. 💙 So when I heard that thought start to come through and go off on that train of thought you stop it, stop it straight away and try to distract yourself or think about something else. So for example, why didn't I do something different for any given specific example? 💙 Why didn't I do something different? Why didn't I do X? Why didn't I do Y? Why didn't I do Z? As soon as you start going down that path if you stop that and go I've done this a thousand times a thousand and one is not going to help. 💙 That was a really important lesson for me early in therapy to help me recover from depression. 💙