On Depression and Reinvention

On depression. It’s not like you have to have, or one has to have a deep-seated, deep-rooted depression … root thing, that’s run over years, if not, the whole life … to … experience depression. Life circumstances can change suddenly, or over a longer period of time. And present someone with challenges that, basically, outstrip that person’s ability to handle and deal with these challenges in a constructive, positive way. And when that happens, what comes along is a downward spiral. Quicker or slower. For me it was a kind of slow motion thing, moving from a speeded up motion to a slower motion, to a really slowed down motion. The added factor of sleepless nights or disrupted sleep, compacted that process and development. Then the thing is, is how and where that crisis goes to. And how the person deals with a crisis, and how the person either initiates the crisis or receives the crisis. And by saying ‘receives the crisis’, I mean how passive, how much passivity goes into that process. And then, the thing is is to try to identify the layers and structures of what’s taken place. And try to find some sense and rhyme and reason, for the whole experience. And then to put together concrete, tangible steps, methods, things, processes, whereby the negative, destructive, unhelpful aspects of that crisis, can be overcome and turned towards constructive and helpful, growth-driven patterns, paths-ways. And actually the really positive thing about having a major crisis, is it… it’s like a storm that comes along and destroys a lot, and sweeps a lot of things off in its path. The storm’s path. And after the storm … comes … growth. Hopefully. And after the storm comes a rebuilding and a re-construction and a reinvention … of things, and the ideal is that it’s not just a replication of what existed before the storm, but rather a combination of reconstructing the positive things, that one reflects on as having existed. And using the opportunity to put new things, elements and ingredients, into the new period of life. Things that weren’t necessarily there. Or there in a form that one would call mature and tangible and visible. And that’s a really good opportunity, and a really good reason to say a crisis is not a bad thing, it’s not a negative thing, it’s an opportunity.