Dear Reader,

In the psychiatric world, we look at depression quite clinically. But there is also an experience. I drafted today’s newsletter between sessions of a recent psychiatric conference.

– Kourosh

The Weight

Depression is a slog through muddy water. Moving through, even the simplest gestures require deliberate effort.

When the world seems not in our favor, when nothing moves, we are more than not “inspired.” Emptiness pervades as we fall into depression, if not despair.

We care less, about our selves and others. We withdraw from goals, having failed them, as we fear that further attempts would risk yet more damage to self-esteem.

The very experience of being alive dissolves as meaning itself suffocates.

Our Perspectives

Certainly, our perspectives on depression are multiple: Biological, physical, emotional, verbal, spiritual,… none are “right” so much as they are approaches to the same mystery.

But, I’ve sometimes wondered if the opposite of depression’s experience is not “happiness”, whatever that is, so much as it is the lack of meaningful play.

Maybe we even understand this intuitively.

When we can find ourselves in a deep engaging flow, waves of ideas lap in tensions and challenge, drawing us forward. Most every direction makes sense. Intuition guides. Self and world dance in discovery and creation.

If we could only remember how we got there.

Seeking a Path Forward

Searching for stimulation, a spark to re-engage play’s fire, we might seek “quick wins.”

Maybe a game we’ve played a hundred times will help us find momentum? How about completing something, like that show we’re nearly done with? Maybe energy will greet us at the other end of a nap?

Any of these may well provide the alchemical arrangements to engage. But often not.

I’ve found neither singular nor universal, “here’s what to do.”

A Return to Play

At times, sadness is vital, a mourning required to understand our wounds, recent or distant. In providing time for sadness, we practice care, creating new nests for rebirth, new strands to strengthen our story.

Meanwhile, we might wallow in nothingness. Even sadness can become a defense against something else. Depression’s spell can often cause us to lose sight of our agency.

But when we pick up and place that one project piece, sometimes something moves. When play feels meaningful, something seems to catch. After all, mastery and meaningful work form from guided play.

When engaged, we discover a connection between self and world, where the world supports our creativity and creations in turn.

Sometimes these moments seem to appear of their own accord, like a book on the shelf drawing the eye or an ad for a course that suddenly interests us. But like many successes, they tend to form more often when our attempts are deliberate.

When we can accept our agency, along with its risks and responsibilities, we can more deliberately make visits to both melancholia as well as the practice of a meaningful play.

– Kourosh

PS Doors close to new members for the Waves of Focus this evening, (or when I wake up to turn it off tomorrow morning.)