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Existential depression

Has your situation changed much since making this thread?

I've written about this many times on here, started a topic on it a while ago.. endless years of this has really worn me down to nothing. I have been so focused on personal freedom, both mental and spiritual my entire life and I'm now beginning to think the only relief to this is giving it up, shifting the focus away from myself and exclusively towards others and at the service of others.

I'm becoming more tempted to do some long-term travel overseas again to clear my head. I have found working full-time in the west for prolonged periods of time seems to exacerbate this existential frustration.

This seems to be one of those days where it's all collapsed on me, usually I do manage to hold it in place.
 
malakaix said:
Has your situation changed much since making this thread?
Click to expand...

Inwardly, things have changed a lot, but I still have days where I sink into existentialism. My life has become very busy lately and filled with activity, much of it onerous. I am in love again and have a nice partnership shaping up. I am still very much dissatisfied with my life. Don't get me wrong, I'm grateful for the things I have, for my life and my health, for intimacy. I would not turn back the clock on that for anything.

I guess what's happening now is... I am becoming more embodied. There is no psychedelic paradise to run away to, no illusion. I am coming to terms with having spent so much of my youth going as far out as possible in order to feel OK being alive. There has been grief over it. I wasted so much time running away from myself. That, or I was seeking an antidote to the meaninglessness of existence. Now I have come full circle. I have never been an addict but I suspect that this is the #1 thing addicts are really dealing with when they try to get sober.

Now that I am having to learn how to practice being OK in any given moment, and not rely on the external world so much to feel stable, I am facing the fact that there is nowhere to go. I could travel, I could go back to school, I could have a fling, I could do anything I put my mind to. And yet it never changes the momentariness or the OKness. So I'm adjusting to living life this way, of not being compulsively driven by trauma psychology or "shoulds" to do stuff. I'm trying to listen quietly to my heart.

Maybe I'm just biding my time for now, I dunno. I was looking at Maslow's Hierarchy the other day (which he actually stole from native people), and I am trying to practice contentment while also feeling a nebulous drive to reach higher and higher. But where do I think I'm supposed to go? I have all the basics taken care of now but that inner dissatisfaction lingers. It's the age old question.

I guess I'm "better" in the sense that there's no more crisis or apocalypse. My old trauma psychology actually wants to create some drama because it almost makes more sense than facing the flatness of existence, but I am not letting it. There is a new side to myself emerging that just wants to be as perennial as a tree... sitting there in one spot and being OK with the seasons changing. I know some people might think that sounds so basic, but when you have spent most of your life feeling uncomfortable in a body, it's kind of profound.

Seems like I'm coming down.
 
Interesting, slightly cathartic thread to read. My existential depression kicked in at about age 9 or 10. I've never really found a comfortable (mental) place to exist for more than a year or two at a time, and it's been about 4-5 years now since my latest bout kicked in hard without relent. I'm profoundly disconnected from everyone around me by default, but I always did feel that brief connections with others were temporarily comforting. Aside from that, most days feel like a nightmare that I usually try to ignore with varying degrees of success. The fact I'm still here impresses me though.
 
Managing expectations is the only way I have found to change dissatisfaction with satisfaction..the two are the same thing it comes down to perspective..u know this tho, it is easy to knowi but hard to do it in daily life
 
Depressed. Or just starting to think? That's the way I have come to frame my definition of the concept of depression. For me it was a mild dose of shrooms at 15 that kick started the process, it was like a pause button was pressed in what was otherwise an uninterrupted train of thoughts that began somewhere in infancy. That mental pause allowed reflection to creep in, of myself and of the world about me. Thanks to the internet it quickly became apparent just what kind of world I was actually living in, and not the one insinuated by parents, school and media culture. It was quite a shock, one I don't think I've really recovered from.
 
^that Type of "depression" is what most ppl have this day in age and swallowing a bunch of ssris will do nothing to help..acceptance is the only medicine for that..very few ppl I believe have brain chemistry problems that would benefit from meds
 
Cdkman said:
^that Type of "depression" is what most ppl have this day in age and swallowing a bunch of ssris will do nothing to help..acceptance is the only medicine for that..very few ppl I believe have brain chemistry problems that would benefit from meds
Click to expand...

Maybe, but most people don't take it much further than 'we have x and y environmental/political problems'.. it's a form of disillusionment, and whilst it may trigger a mini depressive episode I think most people find ways to rationalize and continue their existence. For me I've never been able too - that initial disillusionment led me to begin questioning existence and my place in it, and I have yet to come up with a satisfactory answer. Each day is a struggle in justification when you know you're a pawn in someone elses game, and in natures game too. The only thing that seems to plug the hole and get me out of bed in the morning is rage to be honest - anything else feels like delusional rationalization, but rage doesn't conflict with what I know.
 
Yeah, that's what I have always thought. Except for some cases of severe imbalance (my good friend for example, had a great childhood but at onset of puberty started to experience suicidal depression and it has never relented), I think if you feel depressed you need to stop and think about what's not working, and fix it. Depression is situational to a large degree. Seems like it affects a lot of people today. Like my girlfriend... in her case, it's because she let herself get pushed by her dad into a field of study she didn't want, and now she feels it's too late to pursue her dreams, she's unwilling to put in the work to get there. So she's depressed because she feels worthless and like nothing lights her fire. But she knows what would light her fire. I think she should work towards that, yeah she's has big setbacks but even working towards something that brings you joy/passion improves the quality of your life.
 
Foreigner said:
What happens if it's a problem that can't be solved?
Click to expand...

One way or another you'll eventually take action, whether that means moving towards a goal or away from a situation, or internally battling the question until your mind arrives at a solution.. which might be there is no solution or the question itself is erroneous and therefore in need of dissolution. I guess.
 
Existential Angst, even reaching to the level of depression, is common among deep thinkers. Perhaps it may give some consolation to
some, that they are not alone in walking this path, for many have struggled with these same issues before them.

Sometimes it is useful to catergorize depression into two types, organic and situational. Unlike frustration, which simply suggests we should
find another route to our goal, depression, suggests that we perhaps give up on that goal, and find another way, to meet the underlying
need our old goal was supposed to meet.

My life matters to my aging parents, both my Mom and Dad. If I committed suicide, it would deeply sadden them and disadvantage them in
their own lives. And I choose to care about their feelings. I have been divorced over 9 years, and chose in my early adult life, to not have
kids, before marriage, during marriage, and now post marriage, a decision, I often ponder on, at times even regret. One's life can matter,
to your spouse, (husband or wife) and your kids.

Considering the high risk of suicide in severely depressed individuals, such approaches, as, psychotherapy with or without, medicines, that
are prescription only ethical pharmaceuticals, (being tricycle anti-depressants, to SSRI's to SNRI's, with therapy or without therapy, like
USA non DEA controlled medicines, or UK medicines, not, in Class A , B, C controlled medications, such approaches should not be routinely
dismissed.

For those with treatment resistant depression, or, refractory depression, that, is a subject, I am very familiar with, but do not want to go off on a tangent
with, with this target specific thread subject matter.
 
Wish I had something useful to add and I hope I don't get in trouble for this worthless post. But I felt so compelled to just say how fascinating this thread has been to read. Many things I've never put into words before.

Be well. Peace.
 
ZacherySwan said:
Existential Angst, even reaching to the level of depression, is common among deep thinkers. Perhaps it may give some consolation to
some, that they are not alone in walking this path, for many have struggled with these same issues before them.
Click to expand...

Reading a bit of Arthur Schopenhaur helped me, or other materials that help put writing or verbal dialogue to some of the deep seated feelings that occupy my heart to which I'm unable to articulate (or even have an audience for). Knowing, or better yet reading/listening to others who appear to have battled with the same unknown path seems to lessen the motivation to become negative towards yourself.
 
-=SS=- said:
Reading a bit of Arthur Schopenhaur helped me, or other materials that help put writing or verbal dialogue to some of the deep seated feelings that occupy my heart to which I'm unable to articulate (or even have an audience for). Knowing, or better yet reading/listening to others who appear to have battled with the same unknown path seems to lessen the motivation to become negative towards yourself.
Click to expand...

Any recommended readings re: Arthur Schopenhaur ?
 
@Foreigner @SS

Hello, I hesitate to post on this most absorbing read, as I do not want anything I post for anyone to interpret in
the wrong way. I just read all six (6) pages of the subject of this entire thread, and, I thank both of you, for
offering me the reference material on Arthur Schopenhaur reference Studies in Pessimism ! (with deep
sincerity, a new source for me). Reference @SS and @Foreigner

These books have given me some meaningful insight, on the title of this target specific thread, and, I just read
all six pages of this disarming, and most absorbing, subject, like, @ABetterWay stated.

1. Man's Search For Meaning by late Dr. Viktor E. Frankl

2. Mere Christianity by C.S. Lewis (Chapter 8 on The Great Sin (Pride) and Chapter 11 on Faith.

3. I Got Tired of Pretending by Bob Earll

4. Turning on the Light (A Plan for Empowerment and Fullness in Life) by Bob Earll

Mod's please erase if I have broken any rules of BLUA or of P & S Forum Guidelines.
 
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