I was depressed/fed up with my life for quite some time … For a while, it felt like nothing was going right in my life. I was depressed and just tired of my life that I thought about suicide. Now, I love life and I love where I’m at. I’m actually enjoying the present moment and enjoying everything that has been going on in my life and you know what? Only one thing in my life changed… and it was ME.
I changed my mindset. I stopped looking at the glass half empty or even half full. Instead, I started looking at the pitcher that was right next to my glass. That pitcher was called life. The fact that we have that pitcher gives us the opportunity to create a more optimistic future while enjoying where we are at.
It took sometime for me to get to where I’m at — about a year. I have a really strong spiritual practice now, I stopped caring what other people thought about me and decided to choose positive emotions like love, rather than anger.
Too often we give into negative emotions and start to create actions of hate and animosity that it truly makes us feel like sh*t. I stopped doing that. Even when people were mean to me or judged me, I just loved them and made the decision that their actions would not dictate how I feel.
As people, I believe that we have to live life without conditions in order to be completely free of depression. Now don’t get me wrong, I still have my days where I get sad (NO, NOT SUICIDAL), but that’s normal. I’m grateful for those moments when I’m sad as well because it helps me grow and it allows me to appreciate the moments when I’m happy. Once you learn to live life and love without conditions, you will realize man this is pretty awesome.
My advice to you is to take it day by day. Don’t try to look too much into the future, but rather think about what you can do to create a positive life. Somethings that helped me were:
Read books on self improvement
Find a support group (i.e. a church, sports team, meetups)
Journal your thoughts and 10 things you are grateful for
Dig deep into why you are truly depressed. Are shaming yourself? Do you need to forgive someone? - if so, journal this : I forgive myself for …, I love myself for …
Meditation (if you’re new — try guided meditations)
Saying Affirmations — Whenever I feel anxiety creeping because of a situation, I tell my self “Things are always working out for me” “I love that everything is always working out for me”.
Podcasts, Audiobooks
Exercise & eating healthy - To be honest I hate going to the gym, but what’s helped me is joining small group to workout or joining a sports team like boxing or a paddling team.
LOVE LOVE LOVE. If you can love the people who hurt you, love yourself and love everything — you will be quite alright ;)
btw, every morning or whenever I feel a negative emotion I start naming all the things I love like a crazy person. It’s the best! “I love coffee” “ I love my dogs” “I love how everything is always working out for me” “I love my job” “I love my family” “I love my friends” “I love my church”
Goodluck :)