I was doing a training in London the other week when someone asked me a question about all the unrest that is going on and that got me thinking about our behaviours and how we are coping with all this uncertainty.
When thinking of behaviours it also brings up for me 'personas'. We all have our 'persona', the 'act', that aspect of us that is the manager, the teacher, the parent and so on; It's the extra of how we sell ourselves. I'm not saying it's false, made up or even a lie.
Basically it's job is to help emphasise or promote the situation or role we are in at any given moment. I am aware, from the feedback I have been given over the years, in my role as a Speaker and Motivator, that to the observer I come across as: together, physically fit , confident, happy, motivated etc. When in actual fact, those close to me know that since I was young I have had an 'interesting' relationship with depression.
Why do I say an interesting journey with depression? As a motivation speaker, to say I am a depressed person; I am currently depressed; I have a deep state of depression or anything like that, would say to me that I was absolutely like that all the time - like a label and once we labels ourselves it's more difficult to change our perceptions. I would rather view it more as something which is within me, on what I call my 'hard drive'. On that drive I have all the other possible behaviours such as laughter, fun, energy, calmness, and just one of the behaviours I also have is a possibility to go into depression, as I also have the possibility to be very motivated, excited and happy.
I often talk at seminars about this whole area of polar opposites and how we are not able to position happiness, if we've never actually experienced sadness. How are we able to know what up is about if we don't also know what down is? So I often say, well if you want one end of the spectrum you have to accept the other also exists. So if I usually connect with being a very motivated person, at times, there's a chance I am going to connect with being unmotivated, down and very lost.
I recognise that through my life there are those times when sometimes, for no reason at all ( I don't know if you can relate to this?) for no reason at all, I just wake up and suddenly I realise I'm just not great mentally and the night before I was fine! Having spoken to others the bigger picture is showing me I'm not the only one feeling this way. I'm not saying people are getting more depressed with the state of the world, but I do think that there is a likelihood that they are going to feel a sense of uncertainty, a sense of not knowing what to do, of being un-resourceful or that they can't seem to change things.
So, what is depression? I get asked this a lot, and rather than going into the medical definitions, it would be great to know from you and about what you are experiencing right now. At the moment I'm writing a book about how to get through depression. We all know that depression isn't like when we catch a cold, it's not a virus, but is it something were born with? Is it something that comes from a specific incident in our life or is it just a limiting belief about our ability to cope? As I said before we could look in the dictionary and we can get statements about what the word actually means, but it would be great to hear your views and experiences of how it feels at times when you're 'depressed'. Is it something that you have all the time? Is it something that just seems to happen? Or is it something else?
One person a few weeks ago said that they thought that occasionally being depressed was actually quite good. Although they didn't feel good at the time, they felt it was just a necessary way for our brain to close down and recharge it's batteries. Some people think its a chemical imbalance and therefore we need to take a prescription from our doctor and that will help restore the balance. To put in a cliche, 'at the end of the day' there are different people in different situations so I'll be touching on the subject regularly not only because it's something close to my heart but it's something that I too am working through.
So from what ever 'state' you are in as you read this, have a great few days and I will be back blogging soon. I'm going to discuss how we deal with these different states we find ourselves in and do we feel we are in charge of them? Do we drive them or do they drive us?
So great to hear comments take care till then, bye.
nigel@nigeljardine.com
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