Category Archives: cognitive therapy

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Your Do-It-Yourself Guide to Fighting Depression – Part 3

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This is the third article on do-it-yourself tools to fight depression. In the first two articles we began with the metaphor that depression is like a troll_3mean, parasitic troll that influences you to do the very things that will make him grow. He makes you decrease your physical activity and your social activity because doing so makes you more depressed, thus feeding the troll and making him grow.

The do-it-yourself techniques involve making yourself do the opposite. You make yourself do more physical activity and more social activity. You won’t enjoy it, of course. In fact, you will probably resist it with every once of energy you’ve got. But if you can make yourself do it. If you can get up and move. If you can reconnect with the people who care about you, you will feel better.
In this article, I want to explore a third tactic of the depression troll, as he attempts to grow stronger. He makes you decrease pleasurable activity. He does this in two ways. First, he saps your energy so you don’t feel like doing anything, even something you think you would enjoy. But worse, he takes away any pleasure you experience when you do previously pleasurable activities. Activities you used to enjoy, no longer feel pleasurable. There is a word for this in psychology; anhedonia – the inability to experience pleasure. The depressed person just doesn’t seem to enjoy anything.  Does that sound familiar?
Not surprisingly, the absence of pleasure worsens the depression, thus feeding the troll. So, what are we to do? How can we experience pleasure if the activities we used to enjoy no longer feel pleasurable?
I’m afraid the answer sounds a little like “fake it till you make it.” You have to make yourself do activities that were pleasurable before you became depressed. You identifying activities that you previously enjoyed, and you try to make yourself do them again,
You won’t enjoy them at first. You won’t look forward to them. In fact, you might dread having to do them, but doing them does help you in your fight against depression.
Of course, doing previously pleasurable activities won’t make a noticeable difference at first, but if you persist in doing those activities, you will gradually experience pleasure in them. Then they will serve to fight the depression and starve that mean ole depression troll,
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The Power of an Attitude of Gratitude

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thanksgiving_photoOnce more, scientific research has confirmed something that our parents and grandparents already knew; that counting our blessings will make us happier. In fact, practicing this one habit seems to improve our sense of emotional wellbeing more than any other behavior.

In the mid-1990’s, a branch of psychology began to emerge, called “Positive Psychology”. Rather than focusing on emotional illness or difficulties, this group turned their research toward increasing understanding of the factors that made some people exceptionally positive or mentally healthy.

We’ve all known some individuals who seem to handle life’s difficulties with exceptional grace, and just appear more happy, joyful or satisfied. They clearly experience their share of life’s up’s and down’s, but do with more peace and hope than most. The researchers in Positive Psychology studied such individuals to identify those traits, attitudes or habits they shared that allowed them to do this.

First, let’s look at the factors that did not predict happiness. The researchers found that material wealth or standard of living had very little to do with happiness. While the United States has the highest financial standard of living, we are clearly not the happiest people. Many people who have much less than us report that they are much happier.

The research also found that negative life events did not necessarily lower a person’s level of happiness on a long-term basis. Of course, one’s happiness does go down immediately after experiencing a negative life event, but the research found that the person’s level of happiness usually returns to their pre-event level within two years. This was even true when the negative event was extreme, such as spinal cord injury resulting in permanent paralysis. Interestingly, the same was true for positive life events. Immediately after the event, the person’s level of happiness did go up, but usually returned to their pre-event level within about two years.

The studies did find, however, that exceptionally positive people all share an attitude of gratitude. They report that they pay attention to the blessings in their lives. Most of them consciously and deliberately cultivate this feeling of thanksgiving in each day. Most report that, with practice, the attitude becomes more natural and automatic.

We can all learn to be more grateful. Make the decision to cultivate an attitude of gratitude starting today. Count your blessings. Write them down. Before your feet hit the floor each morning, make yourself think of five things you have to be thankful for. Thank those you love. Thank them for the things they do for you, but more, thank them for loving you and sharing your life. Look for opportunities to be thankful today. You just might find yourself feeling happier!

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Your Do-It-Yourself Guide to Fighting Depression- Part 2

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In the last post, we looked at depression as being similar to a mean, ugly, parasitic troll, which had gotten your body andtroll_2 mind. This destructive troll wants to grow stronger, so it makes you do the very things that feed it. Unfortunately, as it grows stronger, you grow weaker. Such is the course with all parasites.

This troll makes you feel fatigued, weak, heavy, and drained so you decrease your physical activity. When you’re depressed, you just want to sit, or worse, stay in bed. You almost yearn to be still and move as little as possible.

The depression troll makes you decrease your physical activity because this worsens the depression. To fight the depression you must make yourself do as much physical activity as possible. While this can be difficult, and seem impossible, you can do little bits of activity at a time. Then you can gradually increase the amount of activity.

Today, will cover the second do-it-yourself tool to fight depression. While the depression troll works to make you decrease your physical activity, he also works to make you decrease your social activity. He makes you want to withdraw from others. He makes you isolate yourself.

The depression makes you uncomfortable being around other people. You feel that you don’t fit in. You imagine that they are thinking negative things about you. You perceive that they are judging you. You feel more comfortable when you are alone.

Even when you are around others, you don’t talk as much or share as much. You feel a distance, even when others are in the same room as you. You feel disconnected. You may perceive that others are backing away from you, but it’s more likely that they are simply responding to your distance.

Your do-it-yourself tool is to make yourself do the opposite of what the depression troll makes you want to do. You approach others. You identify those in your life that have been the most supportive and positive toward you, and you approach them. You call them on the phone. You write an email. You invite them to lunch or a Saturday shopping trip. You make yourself spend time with others.

Then you try to make yourself connect. You make yourself talk, even when you don’t feel like it. You make yourself talk, even when you don’t think you have anything to say. You force yourself to make and maintain eye contact. You connect.

This will be uncomfortable at first. Every fiber of your being will want to run away, find an excuse to withdraw and go back to bed. That’s normal. Connect anyway.

Even if you don’t enjoy this increase in social contact, it helps significantly in fighting the depression. It starves that parasitic depression troll, until he just decides to leave you. I don’t know why it works, despite the fact that you don’t enjoy it, but it does work.

Do it now. Call that old friend or family member. Send a re-connection email. Just come out of your room and spend time with your family. Look them in the eye. Smile. You’re not alone.

Question: What do you feel contributes most to the depressed person’s tendency to withdraw, even from those who love them?

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Your Do-It-Yourself Guide to Fighting Depression (Part 1)

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Are you suffering from depression? Is someone you love suffering with depression? Suffering is the operable term here, because depression is trolltruly painful. People with both chronic physical pain and clinical depression have told me that they would rather have the physical pain than the depression. The pain of clinical depression is hard to describe, but you’ll know it if you get it.

The most effective treatment for depression is a combination of medication and cognitive psychotherapy, but sometimes those treatments are unavailable or may not be working well enough for you. Whether or not you are getting professional treatment, there are several do-it-yourself actions you can take to fight your depression.

Sometimes it helps to have a different way of perceiving depression. Think of your depression as a parasitic, mean, ugly troll that has gotten into your body and mind. This troll wants to grow, and it doesn’t care what it does to you. It is truly a parasite. The depression troll grows by making you do the very things that will feed it. It makes you yearn to do the things that make it grow and become stronger. By resisting these tendencies, you can weaken your depression and starve that mean, ugly, parasitic troll and make him go away.

There are four areas where the depression troll influences your behavior. To fight the depression and starve the troll, you have to do the opposite of what he makes you want to do. In order to give each area proper attention, we’re going to consider the four depression fighters in four consecutive blog posts. This is the depression fighter for today:

DEPRESSION FIGHTER NUMBER ONE:

INCREASE PHYSICAL ACTIVITY

Your depression troll makes you decrease your physical activity. You feel tired all the time. You don’t feel like doing anything. You don’t want to move. You feel heavy and drained of energy. The troll makes you feel this way because it feeds the depression, making it grow. The less you move, the more depressed you become. In contrast, the more you move, the less depressed you become.

Any activity or movement helps. Even getting up from the couch and walking around the house helps some. Any activity that makes your muscles move and speeds up your heart and breathing fights depression. Walking is a very effective depression fighter. A 20-30 minute walk every day would be great, but any amount helps. It seems to help the nervous system’s balance the neurotransmitters (the chemical foundation of depression).

I do realize that getting up off the couch or out of bed can feel like a monumental endeavor. It can feel totally impossible if your depression is severe. You may have to begin with very small increases in physical activity. Take a shower and get dressed. Walk from one room to the next. Step outside for a little while. Try to push yourself, but don’t chastise yourself if you can’t. Just try again later. Keep trying. Persistence is often the key to defeating depression.

You might also recruit a family member or friend to help you increase your physical activity. Tell them to push you, without fussing at you. This can be a fine line, so they will have to be careful, but the benefits of a supportive friend can be enormous.

Next week, we’ll look at the second step in your do-it-yourself guide to fighting depression, but for now try to increase your physical activity as much as you can each day.

Question: Share some actions that have helped you or a loved one fight depression.

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The single biggest problem in communication…

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I couldn’t agree more with this post by Otrazhenie. We assume we know that the other person is thinking or their intentions or their feelings. So often we are completely wrong, but don’t believe we are wrong. We then act on our mistaken assumptions, hurting the relationship and the other person. Don’t assume. Don’t do mind reading. Ask for clarification. Tell them your assumption and ask them if it’s correct. Notice how many times you are wrong. Your relationships will be better for the effort!    Terry Ledford, Ph.D.

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Story!

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You may be surrounded by wonderful, well-meaning people, but only you can know your needs, feelings and purpose. You can listen and learn from others, but you can’t allow them to direct your life. Live your life deliberately!

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Life’s Roller Coasters

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roller_coasterRoller coasters are fun because we know we will get off soon. We can thrill to the ups and downs and unexpected curves because of the flat part at the end, where we slow down, stop, raise the bar, and get off. The experience is pleasurable because we know that it is temporary.

Life sometimes feels like a roller coaster, with its own ups and downs and unexpected curves. Unfortunately, we often can’t see the flat part at the end where we slow down and return to normalcy. We imagine that our present chaotic ride will go on forever. We dread the next fall and anxiously await the next unexpected turn.

It does seem that negative life events often come in clusters. Just when we’re recovering from a jab in life, we’re struck with a right hook, and we find ourselves reeling and unsteady. Our only goal is to stay on our feet, or to put one foot in front of the other.

When you find yourself in the middle of a cluster of negative life events, you have to hang on tighter and realize that you’re not alone.  When life is unstable, we need to lean on others for assistance, advice, support or just their presence.

We also have to recall past negative clusters and remember that they eventually ended and that we survived. There is a lot of wisdom in the phrase, “This too shall pass.”

Most importantly, remember that the roller coaster had a creator, who knew each twist and turn long before you purchased your ticket. Trust that creator to bring you home to the flat part, where you can slow down, step onto stable ground and breathe a sigh of relief.

 

Question: When you’ve experienced the ups and downs of life, what steps have you taken to hold on and stay the course?

 

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The True Source of Your Self-Criticism

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This is the fifth in my series on the teachings of the Bible regarding self-esteem. We are looking at various aspects of self-esteem from a scriptural perspective. So far, we have established that we are precious and loved by God, and that wwhisperinge don’t have to do anything to earn that love. The fact that we are imperfect sinners doesn’t alter His love for us in any way. Finally, we have seen that we should be humble in our relationship with God, realizing that we are totally dependent on Him.

So, if we are so precious and loved by our Father, why do we experience self-esteem difficulties and why do so many have self-critical thoughts? Why do we not recognize our true, God-given worth? Why are so many people so miserable?

To answer these questions, we have to look at scriptures on Satan and sin. In John 10:10, we are told:

Satan comes to steal, kill and destroy.     John 10:10

There are various ways to interpret this verse, but I believe that Satan comes to:

-steal your proper identity as a beloved creation of God

-kill your joy in this life and

-destroy your ability to serve God.

Look at the fruits of your self-critical thoughts. Does God benefit from the names you call yourself? Do your negative assumptions of your future bring Him joy? Is His kingdom advanced by your belief that you aren’t as important or lovable as other people? Do your feelings of inadequacy help you reach out to others or share the gospel?

Satan benefits from our self-demeaning and self-critical thoughts. In fact, I believe that Satan feeds us self-critical and self-demeaning thoughts because it serves his purposes. When we have negative beliefs about ourselves, and our thoughts are bombarded by self-criticism, our behaviors and our choices change. We sometimes become negative or mean toward others, inducing pain. We certainly are being negative and mean toward ourselves. We become ineffective in sharing God’s love. We back away from important activities because we feel inadequate or unworthy. Many feel they cannot even attend church because they have done too many bad things. We don’t experience joy, and we certainly don’t experience abundant life.

In Revelation 12:10, John writes:

For the accuser of our brothers and sisters, who accuses them before our God day and night, has been hurled down.          Rev. 12:10

 

He accuses us both day and night. Does that sound familiar?

Unfortunately, when Satan accuses us, it sounds like our own voice. We don’t recognize the source of the thought. We accept the thought without question. It becomes as natural as breathing. With each self-critical thought, he has won another battle.

Would your reaction be different if you immediately recognized those self-critical thoughts as coming from Satan? Would you listen to them and accept them if the voice sounded like Satan? Would it make a difference if the voice you heard was raspy and sinister like a movie monster? Of course it would. Unfortunately, the voice sounds like your own. You have to remind yourself of the true source. You have to catch the thoughts and refuse to listen. You have to be diligent in changing your thinking. You might try praying that God will help you stop being self-critical. He just might!

 

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Confusing Humility with Self-Punishment

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What does The Bible say about our proper self-esteem? As Christians, how should we see ourselves? How should we think of ourselves? This is the third in a series of blogs on “Our God-Given Self-Esteem?
In the last blog, I discussed scriptures pointing out that we should be humble in our relationship to God. We have to realize that we are totally dependent on God and can do nothing by ourselves. We also must recognize that we are sinners and are helpless without His grace. This is just reality. We lose much when we forget our dependence on God.
Many times, however, Christians have taken this truth and carried it to the extreme, believing that they should be self-depreciating and self-punishing. Many people live their lives riddled with extreme guilt, and self-criticism or even self-abuse, thinking that they are being good Christians.
For most this has taken the form of self-critical thoughts and consuming guilt or sadness. Throughout history, others have gone even further. Some have practiced “mortification of the flesh,” believing that they should punish themselves because of their lowly, sinful nature. This self-punishment has taken the form of wearing sackcloth, extreme fasting, carrying heavy loads, wearing a tight garment or band with inward spikes that pierce the flesh (called a cilice) and flagellation (constantly whipping oneself with a whip).
While most of us would never consider such extreme forms of self-punishment, we often abuse ourselves in our minds. When we flood our minds with self-critical, self-demeaning or self-abusive thoughts, aren’t we just substituting the flagellation whip with words? In fact, I think the physical whip might be less painful than the words. Physical wounds heal faster than emotional wounds.
Notice your self-talk. Listen to the statements you say to yourself, particularly when you have made a mistake or fallen short of your expectations. Are you being overly harsh with yourself? Would you say the same words to anyone else? Are you abusing yourself with your words? Are you verbally flagellating yourself?
Would now be a good time to lay down the whip?

Question: Have you experienced religious messages that you should be self-depreciating or self-punishing? Do you believe such messages to be helpful or harmful to one living life abundantly and with joy?

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Stopping with “Thank You.”

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When someone compliments you, how do you respond? Do you respond with some depreciating remark about yourself? “I tried, but I didn’t do a very good job. Someone else could have done better.” Do you quickly return a compliment, as a way of gettingThank_you attention off yourself? “Well, I was just thinking about how pretty that dress looks on you.” Does your response reveal your distrust of the compliment? “Right, now you’re just trying to make an old woman feel good.” Or do you just say “Thank you?”

We often have trouble accepting a compliment because we mistakenly believe that to do so would suggest that we are proud or arrogant. We fear that a simple “Thank you” would indicate that we agree with the compliment and feel we are superior in some way. Think about it. If you genuinely compliment someone and they just say “Thank you,” do you think they are being arrogant, or do you feel good that the compliment was accepted?

We sometimes have trouble accepting a compliment because we are self-critical and can’t imagine that the statement was genuine. The words are so opposed to our self-beliefs, and we assume that our “truth” is evident to everyone.

Regardless of the reason, responding to a compliment with any response other than “Thank you” is unnecessary and sometimes even impolite. Pay attention to your responses to compliments. Force yourself to respond with a simple “Thank you.” It’s enough.