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Depressive Surrealism
Nov. 21st, 2020 07:25 pmMy relation to depression is... a little weird. I have had it, I am pretty sure, for over a decade. Certainly I've had the symptoms and was on medication for most of my childhood. I eventually stopped taking it, though, because it simply wasn't doing anything. And I seemed to be managing it--I was depressed, sure, but not so much that I couldn't function. There was no real risk I'd harm myself; self-harm seems to be something that I'm not really psychologically capable of. At least, not under any conditions I'm familiar with.
So pills didn't work, and therapy didn't work. So I just kind of did... nothing. Which was honestly kind of practical. My depression is worse when I'm actively thinking, and if I'm busy keeping an eye on birds, or removing invasive species, it's difficult to be depressed.
As a side note, I think that fed into my problems with distractibility. If you're splitting your attention three ways and passively reading things, you don't feel much of anything.
And as time went on, depression seemed to actually be something of a benefit. I saw people, over and over again, fall into utopian or otherwise overly hopeful thinking. They overestimated their own capabilities. They thought this new piece of technology they read about in Wired or heard about on Reddit would Save The World. I didn't fall into those cognitive traps (at least, when I noticed other people falling into them), and I knew about the hypothesis of depressive realism. It seemed plausible, so I concluded that my depression was at least part of what kept me from falling for it. Or, alternatively, my depression was the result of not falling for it. Sure, I was miserable, but you know, who wouldn't be? Open a newspaper.
But as time's gone on, it's gotten more and more grating. Because as part of it, or related to it, or something, I seem to just... keep going. Not in the sense of having emotional and mental endurance, though I think I do, but in the sense of being stuck in this rut and never getting out of it. And it feels like the sides just keep getting deeper as the environmental situation gets worse, and the communities I care about wither and die, and I lose opportunities to do stuff I would have enjoyed because I can't be assed to do them.
More importantly, I'm starting to question whether or not my worldview is really more accurate. Perhaps depression overcorrects, and makes me overly cynical about the state of the world--and about other people. Maybe I'm dismissing some things because of it that I shouldn't be.
So pills didn't work, and therapy didn't work. So I just kind of did... nothing. Which was honestly kind of practical. My depression is worse when I'm actively thinking, and if I'm busy keeping an eye on birds, or removing invasive species, it's difficult to be depressed.
As a side note, I think that fed into my problems with distractibility. If you're splitting your attention three ways and passively reading things, you don't feel much of anything.
And as time went on, depression seemed to actually be something of a benefit. I saw people, over and over again, fall into utopian or otherwise overly hopeful thinking. They overestimated their own capabilities. They thought this new piece of technology they read about in Wired or heard about on Reddit would Save The World. I didn't fall into those cognitive traps (at least, when I noticed other people falling into them), and I knew about the hypothesis of depressive realism. It seemed plausible, so I concluded that my depression was at least part of what kept me from falling for it. Or, alternatively, my depression was the result of not falling for it. Sure, I was miserable, but you know, who wouldn't be? Open a newspaper.
But as time's gone on, it's gotten more and more grating. Because as part of it, or related to it, or something, I seem to just... keep going. Not in the sense of having emotional and mental endurance, though I think I do, but in the sense of being stuck in this rut and never getting out of it. And it feels like the sides just keep getting deeper as the environmental situation gets worse, and the communities I care about wither and die, and I lose opportunities to do stuff I would have enjoyed because I can't be assed to do them.
More importantly, I'm starting to question whether or not my worldview is really more accurate. Perhaps depression overcorrects, and makes me overly cynical about the state of the world--and about other people. Maybe I'm dismissing some things because of it that I shouldn't be.
