We only complain because we care. — StreetlightX

If we cared so much, why are we still complaining?

So, California passes SB100, mandating that we go 100% renewable by 2045.

I think a career in the solar industry wouldn't be a bad idea for me. Thinking about going to some occupational school and do the solar voltaic occupation.

Thoughts?

How could coping be self-refuting? — Janus

Because you resign yourself to your problems. Conversely, if you're coping successfully, is there anything left to cope with?

The tension I think you're identifying comes about when also considering coping to mean something like: resigning oneself to the way things are. — csalisbury

Yes, resigning oneself to the way things are is a coping skill? I mean, embracing depression entails that one accept or resign oneself to the cards dealt by fate. Is this a stipulative suggestion to think of coping in these terms or self-refuting?

Sorry, it might not have been that clear.
What I was trying to point to is that "adequate" seems at first glance to be a normative (intersubjective) standard, but that asking the question "adequate for what' allows you to think of it in terms of your own subjective measure of adequacy, in accordance with your own goals. — Janus

So, coping is defined to be dependent on a subjective assessment, or intersubjective assessment of one's adequacy?

Isn't that ambiguous?

I mean, when one is depressed one is depressed about one's self-worth. So, coping is self-refuting?

Anyone try microdosing LSD? — Metaphysician Undercover

I'm on medication that nullifies the effects of microdosing. I tried microdosing while on that medication, but, didn't notice too many effects.

Also, "adequate coping" must be recognized to be a normative standard; it begs the question 'adequate for what?'. — Janus

And how do you arrive at a normative standard, when talk about coping with depression?

I suspect that your depression is getting worse since you have contaminated your wonderfuly capable and kind brain with this muck. — Marcus de Brun

It's always been there. Just haven't addressed it enough as of late. I still wallow around and feel some hope for the future. I guess you can call it a meta-cognitive belief about being depressed about being depressed. I wonder how you tackle those nasty beliefs?

YOU DO NOT NEED TO DISIDENTIFY WITH YOURSELF — Marcus de Brun

OK, I'll take it easy on the disidentification thing for now.

The solution is not to create a meta-meta-cognition but rather to collapse the first meta-cognition upon the primary dialogue between self and reality, and this can only be effected through guided or self directed introspective analysis of the self. (Not necessarily of the Freudian variety) — Marcus de Brun

But, what about disidentification? Doesn't that seem like a solution to the meta-cognitive depressive realm? I feel as though, disidentification is a stepping stone to getting better in terms of replacing a distorted metacognition with some other more useful one. I don't believe one can completely disidentify with anything, just that it can serve as the kick-start switch to finding alternative or better metacognitions to abide by.

Do you really wish it were easy? — Wayfarer

Yes, I would wish that it were easier to get out of my rut. But, as I mentioned before, my depression seems endogenous and deeply buried in my psyche. I feel somewhat hopeless about getting better, and what's left for me is to cope with it.

But do you. — Wayfarer

Do I what?

Personally, I don't think that depression is motivating enough, particularly if medicated, I think that one has to succumb to feeling worse before they can feel better. Their situation must become intolerable, or why else bother to change? Maybe one has to be faced with "die or change" for real change to occur... but it seems that most don't live or die, they just float. — All sight

That's interesting. So, things have to get worse to get better in the end?

Practical steps - get physically active and fit, find a fitness coach or a program of action. Also some life coaching might be beneficial. Don't spend time thinking about it 'gee I wonder what that would be like'. You know the Nike ad: Just Do It. — Wayfarer

Wish it were that easy. I suppose I better stop ruminating over it as much as I do.

It's not straightforward at all! It's a deep challenge, and I'm not expecting a quick answer here, or in general.
How could someone tell me about a feeling they refuse to have? — unenlightened

I don't feel much at all. I'm on two mood stabilizers and an antidepressant, so I don't know if that has anything to do with it. My emotions feel muted to some extent. I feel as though it's hopeless to try and figure out the root cause. It's deeply embedded into me in some sense and I have no way of reaching it. That's I think a predicament many depressives face. Of having their depression so deeply intertwined with their being that they can't separate the two. This again reminds me of disidentification and its perhaps use.

That's not apathetic, that's making yourself comfortable in your misery, and that's why it's tolerable. At the risk of provoking some feeling in you, I will point out that it is self-indulgent. — unenlightened

Seems to me like apathy. I just don't want to do anything. It's not dysphoric though. More like you said earlier, about a general decrease in affective mood or engagement with the world.

Interesting read:

https://donaldrobertson.name/2013/01/18/cognitive-distancing-in-stoicism/

The question I tend to ask someone who is depressed is, 'what are you depressing? — unenlightened

Is the answer ever so straightforward? It seems to me, that depression is under layers of thought and memory that isolating the cause is never so obvious.

So here is a safe exercise, that requires no therapist or equipment, and which does the opposite of what everyone else is telling you. Find a quiet place, lie on the floor, and pretend to be dead. Feel the intensity of depression; nobody cares, least of all you, that you are lying dead in some corner. Life goes on elsewhere, and nothing is happening to you. My own experience is that it takes about 20 minutes of being dead to arrive at a definitive 'bugger this, I've got better things to do'. It might take you longer or shorter. Then go and find someone to talk to and care about. — unenlightened

I lay in bed most of the day, so I know how intense the depression is. It isn't intolerable, just persistent apathy and lack of interest in things.

One would think that after so much thought and so many threads, that some answer might come to my mind. Yet, here I am still pondering over this issue. Won't seem to go away. I'm getting pretty darn tired as it is so I hope someone else can chime in.

Buddhism often has quite a lot to say about such forms of mediation in which one makes all experiences that which one in some apprehends as an awareness—thereby experientially establishing the given awareness as ontologically independent of all which it otherwise will be constituted at any particular moment as a “self”. Note that within Buddhism, this is intended to be transformative in what one construes to be ontological, to be real, in regards to personal being. It is after all part and parcel of the ontological position of Buddhism. This process of meditation, however, is neither quick nor easy. It requires effort and perseverance. — javra

Thanks, that makes sense. So, in my own words, would you call this a metacognitive state of mind that Buddhism enforces, through the practice of mindfulness, compassion, and altruism? One then refers back to this state of mind, when dealing with depression?

Yes, that's probably true. — Janus

In CBT, there's a term called "mental filter". It basically, is stating the reality of what you experience regardless of whether it corresponds to reality or not.

It's an interesting term because it is in a figurative sense the lowest common denominator. All other cognitive distortions are dependent on affecting how your mental filter is processing information. It's my personal opinion, that you can't really have any effect on your baseline "mental filter", well, maybe more than a little. But, anyway, what I'm getting at is that disidentification can have the positive effect of altering your mental filter through changing what you conceptualize thoughts to be.

In my experience, there were brief periods of stillness and tranquillity, very Zen-like, when I was trying to apply disidentification.

But even in saying that, you're setting yourself up to not succeed. It's almost like you want to believe it. Just saying. — Wayfarer

Well, I do feel the symptoms every day, so I guess if it walks like a duck, talks like a duck, then it must be a duck. I don't see how you can dissociate from that feeling of bleakness or apathy.

I guess there's a difference between dis-identification in the sense of not identifying with some definition of ourselves; as a depressive, a set of symptoms, a process of suffering or whatever, and dis-identification in the sense of gaining an insight into compulsive negative thought patterns that we have been to identified with to be able to see what they have been doing to us. — Janus

I agree; but, that distinction is blurry when it comes to problems like depression. It's a mood that pervades your entire being. So, the latter reinforces the former.

I think part of the mental knack is being able to develop some detachment from it - which I know must be a lot more difficult from inside the condition that from outside it. — Wayfarer

This is an ongoing discussion we're having in the On Disidentification thread if you care to join us. In that thread, I attempted to disidentify from the condition and live by thinking that "I have depression, and not I am depressed." My trial ended with me feeling angry or frustrated that I still feel the symptoms of depression even if I didn't think I have the condition.

I suspect endogenous problems like depression, are very deeply embedded in one's persona, so it can be difficult to disidentify from or become detached.

I can add that, the process of dissociating yourself from a diagnosis, such as depression, might be a topic worth pursuing; but, isn't something that would come to fruition in terms of remission from depression, anxiety, or OCD. I think...

I'm not sure how you are thinking about it, but I would have thought the depression just is the "set of symptoms" and that you are neither that nor those, nor the compulsive patterns of thought which may be giving rise to them. You are the one suffering, or put another way, you are more than merely the set of symptoms, depression and suffering. — Janus

I was thinking about it in terms of distancing myself away from the diagnosis, and the symptoms as just self-labelling. I was trying to not identify with the diagnosis and my symptoms. I guess you can say I was trying to consciously dissociate myself from the disorder; but, to little avail.

The issue crept up once I started feeling the symptoms again (laying in bed, rushing to get home to lay in bed, lack of interest in getting better). Once the symptoms surfaced, the automatic thought that "I have depression", resurfaced. I didn't make it more than 2-3 days before I returned to the negative talk and realized that it's depression and not anything else.

You mean that in your experience, in your particular case, it has proven to be too entrenched to treat with disidentification? But what of the possibility that you haven't tried hard and/or consistently enough? (I'm not saying you haven't, but I'm just asking the question). — Janus

Yes, that thought occurred to me, that I wasn't trying hard enough or my method of doing so was faulty. But, I did give it a good try. I didn't seem to feel any better thinking of myself as a set of symptoms instead of depression.

I don't know. What could have gone wrong?

It all sounds to me like wishful thinking to want to "wish away" the depression.

I really do wonder how would a Buddhist tell a student or follower, how to disidentify or detach from depression. I doubt they would think it was sound advice to try and do so. It seems to me that to want to disidentify from a feeling, one is incapable or not feeling it.

I want to analyze why disidentification didn't work for my depression.

It seems to me that internal problems of the mind are harder to treat with disidentification than external afflictions. This is due to having the mind be constantly aware of its own internal workings. One can disidentify from being called a nerd, geek, or what label people can invent; but, for depression or anxiety or OCD, it's not possible to dissociate from the condition. It's too endemic to treat with disidentification.

Thoughts?

Well, I gave it a try at disidentification, and it didn't seem to help with my depression, as thought.

Guess not disidentification, then.

What now?

Never tried that. Does that work for you?

What if the depression is hereditary? Meaning, in the genetic makeup of the individual. Does one just have to cope with it then?

No, it's not offered as a cure for you. It's a cure for a shitty world - a shovel and a lot of work. — unenlightened

It doesn't seem like anyone cares. Not your or my problem. And the depression continues.

Thanks, Bonnie, I'll think over it.

What I am down on is the mask of scientism; and in particular the claim that the efficacy of practice demonstrates the truth of theory. — unenlightened

So, psychology isn't a science? I don't understand the negative outlook here.

But personally, I do not advocate for it; I advocate for facing the horror that pervades one's being and the world, and doing one's negligible bit to ameliorate it. — unenlightened

To be honest, I doubt my depression can be solved by this means. I don't really know the source of my depression. It seems as if it runs in the family, and no psychotherapy will help.

Thanks for sharing mcdoodle.

In the long run I've just concluded: I have a melancholy disposition, and the way things have turned out seem to demonstrate how right I was to be melancholy. — mcdoodle

Sounds like a self-fulfilling prophecy to me.

I would add: therein lies a danger of disidentification. Alienation. If you refuse the label you're given when you go into the therapeutic room you'll find yourself isolated, and that itself may not be wise. — mcdoodle

There is that danger, yes. But, the goal is to get better, so, as long as that goal is being satisfied then why worry? But, I no longer believe in disidentification. I find it impossible to not think of the polar bear once brought up, or the fact that I have depression...

Suppose I said to you that if you believe in Jesus as your saviour, and showed you with statistics that people who believe in Jesus as their saviour are much happier, than those who don't, would you believe in Jesus as your saviour? — unenlightened

Pragmatically, I would have nothing against believing in Jesus. But, I could create another belief in something else that may better suit my inclinations. But, I guess I see where you're coming from. It's just that psychotherapy, be it CBT or MCT, is validated by empirical studies and since it would be hard to argue that no person does not have cognitive distortions, then what's wrong with pointing them out if they actually do occur, which they do.

I don't quite see what is so depressing about it. Care to elaborate?

And, what are your thoughts about disidentification, if I may ask? My depression isn't that bad recently. Manageable; but, still bothersome.

And so what it comes down to, without the cloaking of complicated scientific terminology is "think happy thoughts and don't worry whether they are true."

It's all rather depressing, and therefore it must be wrong. — unenlightened

I don't think it's that bad as you say. CBT and MCT have their foundations in scientific inquiry. They have empirical grounds where their efficacy has been determined. Therefore, they aren't just another set of metacognitive beliefs devoid of meaning. Their use is determined by the ability to get one out of depression. And, they seemingly work for that purpose.

Change the reality. — creativesoul

Reality is hard to change. Besides suffering is an endemic feature of depression in many cases that persists in different environments, hence it's dysphoric.

So, how do you think our ordinary beliefs change? Do they "become other beliefs" or do they merely replace them? — Janus

I don't know I'm asking you or others.

What happens to the content of ordinary beliefs when you replace them? I'm not clear what this question could even mean, to be honest. — Janus

Yes, how is it altered? Think of a hard drive being the brain and software being the belief, how is the software changed to fit a new perception or altered belief of reality or oneself?

It seems to be obvious by definition that they do not form consciously. So, I guess they are unconscious, unanalyzed assumptions that we make about our thinking, and what it might do for us, how it might protect us or whatever. Also, what exactly do you mean by "cognitive distortion"? — Janus

I mean that how does the maladaptive thought become maladaptive? Through an incorrect identification of a situation or belief about the world through a conscious cognitive distortion?