For most of my life, I have lived with depression. I never made it my identity though. Instead, I strove for good mental health awareness. I sought to accept it, but also saw it as an opportunity to go beyond the symptoms and get to the root cause.
My childhood was plagued with emotional and psychological abuse from my mother
and grandmother. I was told often by my mother, “I brought you into this world,
I can take you out.” I believed her threat to the point I'd lock my bedroom
door at night while I slept. She'd yell, curse, and throw things at me. My
grandmother was no different. My mom was herself a victim repeating the pattern
of abuse.
I also had abandonment issues from when my dad divorced my mom. I was nine
years old and remember vividly the morning he left. His van was packed up. He
drove me and my brother to the bus stop on a cold Illinois winter day. He said
goodbye. I didn't believe he was actually gone. I thought he'd be home after I
got out of school. I blocked that day out of my mind until I went through
childhood regression and the memory came flooding back. I had stayed up waiting
for him. When the reality hit me, I cried and cried and cried. So did my brother.
That was the day something in me broke.
My marriage to a man of almost 19 years was unhealthy. I didn't even recognize
the abuse until I was going through the divorce when the abuse was the worst. I
remember my public defender reading the printout of his text messages. She made
the comment, “This is narcissistic abuse.” It was a relief to have someone
confirm the hell I was being put through and give it a word that was now
tangible. I wasn't crazy!
Impermanence has been a good teacher and medicine for my depression. I've
learned to be mindful and to practice impermanence throughout my day. What's
impermanence? Knowing things are constantly changing, that nothing is
permanent. This is not always easy. Some days can be more difficult than
others.
Meditation has also been a tool I've practiced for over two decades now as a
means of reflecting on my state of mind, uncovering conditioned thoughts, and
working with my consciousness to unlearn trauma responses in order to foster a
healthy mind.
In my thirties, I choose a career that would keep me out of my own mind of
suffering.
My job as a caregiver keeps me humble. I'm aware of not just my own suffering,
but the suffering of others. Regardless of the mood, I am in, I focus on their
needs. It fills me with purpose and reminds me that there is always someone
suffering more than me. I'm valued, appreciated, and loved. Every day is
another opportunity to be a gift to someone. What I nurture, nurtures me in
return. What I give, the Universe gives back. At the end of the day, my
depression is an afterthought.
I don't try to ignore my depression. Instead, I ask what message is it trying
to communicate to me. So, I sit with it and allow it to speak to me. Sometimes
I just need a good cry. Sometimes it reveals an aspect of myself that was
hidden.
A daily spiritual practice keeps me rooted in impermanence. that this too
shall pass. It's been a good teacher, teaching me how to love myself by
accepting all the broken parts of myself that just need nurtured.
While writing this I came to the realization that I've had three years of
healthy relationships with not just myself but with everyone in my life. I've
had to set healthy boundaries with others, face my insecurities and
codependency issues. Slowly I've noticed a shift in my perspective. Instead of
a mindset of always waiting for the other shoe to fall, my inner state is
calmer and more trusting of what the Universe brings my way. Because now I am
aware that everything that happens to me serves my growth and deepens my trust
in God.
Most of us have experienced this ride of chaos in our own lives. At the personal level, chaos has gone by many names, including” dark night of the soul” or “depression.” Always, the experience is a profound loss of meaning- nothing makes sense in the way it did before; nothing seems to hold the same value as it once did. These dark nights have been well-documented in many spiritual traditions and cultures. They are part of the human experience, how we participate in the spiral dance of form, formlessness, and new form. As we reflect on the times when we personally have descended into chaos, we can notice that as it ends, we emerge changed, stronger in some ways, new. We have held in us the dance of creation and learned that growth always requires passage through the fearful realms of disintegration.
We need to acknowledge the difficult side of life- the sorrow and suffering that has come into our experience. We surface these dark shadows not to mend them or make them disappear, but simply to acknowledge they are part of the reality of life. With meaning as our centering place, we can journey through the realms of chaos and make sense of the world. With meaning as our attractor, we can recreate ourselves to carry forward what we value most.
We can use our own lives as evidence for this human thirst for meaning. As we mature in life, we search to see a deeper and more coherent purpose behind the events and crises that compose our lives. What shape has my life taken? What is my purpose? Can I now see that seemingly random events were part of a greater plan? Do “chance” meetings now seem to have been not as all accidental? Each of us seeks to discover a meaning to our life that is wholly and uniquely our own. We boldly embrace the void, knowing that out of chaos’ dark depths we have the strength to give birth to order.
Thank you, S for showing me what love looks like. I’m not the same woman you met three years ago, and you have a big part to play in that! You were the medicine for my soul when I needed to heal those parts of me that felt broken by men. Don’t ever doubt God’s timing!
~
Leadership and the New Science, Margaret J. Wheatley
