Here’s Your Universal Guide to Fighting Depression
Or even better — to avoiding it.
It was a Thursday morning. I was sitting in front of my laptop and working. I was in a bad mood: several minutes prior to that I had come in for an undeserved criticism from my manager. Normally such situation eats away at you and you end up finding yourself in a short-lived depression. Luckily, things were different this time. I logged into my Instagram account and came across a timely story posted by my acquaintance. After reading it, all my problems seemed a mere trifle.
It was Daniil who published the story. He is an old acquaintance of mine, whom I got to know at dancing classes ten years back. We even enrolled at the same university in another city, though we were never that close. Usually we would come across each other in university’s corridors, exchange greetings and continue going about our own business. Perhaps at this moment one of us would recall wonderful days of our dancing past. Maybe the matter dropped right there after we shook our hands.
Well, on Thursday he was coming back from another trip. At first Daniil travelled through several towns in Spain. After a couple of days he winded up in Rome. From the Italian capital he took the earliest flight back to Kyiv.
When I opened his story, I saw on the screen the plane’s interior and Daniil’s drowsy face. The latter had to do with the fact that the story was posted at 6 a.m. local time. He said his trip had been cool and eventful. He visited lots of places of interest, ate tasty food and drank local wine. The most important thing he came away with after it was the phrase said by the host in whose apartment Daniil was residing. He uttered a simple, yet very meaningful sentence, which goes like this:
Life could be worse.
Feeling animated, Daniil recommended keeping that phrase constantly in mind. However, having read his story, I did not attach any significance to it whatsoever. I kept on browsing through the newsfeed so as to distract myself and forget my manager’s criticism. Afterwards I closed the window tab to sink into a deep thought.
Damn it, life could be worse indeed.
At any time of my life there will be enough of both positive and negative moments. All that matters is which of them I will listen to.
Back then I was thinking only of criticisms voiced by my manager. Not only did this incident get the best of me, it also drove all other good things out of me. I was focused on the negative side of things. This is exactly what dementors did in Harry Potter books. The negative takes all the beauty away and turns your life into a nightmare at this very second, even though your life is not that miserable at all.
My own life is a case in point. My manager’s criticism is not the most pleasant of things and occurs regularly. Normally it is expressed once a month and does significantly recalibrate the work of editorial staff. Its main problem lies in framing: it is negative and has an impact on my mood.
However, does it have to spoil my day? No. First, I will work on my weak sides and perform way better in future, which means there’s no problem in this department. Second, if you really think about it, I have lots of reasons to feel happy. I keep forgetting them, even though they are always at hand.
My friends got me a new coffee bean that is bound to taste good. They may well not have done it.
In the cupboard I have a bottle of the excellent Pinot Noir from New Zealand, which I am going to uncork at the weekend. The cupboard might as well be empty.
Next March I am flying to Berlin to Lana Del Rey’s concert. I might as well have thought that such a jaunt would be too cumbersome to undertake and I could have not bought the tickets.
I’ve got a hell of a list for topics for upcoming articles on Medium and I will definitely enjoy writing them. I could also have put this plan off.
On my bookshelf I have two wonderful books by Victor Pelevin that I am going to read. There might well be no shelf at all.
There are enough reasons to put on a smile at any given time. However, since they are already present, our mind keeps ignoring them. Instead of bringing out positive things it keeps focusing on recent criticism, for some reason making me picture possible scenarios of my dismissal and get sad because of the fact that in a matter of a couple of weeks I might end up broke amid all this.
I might or I might well not. All could end well and in a couple of days I will, for example, be praised. You never know what’s around the corner.
One should act and possibly get sad only when things have already happened, not before they might happen. Until nothing bad has come about, one had better think of something good. Good things deserve to be our priority.
Great! Yet another article for Medium. Lana Del Rey’s Berlin concert in March is waiting for me. I guess you remember I’ve never been to the city before, right? I suppose it will be cold there. However, I will visit the best coffee shops in Europe. Alas, do I even have a moral right to sink into depression at all? Life could be worse indeed.
