Overcoming Depression & Taking Back Control

“I began having suicidal thoughts as young as eleven.”

Robert “Wobbles” Wright is a retired professional Esports Super Smash Bros Melee player who has spoken up about his personal mental health challenges. Wright became famous in the Melee community for his gameplay with the Ice Climbers character.

While his upbringing and family life was for the most part good, Wright was not. He needed an outlet, a distraction. That outlet became video games. “Video games were a great way for me to feel a shortcut to satisfaction. There is something incredible about video games’ way of scaling, giving you a challenge you can defeat,” explained Wright.

Gaming was not just a distraction; it became a way to build up his self-esteem and self-confidence. “When you’re competing, it lights you up, it makes you present,” he said. “Being able to be present is the antidote for depression. It says, ‘Be awake, be here, right now. Play.’”

Wright is not the only Esports player to struggle with mental health. Long hours of training, alongside the stress and pressure of competition, can lead to mental health issues. Another Melee player, Justin “Plup” McGrath experienced a panic attack at the Evolution Championship Series. League of Legends pro, Diego “Quas” Ruiz spoke out about his struggles with depression after retiring from Esports.

Perfectionism, setting expectations too high, and making mistakes can lead to depression. Feeling like we are not enough in the eyes of those around us and fearing failure can also cause mental health challenges.

On the emotional spectrum, depression falls on the far left. When we are lacking motivation, we cannot operate at our best. While in a depressed state, we may struggle with cognitive tasks like concentration, learning, and decision making.

Depression has been linked to an imbalance of neurotransmitters in our brain, including serotonin, norepinephrine, and dopamine. These neurotransmitters help us regulate our bodies, respond to stress, and experience pleasure from seeking out rewards. While the neurochemistry and causes of depression are complex topics, low levels of these neurotransmitters can help explain some of what is happening in our brain during depressive states.

This understanding can help us look for solutions to overcome depression.

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Overcoming depression isn’t easy, but there are some things that can help us re-center ourselves.

Exercise — In 2000, researchers at Duke compared the effectiveness of exercise vs. prescription drugs for the treatment of depression. The findings? Exercise is better than Zoloft for treating depression.

Researchers tested three groups: exercise, drugs, and exercise & drugs. All three groups showed lower levels of depression, with around half of each group in remission. However, six months after the study was completed the researchers followed up with the patients and found that exercise outperformed medicine over the long-term. The exercisers were more likely to stay out of depression in the long-term.

Antidepressants tend to help us feel physically better first, while we feel better about ourselves later. However, exercise attacks the problem from two directions.

“It gets us moving, naturally, which stimulates the brain stem and gives us more energy, passion, interest, and motivation. Exercise shifts our self-concept by adjusting all the chemicals including serotonin, dopamine, norepinephrine, BDNF, VEGF, and so on,” explained Ratey.

When we exercise, we find that feelings of helplessness and despair begin to disappear. Working out wasn’t an instant cure for me during college, but I believe it helped give me feelings of hope. My workouts provided structure and routine for my days, getting me out of my room and gave me tangible goals to work toward. It was the perfect outlet for managing my emotions.

Find Community — Feeling depressed is often akin to feeling alone. Our friends and family can give us strength. Forcing us to go out and spend time with people we like can give us an emotional boost.

As Jillian Richardson, author of Unlonely Planet, told me, “It’s important to know who you can trust with your vulnerability. Not everyone is equipped to hold someone when they’re in a sensitive headspace. But if you have friends who are emotionally intelligent, lean on them. Sharing with others makes whatever you’re holding feel more bearable, and less shameful. And if you don’t have those friends right now, find a support group. Sometimes sharing with strangers is even more powerful, because they don’t have a preexisting image of who you are. Plus, knowing that strangers share some of your problems can make you feel less alone.”

Take On Challenges — Even the emperor of ancient Rome, Marcus Aurelius sometimes had trouble getting out of bed. He wrote in Meditations, “I am rising to do the work of a human being. Why, then, am I so irritable if I am going out to do what I was born to do and what I was brought into this world for? Or was I created for this, to lie in bed and warm myself under the bedclothes?”

Getting out of bed is often the first challenge we must face and overcome each day. Each time we tackle and complete a challenge, we become more mentally resilient.

Games provide an excellent avenue for taking on challenges. Video games give us a challenge we can defeat that is unlike anywhere else.

Games give us the opportunity to try again and again and again until we figure things out. They teach us how to approach problem solving, and give us great satisfaction when we finally overcome a challenge we have been working on.

Control Judgments — Stoic philosopher Epictetus once said, “What upsets people is not things themselves but their judgments about the things.”

Remember, nothing has meaning until we give it meaning.

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In this blog series, I share excerpts and stories from my book, Hard Wired. I hope you enjoyed this post — if you enjoyed it and want to connect you can reach me here via email brandonlgustafson@gmail.com or connect with me on social: LinkedIn or Instagram. Also, you can also find my book on Amazon — here is the link to buy it: Amazon Link.