Sometimes, no matter what we do or how hard we try, there is no way out or even diminish the pain and suffering of depression. We are directly faced with depression, and with ourselves in it. When this happens, and it may happen much more often than not, we can allow ourselves to experience it. We can allow ourselves to be in our depression and be with our depression.
In my book, I quote James Hillman, who wrote (in Re-Visioning Psychology 98-99): "Yet through depression we enter depths and in depths find soul. Depression ... brings refuge, limitation, focus, gravity, weight, and humble powerlessness. It reminds of death. The true revolution begins in the individual who can be true to his or her depression. Neither jerking oneself out of it, caught in cycles of hope and despair, nor suffering it through till it turns, no theologizing it--but discovering the consciousness and depths it wants. So begins the revolution on behalf of soul" (196).
In Hillman and Ventura's, We've Had a Hundred Years of Psychotherapy and the World's Getting Worse, the conversation relates to dealing with any problem and the necessity to be able to "be with" the problem rather than thinking we can just make it go away.
The conversation:
"Hillman: And one day it [the problem: depression in this case] doesn't feel the same. The body has absorbed the punch. But I'm not sure that's because you processed it or got insights or understanding.
Ventura: Because you're sitting with it.
Hillman: Sitting in it.
Ventura: In it. And being in it, in whatever form, is the exploration.
Hillman: You're in it for a while, then you're with it for a while, and then you visit it.
Ventura: And then it walks with you instead of on you.
Hillman: And it may even go its own way" (32-33).
This "being in" the depression sounds very much like tonglen, the Buddhist practice I talked about here in late September. Both ways of approaching depression are quite direct and raw. They reflect a point of no return and no other viable choice.
Sometimes all the understanding in the world makes no difference at all; we feel what we feel and it is simply overpowering. There is no way out. If we are willing to go through the fires, they will temper our mettle, that is, strengthen our ability and our flexibility to go through the fires next time. If we are willing to allow this with and for ourselves, though it be profoundly difficult, it may be that our depression will reach a point at which "it walks with you instead of on you."
In my book, I quote James Hillman, who wrote (in Re-Visioning Psychology 98-99): "Yet through depression we enter depths and in depths find soul. Depression ... brings refuge, limitation, focus, gravity, weight, and humble powerlessness. It reminds of death. The true revolution begins in the individual who can be true to his or her depression. Neither jerking oneself out of it, caught in cycles of hope and despair, nor suffering it through till it turns, no theologizing it--but discovering the consciousness and depths it wants. So begins the revolution on behalf of soul" (196).
In Hillman and Ventura's, We've Had a Hundred Years of Psychotherapy and the World's Getting Worse, the conversation relates to dealing with any problem and the necessity to be able to "be with" the problem rather than thinking we can just make it go away.
The conversation:
"Hillman: And one day it [the problem: depression in this case] doesn't feel the same. The body has absorbed the punch. But I'm not sure that's because you processed it or got insights or understanding.
Ventura: Because you're sitting with it.
Hillman: Sitting in it.
Ventura: In it. And being in it, in whatever form, is the exploration.
Hillman: You're in it for a while, then you're with it for a while, and then you visit it.
Ventura: And then it walks with you instead of on you.
Hillman: And it may even go its own way" (32-33).
This "being in" the depression sounds very much like tonglen, the Buddhist practice I talked about here in late September. Both ways of approaching depression are quite direct and raw. They reflect a point of no return and no other viable choice.
Sometimes all the understanding in the world makes no difference at all; we feel what we feel and it is simply overpowering. There is no way out. If we are willing to go through the fires, they will temper our mettle, that is, strengthen our ability and our flexibility to go through the fires next time. If we are willing to allow this with and for ourselves, though it be profoundly difficult, it may be that our depression will reach a point at which "it walks with you instead of on you."
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