Over Depression

The sky was blue and glistening. The heavens above shined brightly. However, the pain I experienced within me seemed to put a dark cloud upon everything I looked at. It wasn’t my first year as a freshman in college. It was my second. And, he was my professor – tall, statuesque, insightful, meaningful…gorgeous.

One day, I sat in his lecture. The woman next to me was a fashion design major. She colored her carefully designed fashions with colored pencils while listening. I, however, took notes. Somehow, we both managed to ace the course. I also learned that this woman was a dancer, loved to bake bread, lived in a home on the outskirts north of Chico, and had a roommate she didn’t like to mention. I was curious but decided to leave that one alone.

In November, the weather typically turns bone-chilling cold. The phone rang. It was my father. He was passing by the outskirts of town but didn’t want to come to my college apartment to say hello. But it was too out of the way for him and his new wife. I felt like I could die.

Depression wasn’t new to me. Whenever my father called, and for some strange reason, I’d spend the next several days picking myself up again. My aunt, who lived nearby, would take me on a nice long, brisk walk to get my adrenaline pumping so I could shake the blues away. She took antidepressants and figured it must have been hereditary. I resented her saying that to me. I didn’t want to be depressed and taking antidepressants like her.

Then, the day came when there was a knock on my door. It wasn’t my father. It wasn’t my professor. It was my spiritual teacher and friend. She said, “You know, you don’t have to go there.”

I wanted depression behind me, so I wrote down what I wanted and asked God to reveal it to me. What I remembered, through meditation, was that depression was related to responsibility – in other words, response-ability – or the ability to respond to the energies.

When I wasn’t willing to take responsibility for myself, I would become depressed. This included giving my power away to my father, who didn’t take responsibility for himself.

Now, whenever I feel my batteries running low, I ask myself, “What’s my responsibility? Am I demonstrating ability?” For example, did I pay the bills? Are the kids getting enough attention? Have I done my daily spiritual practice, meditated, completed my spiritual reading work, and written my summary? Or did I make that important phone call, hug a loved one, and write an uplifting instant message to a friend?

All of life’s responsibilities are tied into the spiritual work, and, like every hair is accounted for on one’s head, so too is every thought, feeling, and action.