Healing WellHealing WellEach of us will face problems in life. Whether it falls within the realm of dating and marriage or relates to employment and money matters, we will have to tackle a host of issues during a lifetime. People who struggle with life’s issues will react to them in a variety of ways.

For example, those who are dealing with a financial issue, such as a job loss or decrease in income may experience a wide range of feelings and emotions. Some may feel depressed about the situation. Attempts to find a new job or ways to improve their financial situation may not succeed or fall short of their goal. As a result, they experience greater feelings of sadness combined with a sense of failure and disappointment. These feelings build up and cause a person to become depressed about the financial situation.

These feelings of depression are really awful since the situation appears awful. There seems no end to the crisis. Each day and each hour brings more feelings of hopelessness and helplessness. Life is filled with negative results, and you feel powerless to change your situation. This state of being goes beyond sadness-it is depression.

Depression involves sadness, pessimism, and a preoccupation with personal problems. It may manifest itself in many ways: feeling sorry for one’s self, anguish, crying, and utter despair. People who are depressed often lose interest in many activities, especially ones involving social engagements. Depression robs people of the simple pleasures in life. They tend to be chronically tired and have low energy levels. Although they go to bed early, their sleep tends to be disturbed, and they wake early in the morning with uneasiness about the day that faces them.

In some cases, depressed people display episodic swings in appetite, weight loss and gain, feelings of inadequacy or worthlessness, regrets, or recurrent thoughts of death and even suicide. As with any situation in life, we need to change something in order to get out of our depression. Since few of us have the power to change the events in life, we can certainly change our attitude toward those events that brought on the depression. Most people who suffer depression possess the basic skills that enable them to work through the situations in life that are the cause of depression, and that is the first step in overcoming depression-recognizing and utilizing the skills you possess.

(To be continued)

 

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