Happiness Roadblocks: 6 Ways I Dealt with Anxiety and Depression

Chatting a bit about today’s post topic…check it out before diving in…

It’s easy to look at someone like myself, trotting around the globe, and think I must be some master of my mind, that I probably have never dealt with serious setbacks. We think of all our ‘issues’ holding us back, and make the assumption that people who have found success, crafted their ideal life and what have you, must not have faced these same challenges. They have something we don’t, and we’ll never be able to do that too. Happiness will forever elude us.

But, this is not true. Some of the most successful, happy people overcame lots of crap to get where they were. And, often times, this ‘crap’ was in the realm of thoughts and feelings.

A lot of people like me, who are uber-passionate about personal development, got this way because we were dealing with some form of difficult circumstances.

As far as I go, my life was okay. I wasn’t assaulted by some major tragedy, nor was my existence one of great struggle. I grew up middle-class in a first world country. All my needs were met and life was comfortable. What was getting in my way of happiness was battling feelings of anxiety and depression,

In high school, I wouldn’t say I was flat-out depressed, but I definitely did struggle with something I felt other people my age didn’t. I remember I would sleep a lot, and looking back on it now, I think I was battling some low-grade form of depression, that while not constant, was always kind of in the background.

At one point in my early 20’s, the depression was severe. I felt really hopeless, getting through the day felt impossible, I felt overwhelmed because I was hiding it, and I was having all sorts of weird, obsessive thoughts about things, things that weren’t true.

As for the rest of my years up until now, there were no serious episodes. But, I would have moments where things felt really dark. I was generally a happy person, but it was like there was some sort of cloud. I would look at people who seemed naturally upbeat, and envied them. While my depression was not of the severe kind where I couldn’t function, and felt totally hopeless about life, there was something definitely going on. It was lurking.

As for the anxiety, it was not debilitating. I certainly wasn’t having panic attacks, but it was pretty intense at times, and it was always there to some degree.  I had a really low tolerance for ‘stuff’ and it didn’t take much to make me anxious. I worried a lot, about everything. I think a lot of us have issues with anxiety, and we don’t realize how much it is affecting us.

Now, while I still experience these feelings from time to time, they are nothing like they were. In the past, I held the belief that this was ‘just the way I was,’ and I thought I would just have to deal with it. But, I now know this isn’t true for me, and I believe this isn’t true for anyone.

Here is what helped me, and I hope you will find something within this post that you think will help you too.

Studying the Law of Attraction

When we think of law of attraction, trying to ‘get stuff’ is what usually comes to mind. And with good reason. Working consciously with this process can change your world, and bring into it, all the things you desire, whether it be more money, a relationship or anything else. In recent times, I have made great strides in applying the principles, and the results I have gotten leave me without a doubt there is something to all this.

It recently occurred to me that my work with LOA has been a major catalyst in improving my depression and anxiety. The idea our thoughts and feelings can influence our reality, and we can get everything we want, by simply believing it is possible on the deepest levels of our being, is a very empowering thought to say the least.

For me personally, a major reason behind my feelings of depression and anxiety were a sense of not feeling in control of things, worrying I couldn’t have what I want, and my life being greatly influenced by the actions of other people, and other things outside of myself.

But, the changes I have seen in my life have proven these fears unfounded. Also, I made a powerful realization our thoughts themselves are manifestations of our predominant vibration. They are something we are attracting, just like everything else in our experience.

The more I worked on feeling better, by simply putting my energy towards things that made me feel good, the higher my vibration got. The higher it got, the harder it was for these lower-energy thoughts to get into my experience. I was no longer a match for them, so they got weaker and weaker. We can only experience that to which we are a match.

Practicing Gratitude

For anyone who regularly reads this blog, you know that gratitude is something I have discussed in various contexts. There is a reason for this—focusing on the things that are good in our life can totally shift our thought patterns and how we feel on a very deep level.

A lot of us are really ungrateful because we are just so used to having certain things, things that other people in the world would kill for. So, it’s not totally our fault—we are not simply bastards. We have just grown up in circumstances that were very comfortable, where we were fortunate to avoid really terrible things that we cannot even fathom, things that are regular occurrences around the globe.

It is so easy to put our attention on what is missing and what is wrong—we have a huge amount of momentum behind our negative ways, and it takes almost zero effort to go down that path mentally. We feel very justified in focusing on these things, but ultimately, we have a choice to put our attention elsewhere. Start consciously practicing gratitude, and this line of thinking will build momentum, and you’ll be able to easily move into that space more often naturally. It won’t feel like so hard.

Letting Go of the Guilt for Having These Feelings

Looking back on my life, there was nothing so terrible in it that I ‘should’ have felt the way I did. I lived a comfortable first-world existence. I had been told on many occasions I am that type of person that everybody likes (though I doubt there is anyone whom everybody likes), had great parents, was healthy,etc…

Things were pretty good, yet I just didn’t feel happy. And, there was a part of me that felt guilty about that. Though, for a long time, I didn’t realize that was the exact emotion. I felt I wasn’t entitled to these feelings, and I would try to will myself to make them go away because I believed I hadn’t ‘earned’ the right to experience them. It was not ‘understandable’ for someone such as myself to feel all depressed and anxious about everything.

Now, while I agree realizing lots of other people have it a lot worse, can offer a healthy perspective that can raise our energy, that doesn’t mean beating ourselves up for not feeling happy, simply because there is an absence of these more difficult situations, in our lives.

We feel how we feel, and it is what it is. If we pile guilt on top of all of it, we will just sink further down the hole. We will never really deal with these feelings effectively, because more of our energy will be spent trying to force them to go away, and that will not get us very far.

Meditation

Meditation can do wonders for feelings of depression and anxiety. It helps create a calmer state of mind; it allows us to really tune into all the ‘stuff’ we suppress and ignore. Now, that can be a bit unpleasant, I will not lie to you. But, oh so worth it.

We really can’t release things until we embrace them. We learn to observe what is happening in our minds; we don’t get as caught up in emotions. We can see what is really going on in a particular situation, and that can do wonders for reducing anxiety in particular.

Meditation helps you realize that everything going on in our minds is a matter of choice and perspective, and that nothing we think is any sort of objective truth. We can decide how we will view things, and how we will respond. It’s a pretty magical thing that can alter our whole world!

Lowering my Resistance

No one likes feeling unpleasant things like depression and anxiety; who wants to deal with all that crap? And on top of feeling badly, in and of itself, we feel badly about feeling this way. The absence of feeling good is felt very strongly. It slaps on a big, thick, extra layer of emotional distress.

This is where the suffering comes in. That feeling of suffering is based on how we are perceiving the things in our life that are unwanted. The more we resist what is happening, the worse we feel. The more intense everything gets.

Lowering my resistance to my feelings of depression and anxiety changed everything. I still didn’t really like I was feeling that way; I still had a strong preference for feeling better. But, accepting what was happening reduced the suffering. Accepting reduces intensity, and takes away the power of these negative feelings. It makes them go away more quickly.

Sometimes I just don’t feel good and there is no trigger. The feelings of depression are much rarer these days, but sometimes they just pop up. Being human, I still feel anxious sometimes, but again, nothing like it was. When they come for a visit, I am not thrilled, but I just accept the moment for what it is, and do what I can to feel better, but not in any sort of forceful way. I just accept.

Stopped Looking at the Future with a Sense of Fear

When it comes to anything unknown, we tend not to be very optimistic and positive. We are always thinking of the bad things that can happen, all the unexpected crap waiting in the wings to blindside us completely.

If we are going to a party where we know no one, we assume we won’t have a good time, and won’t find anyone to talk to. When we are going to do something we have never done before, our mind goes right away to all the things that can go wrong, or why we won’t like it.

This tendency towards the negative is particularly true when it comes to thinking about the future. How often are you looking towards it with a sense all these amazing things could happen, things you can’t possibly plan for or anticipate?

How often do you feel a sense of excitement because you never know how your path will unfold, and what awesome things you may end up doing? I would imagine most people would say not very often, or perhaps, ever.

More commonly, we are worrying about all that could go wrong and thinking about things we hope don’t happen. If things aren’t so great right now, we conclude they will likely only get worse. This line of thinking can really feed feelings of depression and anxiety.

It is understandable we have this worry because bad things do happen sometimes. But, lots of good things happen too. When I look at how my life has unfolded over these last several years, I never would have imagined any of these things happening for me.

While like anyone else, I experience the unknown with a sense of fear at times, for the most part, I look towards it with a sense of excitement, or at the very least, with neutrality. Having no idea what will happen doesn’t always have exist in a negative context. We can look at that sentiment in a positive way as well. ‘You never know’ can apply to good things too.

I hope that you enjoyed this post, and you found it helpful. Please let me know your thoughts in the comments. What are your tips for dealing with depression and anxiety? What specific issues worry you, and what do you think you can do to look at them differently?

Till next time…