Depression management
When you are depressed or when you are feeling low, you are prone to think that you are helpless and nothing positive can happen, you can change nothing. Modification in the way you think can help you to eliminate or at least reduce the feeling of depression. With little efforts you may be able to change the negative, self-defeating thoughts that come along with depression. We tend to think worst about everything done during the state of depression. When we are suffering from certain kind of disability this sort of feeling is more likely to hover around us. Personality distortions are witnessed, we start lying to ourselves, deficiencies are exaggerated, the person sometimes can become abusive to his/herself. Apart from it cognitive distortions too can make you feel miserable. You may tend to be overcome by all-or-nothing thinking kind of feeling. Over generalizations and jumping on to conclusions can lead you to a stressful situation. One may indulge in emotional reasoning and negating even the positive. There can be magnification, catastrophizing and self pity.
If you find yourself in similar kind of a situation, the following points can be helpful to you:
- Try to describe the situation, giving special attention to the thoughts that you experience before and after the situation.
- Make a habit of noting down the self defeating and negative thoughts.
- Then question yourself about the truth of such messages and thoughts in an honest way. Rank them on a scale of 1-100.
- The distortions present can then be checked and identified.
- Instead of irrational thoughts realistic and rational thoughts should be developed. Positive thinking needs to be inculcated. Coping with the irreversible situation can be thought of and appropriate self management skills should be developed.
Depression can affect the whole quality of your life so try not to be a victim of it.
