The Path to Nowhere: A Tale of Life, or the Lack Thereof

           First off, let me be clear.  This is not how I feel now.  However, I have unfortunately been down this road before, multiple times in fact.  Depression is a condition that is hard to deal with and many people feel awkward and even embarrassed talking about it.  Why?  One out of every ten Americans has this disease in some form or another.  You are guaranteed to meet many people who have struggled with it.  Be accepting.  Try to understand a little.  That is ultimately my goal today.  I don't ever wish any of you to be empathetic, but hopefully I can help make a few of you a little more sympathetic.  Have any questions?  I am always willing to explain it a little better to those who wish so.  Don't be afraid to ask.

           Also, I just want to warn you that the below post may not make much sense and may leave you feeling even more confused afterwards than you did before.  Please just accept this and take it as my very poor attempt to try to begin to describe an indescribable condition.  Therefore, let us begin.

Have you ever felt out of control?  Has your own mind ever betrayed you?  Do you ever get stuck on the outside looking in on your own body with no say on how it is run?  I have.  It’s called Depression with a capital “D”.  You see, the funny thing about Depression is that it doesn’t play fair.  It isn’t ruled by simple logic and consequences.  For example, when someone gains a physical sickness, the person rarely assumes that something is fundamentally wrong with them.  With depression though, it’s all you assume. Depression is a can’t win situation full of pitfalls convinced to make you believe in whatever the depression wants to tell you.  Your mind becomes a booby-trapped lair where careful steps needs be taken to avoid becoming the victim.  Yet, if Depression is anything, It’s patient.  It doesn’t really mind that you don’t believe Its whisperings the first time, or the second, or even the fiftieth.  It doesn’t have to worry, because it knows that eventually you’ll stumble a little.  You may start out falling into a little pit.  Soon though it’s a bigger one.  Then it becomes an even larger one.  And more than anything else, the Depression knows that you WILL succumb.  Wearing down walls takes time, but they will be worn down, until soon, you’re doing its job for it.  You create the whispers, you believe the lies, and you start the path to self-destruction that you’re not entirely sure how you got on.

If this was all, though, it would simply be depression.  Not Depression.  Everyone experiences depression, sometimes extended bouts of it.  Trust me, I know.  I’ve been constantly told that everyone suffers from depressive slumps.  The problem of Depression begins when you are sitting at the bottom of that pit, and you look up and see nothing.  No way out, no way down, no light.  You are stuck in the recesses of a hole so deep that even the thought of it starts to fill you with despair.  Worse, that not-so-little Depression is back, whispering again.  This time though, you don’t recognize it as what it is.  The only voice you hear is your own, mocking you.  Telling you that you deserve to be down here.  That no one can or wants to rescue you, because you’re worthless.  After all, didn’t you dig the pit yourself?  Did you not secretly know that this is where you belong?  Isolated from everyone and everything else?  You deserve the darkness, you are the darkness.  This pit is simply a reflecting ground for you to realize your infinite worthlessness.  And because these thoughts have become your core truths, you believe.  You no longer doubt the voice, as it is you, and all it does is simply tell the harsh, bitter truth.  You don’t matter.  You don’t belong.  You don’t even fit in with yourself.  What light did you ever see?  The problem exists with you, you don’t deserve it.  You don’t deserve anything.  Your life is an annoyance.  A bother.  You are bothering other people simply by being there.  Although you’re down in the bottom of the pit, it isn’t enough.  Somehow, you’re still bothering people.

…

So you change your patterns.  You lose resistance and will.  After all, it’s simply truth that I’m speaking.  So I become quieter.  I don’t speak up as much.  I tend to hide more in the corner.  Soon, I simply stop showing up.  This way I won’t be a bother at all.  But I live with others, and surely they too are annoyed by my presence.  So I retreat to my bedroom.  I begin to do only the basics of survival.  Everything hurts so much and I have lost appreciation for everything.  My world could be compared to a black and white, silent movie.  Then I begin to shut down my emotions, desperate for a lack of caring.  My every action is proving to myself that I was right all along.  That I am worthless, useless, defective.  Soon I cease to care about anything.  My days cannot even be called that and I am in a blank, empty canvas, void of even a splotch of paint.  My mind is numb, as is my heart.  Nothing matters.  Nothing.  And every day I pray for the chance to simply cease to exist.  To have never been.  And that, that is something no one should ever wish for. 

…

Your mind and life could all be summed in a welcome sign to a small town.  It says:

                Welcome to Depression.  Population: Zero.  The Land Nothing.  Don’t presume to enjoy your stay, but plan to stay forever.

It’s a pleasant little sign, isn’t it?  And it will stay that way until you can no longer stand it and start the long journey back to recovery.  Thank goodness though, there is a way to recovery.  A way back to the light.  You just have to be willing to take it.  It may take months, it may take years, but it is possible to taste and see color once again.  And once you do, don't ever let it go.

There is Hope

Feeling a bit down?  I'm not much for words on this one so I thought I'd post some of my favorite songs that give me hope.  Songs that make me think I can make it through this life.  Hopefully it will convey some of the same meaning for you.  Enjoy!

Succumbed

“I am exhausted.  Relief is fleeting and unsatisfying.  There is nothing left but an empty taste, bitterly dry.  The hunger never abates and decisions continue to become more reckless.  The brink pushes closer, consuming all in its path.  Walls build higher and higher; desperate for safety, comfort, and peace.  Yet nothing works as the pursuit continues, and I’m left further weakened with each passing minute.  Emotions overwhelm, sanity flees, and the question of why balloons.  Why keep trying?  Why keep moving?  Why continue this trail?  Where are you traveling and where is the hope?  How do you plan to keep going?

With each question, the foundation crumbles; succumbing to the relentless barrage.  Hope left behind, the light swiftly fading, each moment screaming one word.  FAILURE! it yells.  Failure! it hollers.  Failure! it taunts with a grin.  Failure, it states with a face smug with glee, knowing that it will win.

All is futile, hopeless, despairing.  After all, where can one go?  Where can one flee from the enemy of one’s own mind? 

All is lost.  All is gone.  The darkness wins.

Why does the path not end?”

~Anonymous

Night Owl

Despite many years of early morning seminary, work, and attempts of going to bed to early, I have always been a night owl. I have had many people protest that no one is truly a night owl.  Others have insisted that their biological clock is just set for the wee hours of the night.  In all honesty, I never saw much point in either opinion.  Those who say no one is a night owl often have little trouble sleeping and are content with their lives wholly in the daylight.  Those who protest they could never be a day person make a choice.  Taking meds, choosing to go to bed earlier, watching a little less TV, and they could easily be a daylighter too.  Most people don't understand the call of the night.  It is a very dark time when no one is awake and your head is aching.  There's nowhere to go and little to do. 

Teenagers and single adults have a better grasp of what the night is supposed to be about.  They see it as opportunity to hide in the darkness and do things perhaps not quite so sociably acceptable during the daylight.  They seize opportunity and try, just for awhile, to forget their trials and find fun and acceptance.

But even they don't completely understand.  After all, the night is a mistress of contrast.  Although she revels in fantasy, she is harsh in her truth.  I am a night owl, not because I choose to be, but because I am irrepressibly drawn to it.  At night, I can indulge in all possibility and opportunity.  I can go anywhere and be anyone.

It is also easier to be truthful with yourself in the night.  You can't hide yourself away.  When the only things surrounding you are the cloak of darkness and the night sky overhead, there is no place to hide from the truth of what's inside you.  Sleep is the only escape for that, and even it is a fleeting one.

Nighttime for me is also a time of contemplation.  It is a time of pondering and a time of silence.  Often, secrets are revealed at night.  As the long, harsh day comes to close, gentle night is waiting for the silence to lower your barriers and expose those things you can't show to anyone else.  Living in a large family, and then with five roommates, the only time I get to myself is after midnight.  

On top of this, there are many irreplaceable experiences at 2 a.m..  Silent moments between yourself and God.  Resolutions that can change your life, hopes and dreams that bring you comfort... and often a really bad headache when you wake up the next morning.

To finish, I would like to quote Henry W. Longfellow's "Hymn to the Night."

I heard the trailing garments of the Night

Sweep through her marble halls!

I saw her sable skirts all fringed with light

From the celestial walls!

I felt her presence, by it spell of might,

Stoop o'er me from above;

The calm, majestic presence of the Night,

As of the one I love.

I heard the sounds of sorrow and delight,

The manifold, soft chimes,

That fill the haunted chambers of the Night,

Like some old poet's rhymes.

From the cool cisterns of the midnight air

My spirit drank repose;

The fountain of perpetual peace flows there, --

From those deep cisterns flows.

O holy Night! from thee I learn to bear

What man has borne before!

Thou layest thy finger on the lips of Care

And they complain no more.

Peace! Peace! Orestes-like I breathe this prayer!

Descend with broad-winged flight,

The welcome, the thrice-prayed for, the most fair,

The best-beloved Night!

The Road Not Taken

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both

And be one traveler, long I stood

And looked down one as far as I could

To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,

And having perhaps the better claim

Because it was grassy and wanted wear,

Though as for that the passing there

Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay 

In leaves no step had trodden black.

Oh, I marked the first for another day!

Yet knowing how way leads on to way 

I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,

I took the one less traveled by, 

And that has made all the difference.

~Robert Frost

-----and-----

A Psalm of Life

Tell me not in mournful numbers,

Life is but an empty dream!

For the soul is dead that slumbers,

And things are not what they seem.

Life is real!  Life is earnest!

And the grave is not its goal;

Dust thou are, to dust thou returnest,

Was not spoken of the soul.

Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,

Is our destined end or way;

But to act, that each tomorrow

Find us farther than today.

Art is long, and Time is fleeting,

And our hearts, though stout and brave,

Still, like muffled drums are beating

Funeral marches to the grave.

In the world's broad field of battle,

In the bivouac of Life,

Be not like dumb, driven cattle!

Be a hero in the strife!

Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant!

Let the dead Past bury its dead!

Act, -act in the living Present!

Heart within, and God o'erhead!

Lives of great men all remind us

We can make our lives sublime,

And, departing, leave behind us

Footprints on the sand of time;

Footprints, that perhaps another,

Sailing o'er life's solemn main, 

A forlorn and shipwrecked brother, 

Seeing, shall take heart again.

Let us then be up and doing,

With a heart for any fate;

Still achieving, still pursuing,

Learn to labor and to wait.

~Henry W. Longfellow

Straight Up

Note:  Before reading, please know that I do not want an argument and that I respect everyone's beliefs.  Please kindly return the favor.

The definition of truth is the way things are, not the way things seem.  There are indeed absolutes, moral and otherwise.  There are more types of knowledge than empirical evidence.  I, personally, have a knowledge that Christ lives and love us all, that his atonement is something every man needs, that His sacrifice is our way back to a loving Heavenly Father.  

In today's world I am constantly bombarded with the idea of moral relativism.  In a effort to keep friends and to not hurt feelings, I have often started down this slippery slope.  I look at my dad, my idol, and watch him stand resolute in this increasingly unstable and dysfunctional world.  Many are the times I want to argue, to tell him it isn't all black and white.  That in this day and age no one can get through this world untouched; that times have changed.  After all, all we need do is look at the people around us.  More and more folks have been diagnosed with depression, ADD, and autism.  Very few people are given the privilege to grow up in a nurturing environment, leading to many of these problems.

Indeed, the world is constantly changing.  We are bombarded on all sides with technology, information, and the increasing awareness of all that goes on in the lives of our fellow human beings.  Atheism, homosexuality, and the disappearance of the family unit are all accepted as common facts of life in this post-modern world.  It is easy to forget, to slip-up, to see the gray in our lives and the lives of those around us.  No one wants to turn away a friend because of choices they make, which they believe in.  No one wants to be the only man out as mankind discovers greater and greater wonders.  Everyone wants to fit in and feel that they can make a difference.  So we gray the edges; we find ourselves faced with a moral dilemma and only partially resolve it with our beliefs.  We don't dig too deep or delve too far.  All the while the world washes around us, telling us that we too can find happiness in the world.

However, it is a lie.  A cleverly disguised one, but a lie nonetheless.  After all, truth is the way things are, not the way we often want them to be.

Now, I'm not trying to criticize the way you choose to live your life.  Everyone is faced with choices, unique to them, that only they can make.  Don't take this as my judgment of you.  This isn't.  It is, however, how I choose to live my life.

The truth that my dad often reminds me of is not that I should force my views on everyone.  Or that everyone should comply with ours.  He reminds me that my world must be black and white. And that while loving everyone, because, or in spite of the choices they make, I cannot give myself the same allowance.  "To be in the world, but not of the world," is often a reminder given to those of us LDS members.  It is not that I cannot love those around me and accept their choices, but that I must be a pillar for myself in this fallen world.  Indeed, I would like to be able to face God someday and have a jury called of every single person I ever knew.  And while they can love me, hate me, or be impartial; I want every last one of them to be able to say that they know I believe in God.  That even though I may never have spoken of it to them, my faith means everything to me and I truly strive to simply live as Christ did:  to serve those around me.

I want to end by simply saying that I love my God and my Redeemer, and that I am doing the best I can to remember the truth and the absolutes so that I can make it back to Him.  I see no shame in that.

~Kyrie