So it is Saturday morning, and I feel like shit. Part of feeling like shit is that you don't feel like addressing anything that is bothering you, or have convinced yourself you can't. Humans actually love to solve problems, to change their affairs to suit their tastes more closely, to accomplish and achieve - things you cannot do if a lack of accomplishment or achievement didn't exist initially. No, feeling like shit comes when you aren't happy with things but just sit around feeling sorry for yourself.
Sometimes it can't be helped. Sometimes the problems you identify as being the source for your unhappiness are truly things over which you have no control, and you can't just jettison them from your mind - they affect you too much to be ignored. Sometimes sorrows are sensible and legitimate.
Sometimes, however, these are the lamentations of brains more used to thinking about why their owners suck than anything else, and these lazy, habitual thought patterns are easy to do vs. figuring out sources of discontent, evaluating possible plans and procedures, or adjusting your perspective significantly enough to realize that a particular concern is not really so big of a deal. Sometimes this is just the autopilot that switches on, out of habit, when your body is tired or worn, or when you are going through the natural fluctuations between heightened and depressed affects, which all people do. This is just our favorite station.
And the more you think about how shitty you are, and how hopeless your situation is, the more you will believe it. Why not? I mean, after all, you're the big sack o' shit just sitting around whining. This is all so first world, right? You're an asshole for being sad to begin with, what's your problem you mewling meat sack? And you know you COULD be doing this, or that, but instead you sit here feeling sorry for yourself. That one's pretty fair, actually - if you WANTED to do what you believed would solve your woes, you'd be doing that, instead of feeling sorry for yourself (and probably doing something mindless and immediately gratifying all the while). You may not realize this, but that is one of the most insidious things about depression - it loves itself and wants to stay well past the end of the party. It is you, it is how your brain has become wired, and it is going to town on thinking shitty thoughts and making you feel terrible. You're doing that because it is easy, because it is automatic. It is hard, and thus less desirable, to do the things that would save us. We don't even believe we can, so of course it feels hard. Who wants to spend time doing things we think are worthless, that will have no end? Humans, by and large, are lazy and pragmatic (except when it comes to other people, but that is a whole other issue) and most will not engage in discomfort if they don't predict requisite compensation for their troubles. Simply put, the human being will always ask, what's in it for me?
I have been guilty of the above behavior patterns so many times I can't even begin to imagine it, this very morning has been full of this kind of business. I think many people live in this mental space for great stretches of time. It is clearly something that is common in human psychology, especially in a "first world" which has increasing demands on the mind over the body, and time is less naturally regulated by biological necessity. Still, one thing I can say for myself is this: no matter how far down in the spiral of paralyzing self deception I ever dropped, there was a restlessness inside of me to climb out, to find something better, to solve the problem. The human spark, the bratty baby deep in my heart, she can't be kept down. I may have the damnedest time loving her like she deserves, but she's a fighter. She inspires me, makes me tough, gives me strength. Can't keep a good girl down.
A little forgiveness goes a long way, and gentle reminders to yourself that you don't have to be perfect to be good, and you do deserve better than to recycle the same litany of self hate over and over, creating a dark, hopeless reality in which to live. Most of what we perceive to be real is just a big human hallucination, crude sensory data filtered through our pre-existing fictions about what is significant. But it IS your hallucination, your dream. Be mindful of your thoughts, lest you teach yourself to be helpless in a world that will only reward those willing to advocate for their own worth, and are willing to mentally cast themselves as effective.
