Am I Stressed or Depressed?

As many of you know I am an expert in Stress management and can often be found delivering words of wisdom and inspiration to employees around the country. Many of their stories resonate with me and nothing gives me greater pleasure than when they realise they are in control of all they do and THINK.

There’s seems to be so many people in the world today who are ‘depressed’ and walking around carrying the burden like a crucifix with an invisible sign that if you could see it would read ‘Keep Away From Me I Have Depression.’ I read in an article the other day that a doctor had told his patient that she has a ‘touch of depression.’ – A TOUCH OF DEPRESSION!, What? how the does that work? If you know me at all you’ll know for sure that labels are something I despise, although they can’t be avoided in life, medical condition labels are the worst. You will be familiar with these I am an alcoholic, I have depression, I am Bipolar.

Having trained as NLP practitioner I learned people are not their behaviours so what do these labels tell us about the person? You are not an alcoholic, a depressive or bi-polar that is just a term for your behaviour. We are human beings experiencing life and life will throw us some curve balls, life happens we can't stop that, we have to take responsibility for how we react to whatever life throws at us, this is what makes us grow, it’s what makes us UNIQUE. When we attach labels to ourselves, it keeps us stuck and makes it seem there’s no way out. If you tell yourself something often enough your mind, brain, body and soul start to co-operate to keep you in that state of being. You are what you think ... !

A friend of mine, works with abused women and told me one of the main reasons that abused women stay with their partners is because they don’t believe they have the ability to do anything about their situation. Their partners have gnawed away at their confidence over the years. These women have been disempowered becasue they have heard their partners saying over and over 'who do you think you are?' 'you're not worth respecting' ‘you’re useless’ ‘You’re no good at…’ ‘you can’t do that.’ ‘you’re weak.’ When we label ourselves we are the abuser, the punisher, it is a form of self sabotage and serves no purpose other than to cause us unnecessary suffering.

Depression, sadness and nominalization

The rise of depression in the western world is one of great debate, we have never lived in such affluent times yet 10% of the western world have been labelled as having depression – why? Take a look around you. I know some very rich people and have some wealthy clients yet they come to me unhappy? I guess this shows us that money doesn’t make us happy. The question I would ask us to consider is are we really depressed or feeling a prolonged period of sadness?

“…I realized that in depression, nothing matters. And in sadness, everything matters.” Gloria Steinem

I’ve was treated for depression in the past, some years ago, and was offered Prozac by my doctor. When I realised that I was making my situation worse by telling myself I was depressed day in and day out, and listening to others telling me I was depressed. I began my journey of self discovery and healing. The reality, I was STRESSED not depressed, overwhelmed by life and some of the things that had happened, I had fight and wanted to win. Yet the I was offered a label so readily that if I chose to I could have taken it.

What I was really feeling was sadness. sadness for a life I felt out of control with, sadness for a life I really wanted, sadness for the job that was not making me happy – I was SAD I was feeling despair for the things I didn’t have in my life, and when I realised I was feeling something,  I realised I wasn’t depressed then I started asking questions – What can I do to make me feel happy?

When we label ourselves such as ‘I have depression’ our brain has nowhere to go with that statement, therefore it takes it as fact, there’s no future. This is called nominalization.

Nominalization is when we take a verb or adjective and turn it into a static noun. A state like depression becomes an enormous and sometimes insurmountable, overwhelming state of being, for example, whereas being depressed to most people is more likely to imply a state that has a beginning, and more importantly an end. A block is something much more insurmountable than something that is merely blocking your progress. What sounds more longer lasting: I have depression or I am feeling depressed just now?

We are a feeling beings. When you are feeling something you are alive on the inside, when you don’t feel anything at all about anything, then that’s when you know something is organically or clinically wrong. The labels that are placed upon us, particularly negative labels, hold us back when we begin to identify with them and internalize them as something concrete.

What labels are you identifying with that may be holding you back?