The Three Great Revelations of Depression, Part 1

Siddartha Gautama, the Buddha, had himself four noble truths, to whit:

  • Life sucks
  • It sucks because you can’t always get what you want
  • To end the suckage you simply need to stop wanting stuff
  • Here’s an eight step path to stop wanting, subscribe to my newsletter.

I may be paraphrasing a bit.

Anywho, I was thinking about the first three truths of Buddhism, and it got me to thinking about the three great revelations I’ve had about depression. I told you about the second one last time, but I’ll sum up, and add the other two.

First Great Revelation

The first great revelation of depression is, “Sorry pal, it ain’t going away.”

I’ve been fighting this fight for forty years. Sometimes I’m on top, and I think I’ve got it licked, but it’s like fish tank algae. No matter how hard you scrub, no matter how much time you spend cleaning, no matter how sparkling clean you make that glass, there’re still spores in there, just waiting for the chance to grow.

So it is with depression. No matter how good things are going, no matter how much you’ve beaten down the beast, he’s there. Lurking. Waiting for a moment of weakness to blindside you, and take you down.

And blindside you he will, because that’s the kind of sneaky so of a bitch that he is.

The second revelation tomorrow.