How can meditation help with depression?
Change what you can…
The choices that we can make are always limited, and the effects they have may be small, but they are incremental and supplemental — that is they add up over time to create more profound changes in our outlook and in our ability to make more effective choices in the future. The choices we can make when we are depressed are definitely more limited than otherwise, but such choices do exist.
So learning meditation implies two things: the cultivation of awareness, so that we can make such choices more often and more easily; and learning methods that allow us to alter our mental states. Such methods are often very simple - things like being aware of your breathing low down in your body to calm yourself when you are anxious.
Although meditation is not a cure-all, it obviously has applicability to those who suffer from depression since it is connected with learning to move from undesired states (including depression) to more desired states that are more pleasant and fulfilling and allow more normal functioning.
Every person who learns to meditate is a unique individual. Each person works with a unique pattern of conditioning, which affects his or her ability to be able to be aware and to effect change. There are varying internal and external factors that affect our meditation (from ingrained habitual mental states to the effect of our work and our environment), and these are more or less easy to work with.
We are all working with (and to some degree against) our conditioning. Those who suffer from depression have to contend with chemical imbalances that have a strong effect on mental functions. Sometimes those chemical imbalances are short-lived and due to circumstances, diet, or even lack of sunlight (my own periods of depression have always happened in the winter months).
Other times they may be caused by genetic factors. But to my mind this just makes it more essential that people in this situation use every means available to ameliorate the effects that their body chemistry has on their mental and emotional functioning. You can’t change your genes, but there are things you can change.
Buddhism teaches that all positive change starts with dukkha, which means unsatisfactoriness or even suffering. No matter the source of your depression, your depression is the best reason you have to start meditating.
Pages: 1 2
Write a comment