For more than twenty years my brother-in-law, Matt, has been shaping my musical preferences. Mostly he supplies me with new stuff, a song or two at a time. Recently he introduced a new batch of songs, one of which is "Back in The World" by David Gray. It sums up how I'm feeling, fairly well. Part of it goes like this:
Like the lift of a curse
Got a whole different person
Inside my head
No more trudging around
Stony eyed through the town
Like the living dead no
It's love that lifts us from the dark
Is it God by another name
Who's to say how it goes
All I know is
I'm back in the world again
Yup. Like that.
And so here's the question of the day: How'd I get out? I mean, how does one go from Death Spiral to Back in the World in the matter of a few short weeks? Short answer: I don't know. I mean, I used my tools: I got a priesthood blessing, I let my alternative healer friend practice some qigong on me (my energies were clearly whacked), and I followed the directions given by my physical therapy friend so my knee could heal and I could get moving again. I stuck with the things I knew would keep me from crumpling in on myself: I went to church, I hung out with friends (even though social interaction is really hard after I've been run over by the depression train), I studied scripture and prayed, and I worked to be as active as one can be with a gimp knee. But I've done all those things before! Lots! And while they have, in the past, brought me back up to "zero", it's rare that I get to feel, well, happy. But I feel happy. I feel excited about the future, I begin to have ideas about things I want to accomplish, things I want to study and do. I'm back in the world. For reals.
It doesn't normally happen like this.
And so that's why I think I might actually win. People talk about "beating" cancer, which really means permanent remission. This rapid turn around leads me to believe, to hope, that I can "beat" depression. Permanent remission.
Until then, guess I'd better keep my tools sharp.
Got a whole different person
Inside my head
No more trudging around
Stony eyed through the town
Like the living dead no
It's love that lifts us from the dark
Is it God by another name
Who's to say how it goes
All I know is
I'm back in the world again
Yup. Like that.
And so here's the question of the day: How'd I get out? I mean, how does one go from Death Spiral to Back in the World in the matter of a few short weeks? Short answer: I don't know. I mean, I used my tools: I got a priesthood blessing, I let my alternative healer friend practice some qigong on me (my energies were clearly whacked), and I followed the directions given by my physical therapy friend so my knee could heal and I could get moving again. I stuck with the things I knew would keep me from crumpling in on myself: I went to church, I hung out with friends (even though social interaction is really hard after I've been run over by the depression train), I studied scripture and prayed, and I worked to be as active as one can be with a gimp knee. But I've done all those things before! Lots! And while they have, in the past, brought me back up to "zero", it's rare that I get to feel, well, happy. But I feel happy. I feel excited about the future, I begin to have ideas about things I want to accomplish, things I want to study and do. I'm back in the world. For reals.
It doesn't normally happen like this.
And so that's why I think I might actually win. People talk about "beating" cancer, which really means permanent remission. This rapid turn around leads me to believe, to hope, that I can "beat" depression. Permanent remission.
Until then, guess I'd better keep my tools sharp.
