All this talk about depression, good talk, I went again through some lengths to explain my perspective, in which depression is simply a symptom of the inability to have a conscience in ones circumstances. Some problems are just too deep for the individual ego, I guess the nervous system as a whole, to be able to identify with without becoming seriously overcharged with tasks which have no meaning by themselves or in relation to the current situation.
KP teaches that small steps can be taken, and I would never deny it if he said that is what he did or has seen people do to get out of a depression. But in many severe cases I don’t see that option. Depression is a slippery hole, small steps amount only to another humbling stumble. What is required is some ginormous move to victory that actually convinces the ego, the nervous system, of its own strength.
If the nervous system is convinced of its adequacy before the whole of the task, then slipping back into the pit is a less desperate affair than finding oneself in it the first time.
Out of the depression, one will find that the surface of the rest of the world is quite as slippery, one just isn’t trapped in a hole, one can glide and be bumped anywhere (posture is all-important) except up hills - sharp instruments are required to hold on to these. And this points me to the feat of getting out of the hole in the first place.
It requires sharp instruments; Claws.
The great effort expected by the life of a depressed person is to become tooth and claw. Depression is beautifully portrayed in The Sopranos, where the psychiatrist herself describes it as “rage turned inward”. But it is more accurately portrayed in the end as love turned inward. The raging passion of true love, like a father for his daughter, this is enough to bring a man back from depressed - and this brings me to the title of this post, Jihad; the furious righteous war from within - for god. I mean to say that depression can not be resolved for the sake of the individual.
There is a pluriform reason; on the one side we can see the patient as being unable to vouch for himself, so there is no criterion for true merit, all efforts are a priori lost, even if they succeed by the terms that were supposed to measure them. On the other side there is the World, Fellow Man, the reality directly touching ones own. If one can not demonstrably make life better for one environment, one simply has good reason to be depressed.
Depression is a punishment which is given out by a nervous system that fails to be adequate to its environment. The only resolution is for this nervous system to become adequate. In the most primitive way this means to become violent in the name of a voluptuous idea like god or satan and dominate in a moral passion. This works quite well! But a more refined way is to wage war through deeds that provoke formative responses without ‘innocent babies’ coming between the cogwheels. This I believe is the prerogative of the philosopher, who is only in very few instances a writer. I write for philosophers, and those that wish to be, who have no talent or time for writing. People who will understand and implement without saying a word. The only gratitude a drop of water expects is a thirst. This is my Jihad - my clawed path that guides me around the many lurking pools - knowing and securing the Good.
I know, and I know that I know.
What I know is happiness. Or in other words, that which is most worthy of being known by me.