To depress something is to push down on it.
If you keep it there, the object can be said to exist in a state of depression.
After his involvement in the war with the Olympian gods, Atlas - one of the Titans - was
given the punishment of holding up the sky for eternity.
Only a fool would mistake Atlas’ immobility, stagnation, and depressed state for weakness.
Could they not see that he bore the weight of the whole world on his shoulders?
When I see Atlas, the enduring, I see the embodiment of strength.
Doomed to bear that weight for eternity, he refused to let it crush him.
I wouldn’t blame him if he did.
Eternity is, after all, a long time.
I wonder, if Heracles really did construct pillars to free Atlas, how great it must have
felt to be liberated from that weight.
Did the world rejoice when they had freed up such a strong titan from his immense load?
Anyone who could bear such a weight was surely capable of accomplishing much more now that
he was free.
To live life is to bear a weight.
Some weights are taken up voluntarily and others are imposed on us.
Some we can bear, while others begin to crush us and, like Atlas, we can become depressed
under these weights.
The cause of the weights we all bear is complex and is unlikely to come down to one factor.
Our weights are built up by both biological and environmental factors.
Your physiology, your psychology, and your society all intertwine to form the unique
load that you carry.
To view depression through a lens of strength or weakness is meaningless.
So many variables contribute to the weight any individual carries and it’s mostly invisible
to us.
All that we can see, if an individual allows us, is that the weight has become too heavy
for them.
The question isn’t ,”why can’t you lift that load” but “how can I help you lift
it”.
Even as Atlas bore the weight of the whole world with his godly strength, he still needed
the help of Heracles to be liberated.
And, I wonder, how much better the world was for it.
According to the World Health Organization, depression is the leading cause of disability
worldwide [2].
Imagine how much human potential we could liberate by taking this collective weight
off of the world and helping people bear their loads.
We’ve come a long way in the fight against depression.
We’ve gone from a theory of humoural imbalance to one of chemical imbalances which manifested
itself in various medicines that have helped lots of people [1].
Neuroscience is gaining a deeper understanding of our brain and even moving past this simplistic
model [4].
Future medicinal treatments may prevent the impact of early childhood stress on the brain,
or we may treat the cause of anhedonia — which is an inability to feel pleasure — that
depressed individuals often suffer from [3, 4].
We’ve gone from a mechanistic or mechanical view of people to a more humane one [1].
Individuals have a unique psychology, and that psychology can be fortified and altered
to help them bear the weight of existence.
This has manifested itself in different therapies like Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) which
has proven to be very effective at treating depression [2, 5].
As we understand the physiological and psychological processes better, we can structure our society
better to help lessen the load we impose on others.
We can free people of this immense weight that blocks their full potential, and we will
all be better off for it.
If you feel the weight of your existence bearing down on you, please seek help.
Depression is not something that you can just get over.
It often requires a detailed look at an individual’s physiology, psychology, and environment, and
the solution might require addressing all three.
There are teams of experts trained to help lift these loads.
It matters that you do it for yourself.
You have a unique potential to manifest, and this is just one battle of many that you will
go on to win.
But, it also matters to the world.
Each individual victory is a collective victory, and we will all be better off for it.
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As always, thanks for watching and I’ll see you next time!