Self-Management of Depression

Imagine you are invited to a friend’s house, and upon entering, you see a group of people laughing out loud. You can react to this situation in a couple of ways. You might think something is wrong with your appearance, making you feel that people are laughing at you. Alternatively, you might interpret their laughter as a sign that they are having a good time and you feel ready to join in the fun. This situation can evoke two responses: one makes you feel embarrassed, while the other makes you happy. So, what causes people to experience various emotions in the same situation? It’s all about how you interpret the scenario. Your beliefs influence your interpretation, which is the “B” in the “ABC” framework we will explore next. Albert Ellis (1962), the founder of Rational Emotive Behavior Therapy (REBT), introduced the “ABC” framework as a cognitive model for depression. “A” represents an activating event to which an individual responds. This can include current or past events, thoughts, ...

What is loneliness? Loneliness is a fundamental aspect of life; at some point, everyone will experience it to varying degrees. Even though it is recognized as a public health concern (Office of the Surgeon General, 2023), there is still a need for more discussion about what the experience of loneliness entails and how to recognize it in oneself or others. For starters, loneliness is the distressing feeling you experience when there is a discrepancy between the interpersonal relationships you wish to have and those you currently have (Peplau & Perlman, 1982). It is not the number or frequency of social contacts but your subjective appraisal of the quality of relationships and the satisfaction with the relationships that influences loneliness (Heinrich & Gullone, 2006). Moreover, loneliness is not synonymous with social isolation, nor is it an inevitable consequence of being alone. You can be in the company of others and still experience loneliness, whereas you may not feel...

Though sounding simple, learning to accept and change are powerful strategies that keep relationships intact. “Accepting” your partner means that you are tolerating your partner’s unpleasant or offensive behavior while at the same time trying to understand the deeper meaning of that behavior and putting it in the larger context of your relationship with your partner (Christensen et al., 2014). For example, an individual may become more accepting of their partner’s introverted nature or tendency to criticize. Do not confuse acceptance with submission. Submission is enduring offensive behavior from a position of weakness as one has no alternative. In contrast, acceptance is tolerating offensive behavior from a position of strength as you choose to do so while seeing the offensive behavior in the larger context of your relationship with your partner. Acceptance also doesn’t mean one cannot assertively differ from one's partner, resist one's aversive behavior, or try to limit it....

In layman’s terms, hope is the expectation that your future can somehow be better, no matter the present circumstances. In contrast, psychologists define hope in a more structured way so that they can measure this attribute. According to them, hope is the pursuit of your goals with the knowledge that you have the capacity and the motivation to achieve them (Snyder et al., 2006). In other words, hope has two key elements: 1. A sense of successful determination in meeting past, present, and future goals. 2. A sense of being able to generate successful plans to meet the goals. The first element is called the agency , and the second element is called the pathway , which, in layman’s terms, translates into the will and the way, respectively. These two components of hope are reciprocal and work synergistically but are not synonymous (Snyder et al., 1991). People with the will to achieve their goals may not have the ways to do it and vice versa. Both the will and the way are necessary...

It is difficult not to judge yourself or others or overanalyze a situation when going through challenging times. Strong emotions emerging from the cognitive processes of judging or analyzing prevent you from using your rational mind to arrive at solutions to solve a problem or use mindful acceptance if the problem is unsolvable. In these circumstances, observing ego, a skill used in many mindfulness practices, helps you increase your self-awareness and allows you to perceive an adverse event non-judgmentally.  The word “ego” in observing ego refers to your healthy, rational, logical, and compassionate self. An important function of the ego is the capacity for self-observation. This is your ability to monitor or reflect upon your feelings, impulses, and thoughts rather than impulsively acting on them (Glickauf-Hughes et al., 1996). While your thoughts, images, feelings, sensations, and physical body change, your observing ego, also called the observing self, remains the same (Harris...

Procrastination is putting off things for another day or doing things that are not productive as an excuse for not doing what is essential. While some procrastinate in certain situations, it becomes a habit for others. They leave dishes in the sink, don’t respond to e-mails, don’t pay bills, put off completing paperwork, finish assignments just before the deadline, or ask for extensions. In the latter group, procrastination becomes a form of avoidance. Psychologists consider avoidance as a maladaptive coping style that relieves one from the mental and/or physical effort of doing a task, reinforcing this behavior. Procrastination can be driven by irrational thought patterns, and sometimes, these are associated with depression and anxiety. The common irrational thoughts that foster procrastination include: “Nothing works.” “This is boring.” “I don’t know where to start.” “I can’t do this.” “This is too hard.” "I am not cut out for this." “I don’t have the time to do this.” “I d...

With resilience being promoted as a must-have skill set, individuals are bombarded by various pop psychology iterations of what is needed to bounce back from daily setbacks, acute adversities, or chronic stressors. However, there is no proven pathway to resilience, and we don't know why some individuals are more resilient than others. The best one can gather from research is the predictors of resilience. The salient predictors of resilience include the following: 1. Demographic predictors: Contrary to the popular notion that older adults are at greater risk following a potentially traumatic event, research suggests that older adults suffer relatively lower psychological costs than younger adults. In addition, the male gender is a consistent predictor of resilience in numerous studies, with the possible explanation being that women tend to experience more significant initial threats during a traumatic event subjectively (Bonanno & Diminich, 2013). 2. Personality predi...

Clarifying one’s values and having value-based actions is one of the core tenets of Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT), an evidence-based treatment for depression. Values are our heart’s deepest desires for the way we want to interact with the world, other people, and ourselves. They are what we want to stand for in life, how we want to behave, what sort of person we want to be, and what sort of strengths and qualities we want to develop (Harris, 2009). Values are subjective; what one may consider as a value (e.g., being famous) may be considered as being cocky by another person. Compared to thoughts and behaviors, values provide a far more stable compass to motivate you to achieve your goals, even when faced with personal adversity (Hayes et al., 2012). An exercise that may help you clarify your values and find meaning in life is to imagine that you are eighty years old, and you are looking back on your life. Then finish the following sentences (Harris, 2008): I spent too much ti...

A lot has been written recently about impostor syndrome, also called impostor phenomenon in scientific literature. Most pop psychology descriptions of this condition, which impairs professional performance and leads to burnout, skew towards making this a syndrome of perceived fraudulence or fear of being seen as fake. However, the fact is that people with impostor syndrome describe a myriad of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors and none of the existing scales capture all the facets of this complex and multifaceted syndrome (Mark et al., 2019). Also, contrary to popular belief, impostor syndrome is not limited to highly successful individuals and depends more on how people respond to specific achievement tasks when there is an element of being appraised.  The six facets that define this phenomenon are discussed below: (Bravata et al., 2019; Clance & Imes, 1978; Walker & Saklofske, 2023). 1. Fake: This attribute is the closest to the original conceptualization of imposto...

Rumination is a maladaptive style of responding to stressful situations in which a person repetitively and passively focuses on the symptoms of distress and the possible causes and consequences of these symptoms. Ruminators mistakenly believe that by focusing on their past feelings, they can somehow have a better understanding of their emotions and this will help them solve their problems. The opposite is true: rumination makes people more fixated on their problems and feelings without leading to any active problem-solving to change the circumstances around these symptoms. Research shows that women are more likely to engage in rumination compared to men, which also makes them more prone for depression (Nolen-Hoeksema et al., 2008). Rumination fosters inactivity and can come in the way of getting things done. Many people confuse rumination with worry, but these two entities differ in the following ways (Lyubomirsky et al., 2015): Rumination is focused on the past while worry is fo...