Surviving in a World of Depression

Living in a World of Depression

Nowadays, we always talk about gun violence and mental disorder. The truth of the matter is that we are living in a world of depression. Indeed, there are millions and millions who are suffering from this mental disease all around the world. This disorder is as old as age.  

In ancient times, according to the Bible, King David of Israel was often mentally troubled, and he forever battled against his deep despair. In many of the Psalms, he expresses his anguish, loneliness, fear of the enemy; his heart often cries over sin, and the guilt because of it. Another Biblical example is Elijah, the great prophet, who was often discouraged, weary, and afraid. Even after his great spiritual victories over the prophets of Baal, this mighty man of God feared and ran for his life into the desert, where he prayed. “I have had enough, Lord,” he said. “Take my life; I am no better than my ancestors.” (1 Kings 19: 4)

In modern age, Sir Winston Churchill, the Prime Minister of Great Britain, underwent serious bouts of depression during his country’s national crisis in World War II. The fact of the matter is that depression is no respecter of persons—even for those with high I.Q., such as the Nobel-Prize-winning author Ernest Hemingway, who committed suicide, just as his father did, with the comment “I’ll probably go the same way.”

Indeed, many of us are vulnerable to this genetic mental disorder of unhappiness. To many, the word “depression” may be synonymous with the word “unhappiness”; but the reality is that happiness is not the absence of depression. So, even if you are not depressed at all, you may still be unhappy.

The bottom line: how do we overcome this mental disorder? Medications apparently don’t work. We need profound human wisdom to understand how and why we have become unhappy in the first place, and then use the human mind to create a happiness recipe for each individual to survive in this world of depression..

Stephen Lau

Copyright© 2018 by Stephen Lau