12 Depressions Busters

Be Accountable to Someone

In the professional world, what is the strongest motivator for peak performance? The annual review (or notification of the pink slip). Twelve-step groups use this method--called accountability--to keep people sober and on the recovery wagon. Everyone has a sponsor, a mentor to teach them the program, to guide them toward physical, mental, and spiritual health.

Today several people together serve as my emotional "sponsor," keeping me accountable for my actions: Mike (my writing mentor), my therapist, my doctor, Fr. Dave, Deacon Moore, Eric, and my mom. Having these folks around to divulge my misdeeds to is like confession--it keeps the list of sins from getting too long.

Distract Yourself

Any addict would benefit from a long list of "distractions," activities than can take her mind off of a cig, a glass of Merlot, or a suicidal plot (during a severe depression). Some good ones: crossword puzzles, novels, Sudoku, e-mails, reading Beyond Blue (a must!); walking the dog (pets are wonderful "buddies" and can improve mental health), card games, movies, "American Idol" (as long as you don't make fun of the contestants...bad for your depression, as it attracts bad karma); sports, de-cluttering the house (cleaning out a drawer, a file, or the garage...or just stuffing it with more stuff); crafts; gardening (even pulling weeds, which you can visualize as the marketing director that you hate working with); exercise; nature (just sitting by the water); and music (even Yanni works, but I'd go classical).

Start a Project

Here's a valuable tip I learned in the psych ward--the fastest way to get out of your head is to put it in a new project--compiling a family album, knitting a blanket, coaching Little League, heading a civic association, planning an Earth Day festival, auditioning for the local theatre, taking a course at the community college.

I went to Michael's (the arts and crafts store) and bought 20 different kinds of candles to place around the house, five picture boxes for all the loose photos I have bagged underneath the piano, and two dozen frames. Two years later, all of it is still there, bagged and stored in the garage.

However, I also signed up for a tennis class, because I'm thinking ahead and when the kids go off to college, Eric and I will need another pastime in addition to reading about our kids on Facebook.

Keep a Record

One definition of suffering is doing the same thing over and over again, each time expecting different results. It's so easy to see this pattern in others: "Katherine, for God's sake, Barbie doesn't fit down in the drain (it's not a water slide)"; or the alcoholic who swears she will be able to control her drinking once she finds the right job. But I can be so blind to my own attempts at disguising self-destructive behavior in a web of lies and rationalizations.

That's why, when I'm in enough pain, I write everything down--so I can read for myself exactly how I felt after I had lunch with the person who likes to beat me up as a hobby, or after eight weeks of a Marlboro binge, or after two weeks on a Hershey-Starbucks diet. Maybe it's the journalist in me, but the case for breaking a certain addiction, or stopping a behavior contributing to depression, is much stronger once you can read the evidence provided from the past.